The Books Over Looks blog series focuses on how to encourage children and young adults, particularly girls, to look to books and reading to increase self-esteem and knowledge rather than appearances and material possessions. At some point as girls grow up, they become very aware of and concerned about their appearance. They start to derive self-esteem by how many likes they get on Instagram or the number of followers on Snapchat...
It's t-shirt Tuesday. The day where I choose one of my husband's many amusing t-shirts as inspiration for my blog. Given my continued struggle with the book-mas tree this week (see blog from this weekend) and the fact that it's still not complete, my choice of t-shirts this week will seem pretty fitting. And since it's Tuesday, let's combine TWO things and make it a Twos-day: T-shirt Tuesday and Tuesday Top Ten.
It's Monday morning. And I'm tired for one of the best reasons! Last night was the monthly meeting of my book club, the Nightlighters. And we definitely lived up to our name, talking pretty late into the evening for a school night. As it is the holiday season, we decided to do a book exchange and we were supposed to bring a book to give as part of this. Sounds easy right? Well, not for me. I was worried...
Have you ever heard of a book-mas tree? Well, it’s essentially a tree made of books that you decorate with lights and other ornaments for the holidays. Sounds great, right? I love books. Therefore, I decided this year our family would make a book-mas tree. Here’s how it went, step-by-step, if you’d like to replicate our experience. Although you may want to read the how-to before trying it yourself…
I recently wrote a blog post on my characters favorite books and the books they secretly love (eg, book guilty pleasure). It was fun so I want to do a variation on the theme. This time it's my characters favorite songs and the songs they secretly love but don't want to admit to anyone. (You know, like you secretly love Dancing Queen but won't admit it.)
In the next installment of my Books Over Looks blog series, which focuses on how to encourage children, particularly girls, to look to books and reading to increase self-esteem and knowledge rather than appearances and materials possessions, guest blogger Elizabeth MacKenzie Biedell (check out her bio at the end) talks about the merits of book clubs for children and provides some perspective based on her experiences trying to start a book club with her daughter.
Is anyone else watching this show on TBS called Search Party? I don't watch a lot of television. (Unless you count 6 hours of Gilmore Girls, but that couldn't be helped. Nothing keeps me from the Lorelai ladies.) Along with periodically catching up on episodes of Atlanta and Nick Cage, Search Party is really the only other show I watch consistently. It's like HBO’s Girls and Veronica Mars had a baby with Sam Spade! (Yes, I realize that sounds crazy. But the show is crazy – crazy good!) And, of course, since my mind went to Sam Spade, it then took the not so far leap, where my mind is concerned, to detective novels.
A few weeks ago my family and I were in the airport, preparing for an overseas trip. In the waiting lounge, I said hello to a young girl, aged around 4 years old, who was waiting with her dad in the seating area. She was very social and immediately engaged with me. Right away, I asked her if she liked reading and what her favorite book was. She absolutely lit up! Her favorite book was Clara the Cookie Fairy and she had the book with her! We sat together for the next 15 minutes or so, reading this delightful and amazing book together. This experience reminded me of the inspiring and creative post below by Lisa Bloom from 2011. It’s an eye-opening approach to engaging a girl about her mind via books instead of what she’s wearing.
K.L. Kranes 