The Imagination Library

While reading an article online, I discovered a wonderful program that was created by Dolly Parton to promote literacy in young children. She calls it the "Imagination Library."

Taken from the website (http://www.dollysimaginationlibrary.com/), here is a little background on the program:

In 1996, Dolly Parton launched an exciting new effort to benefit the children
of her home county in east Tennessee. Dolly wanted to foster a love of
reading among her county’s preschool children and their families. She wanted
children to be excited about books and to feel the magic that books can
create. Moreover, she could insure that every child would have books,
regardless of their family’s income.

So she decided to mail a brand new, age appropriate book each month to every child under 5 in Sevier County. With the arrival of every child’s first book, the classic The Little Engine That Could ™, every child could now experience the joy of finding their very own book in their mail box. These moments continue each month until the child turns 5—and in their very last month in the program they receive Look Out Kindergarten Here I Come.

I think that is such a cool idea! Any community can adopt this program now. (On the website you can see if your area participates). The community raises the money to pay for the books through donations, and they are sent to all the children in the area under the age of 5. It costs about $28/child/year to cover the books and the postage. What a great way to promote reading and a love of books from a young age!

In my class, there are lots of children that don't have any books at home. Head Start sends home a bundle of books to any child whose parent actually admits to this (it's a question on our first home visit interview), but they are old, second-hand books....usually not the greatest. With this program, the kids get beautiful, brand-new books that are chosen by a board of early childhood experts to help build a solid foundation for the children and prepare them for school.

I think it's a fabulous idea! Kudos to you, Dolly!

A Father-Son Weekend Project

If you know Jason and me at all, you know we both love to read. Because of this hobby of ours, we have a lot of books. I mean A LOT of books. Currently, all of our books are still in the boxes from our move. This is for two reasons.

1.) From moving so frequently in the past six years, two of our three
bookcases were barely hanging on after this last move, so we got rid of
them. This leaves us with only one small bookcase.

2.) Jason insisted that he wanted to unpack the books so
he could catalog them into a spreadsheet to keep track of them. Since he
buys such boring nonfiction books, he can't remember which ones he has and
doesn't have, which makes it difficult to buy more books.

Of course, he kept putting this off, and we didn't have anywhere to put them anyway, so we still have all the books in boxes. They take up quite a bit of space, as you can imagine.

Anyway, last weekend when we went to Columbia, Jason and his dad worked really hard to build us some bookcases. They got three of them built and they are beautiful. I got a couple pictures (not very good ones though. I am so horrible about taking pictures!

My father-in-law, Keith, working on the bookcases

Two of them bolt together to look like one

They turned out so nicely, much better than the ones we found at the store! (Not to mention WAY cheaper!) Now, Jason and I will stain them to match our other living room furniture and then we can FINALLY unpack our books!

A Graduation

Hickman High School Class of 2009

My youngest sister, Shannon, graduated from high school on Saturday, so Jason and I went to Columbia for the weekend. (I believe she's the blonde without her cap on in the picture above. Notice the beach ball....the teachers literally took about 30 of those from the graduates during the course of the ceremony!)

It's hard to believe that Shan is out of high school now and starting college this summer. Seems like only yesterday she looked like this:

However, she's grown up a lot since then! She's a very talented photographer, and she's studying digital media in school. (I'm honestly not really sure what that means...other than it has to do with computers??? But I'm sure she's good at it.) I have a feeling she'll do something pretty neat with her life.

Congrats sis! You made it!

Email Subscription Now Available!

I have finally figured out how to set this thing up to notify you by email when there is a new post (I think!). All you have to do is type your email address into the box on the upper right-hand corner of the screen under "Subscribe via email." As long as I did everything correctly, new posts should be automatically delivered to your email account after you submit your email address.

Let's hope this works....I know it will be easier for you than checking this website all the time!

Six Years and Counting

Today Jason and I are celebrating our sixth wedding anniversary! I can't believe that six years have gone by since we got married. In some ways it seems a lot shorter than that, in others it seems like we've been married forever!

In honor of our anniversary, here is one of my very favorite poems:

How Do I Love Thee? (Sonnet 43)
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day's
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

I love you x3 Jason!

Keeping busy...for now.

Ok, so now school is out for the summer. I'll try to do a little better about posting more often. I really have no excuse not to write now, since I have very few things on my calendar for the next few months!

I've been keeping busy this week doing things that I didn't have time to do before:
-Cleaning out the cars really well
-Going to the dentist
-Applying for jobs (well, I did that before, but now I can do it anytime!)
-Took the recycling to the recycling center
-Cleaning out closets, drawers, cabinets, etc
-Cleaning up goo that exploded from my shower drain and toilet (yeah, how's that for excitement!)
And lots of other equally exciting things!

Let me just say that I am very upset about the recycling situation here in Mount Vernon. First, there is no curbside pick up, which I think is ridiculous. I would pay for that if it was even available. But it's not, so I have been saving all the recycling to take to the center. This has become a problem though, because the center is closed, and has been closed since January. Now their phones are even disconnected, so I'm beginning to doubt their reopening. I drove half an hour to Centralia to take the stuff to recycle. There are some places here in town that take a few things, like cardboard and plastic, but what about everything else? A lot of people here know nothing about recycling...it's weird. I just don't understand why there isn't more available. I feel guilty just throwing the stuff away.

I would like to do something about it, but I don't even know what to do. Obviously there wasn't enough support to keep the not-for-profit center open. Maybe I could write a letter to the editor or something. It would help if I actually knew some people in town!

Anyway, that's my rant for this week. I should probably try to do something more productive with my day now.

End of the Year Madness

This school year is winding down quickly. Next week is our last week of school already. I've learned a lot this first year. I have tons of plans for next year; ideas for improvement. If I end up staying in the same position I'll be able to start the year with a plan and some experience behind me. I'll even know about half of my students already, since my little ones will still be in my class. Right now I'm going down my checklist, trying to finish everything that has to get done before summer. It's a long list, but I'm making steady progress and I think I'll get it all done just in time!

On Thursday my kiddos will have a little graduation ceremony. Everyone gets a certificate of completion, and we are making some special awards for each child too. They're going to sing some of the songs we've been working on in class, which is always cute. One song we're going to sing is called "Rock and Roll Body Parts," which involves a lot of dancing, and playing an air guitar of course! It should be a nice little program. It scares me a little to send off some of the kids...a few of them aren't ready for kindergarten. I know I did my best, but I still worry about them.

After the program, all I have to do is turn in my files and final paperwork on Friday. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with myself all summer, but I think I'll manage to occupy my time somehow!