Christy from sensationaldivasreview.com enjoyed our book, The Travel Adventures of Lilly P. Badilly: Costa RIca.

Here’s what Christy had to say: “…during the time this book has sat on my shelf, my two year has requested to see it numerous times – he loves it. The illustrations (also by Debbie Glade) are bright, very colorful, and fun…”

Christy’s (along with 6 other diva’s) website is so colorful and homey, you’ll want to linger for a while. This is THE place to go for book reviews for both yourself and your kids. The site is well organized and easy to figure out how to navigate. We at Smart Poodle Publishing appreciate that more than you could know. (We are on line a lot and do not enjoy confusing websites!)

I recommend that you sign up for the RSS Feed so you don’t miss anything. Thank you Christy and son for reading and enjoying our book!

The entire Badilly family performed at the JFK Library in Hialeah, FL today for the 2008 Hialeah Literacy Fair. People in cars on W 49th Street could see this family of millipedes as they drove by. We performed songs from the book and played the US geography game, sold some books and met a lot of interesting people. Check out the photos:

We love getting feedback here at Smart Poodle Publishing. Today I received a letter from Courtney, who was one of our Smart Poodle Publishing Youngest Travel Contest writers. She sent me a thank you note for The Travel Adventures of Lilly P Badilly: Costa Rica, and drew some beautiful pictures. The smile on my face when I opened this letter was so HUGE, that my cheeks started hurting. Courtney, you really made my day! THANK YOU for taking the time to write this and draw the pictures! I will be posting your letter on the wall in my office, so I can look at it every day. To read Courtney’s excellent story as well as all the other winning stories, click here.

The most impressive part of Courtney’s letter was that she recycled the envelope I sent her with her certificate by cutting it and turning it around. That is the ultimate in conservation. What if each of us recycled an envelope every day? How many trees would we save?

Tomorrow the entire Badilly family will be performing in millipede costumes at the Hialeah Literacy Fair. Stay tuned for photos and info about the event.

Since my work revolves around books, reading, writing and learning, I am privy to a lot of discussion about self-motivation and a child’s work ethic in school. It makes me wonder about how a parent can encourage a child to have an excellent work ethic. I have 2 theories abut this:

1. Parents who set a positive example will likely produce the same in their kids – Kids emulate what they see their role models (parents) do (not say) at home. Are you reliable? Do you follow through with everything you promise? Do you generally work hard and offer the most you have to give? Do you often go above and beyond the call of duty when offering your services at work, home or in volunteering? If you said yes to most or all of these questions, then your children are learning by your example. If, on the other hand, you mean well and are enthusiastic but don’t often follow through with your commitments, then your children see that as well. They will be equally as likely as you to follow through or not. So if you are setting a good work ethic example, you will have a better chance of producing offspring who will do the same.

2. Parents who do their children’s work produce offspring with a compromised work ethic – Parents who do EVERYTHING for their kids, can rightfully be said to have a good work ethic. However, their kids will not. Children need self-motivation and confidence in order to have a good work ethic. They will not achieve that as long as someone else is doing everything for them. Why do anything when you know it will be done for you? Take for example the parent who rifles through his or her child’s backpack every day after school, takes out the homework, and then forces the kid to sit down and get busy. This parent leans over the child’s shoulder correcting his worksheet and instructing him what to do next, controlling his every move. This type of parent means well. But what he or she is actually producing is a helpless offspring with low self esteem. Why on earth would a child like this have any motivation to work hard on his own? He knows that his Mom or Dad is going to criticize the work and change it anyway. He might as well just wait for instructions.

So the bottom line is that you need to demonstrate your own work ethic to your children. It is not something you can talk them through and demand from them. Plus you have to respect their independence and let them make their own mistakes. Reward them when they demonstrate discipline and excellence in their work at school and with other commitments. Refrain from doing things for them that they should be doing themselves.

We can only do our best and hope for the best in our kids.

Entries for our librarian writing contest are coming in, and we cold not be happier about it! I’ve had a chance to peak at several stories, and I have to tell you that I am impressed. By the time the contest is over, I think America will finally be educated about how libraries work, what librarians do, the sense of humor librarians have and how much they do for their communities.

If you are a librarian, or know a librarian, please enter our contest. You’ve got nothing to lose, and America has everything to gain by reading your insightful stories. Click here for contest rules.

I visited the Village School in Naples, FL today to do 2 presentations – One for the elementary students and the one to the middle school students. We had a great time!

The Village School is such a beautiful place. It is part of the North Naples United Methodist Church. The preschool has been there since 1985, and for the past 9 years, the school has offered classes through 8th grade as well. The principal, Ginger Sauter, was such a pleasure to meet. Mrs. Sauter shared with me part of her vision for her students, and it was refreshing, progressive and impressive. The children are taught with a combination of different teaching styles (in a Christian environment) and are encouraged to think independently and develop their creativity, while learning responsibility and leadership. The atmosphere was extremely positive there, and the teachers were clearly very happy to be there as well as the children. I have to say this was one of the best behaved groups of kids I have ever met. I think I’d like to start my education over and attend the Village School! Please go the school’s website to learn more.

For the Elementary Program we learned about the characters in the book, the plants and animals of Costa Rica, the importance of reading, how to problem solve peacefully, and we played a US geography game. The teachers got called up to the stage to play too, and the students showed roaring enthusiasm for their teachers! The kids were very eager to ask questions, participate and dance.

I spoke to the middle school students candidly about the creative writing and self publishing process – from the first idea to the final book and beyond. I shared with them the importance of reading and what steps they can take to improve their writing. More importantly I told them about my regrets – how I wish I had worked harder in school when I was their age and how they could take action now to make a significant difference in the world. They were so attentive, polite and very curious. I got to answer some interesting questions and also learn about some of their thoughts as well. I was impressed by their interest in writing and publishing, as they asked me very detailed, well thought out questions. The difference in maturity from elementary school to middle school is significant, and it was interesting for me to switch gears in such extremes in one day.

I say thank you to all the students, teachers and principal of The Village School. It was as much a learning experience for me as it was for them. Enjoy these photos!

Have you ever noticed that the words that and who are often misused? Do you misuse them yourself?

Who is used when referring to a person. That is used when referring to a thing or a group of things.

Correct Examples:

Debbie is the one who wrote the book about a traveling millipede.

The CD that comes with the book is hilarious.

Those are the insects that escaped from the tree.

Incorrect Examples:

Debbie’s daughter, Rachel, that wrote the music, also plays the piano.

The tree who housed the insects was an oak.

It was the group who worked together to trick the nasty spider.

Starting today, you can be sure to use these words correctly, and help your child learn the difference between proper and improper usage as well.

My daughter spotted this window full of orchids while taking the smart poodle for a walk. The flowers are inside a church near our house. There was quite a bit of tinting on the windows and a glare of sun behind us, but I took some photos anyway. It is pretty interesting how the reflection of the trees behind us show in the glass, and you can see our reflection too. (top of our heads anyway.)

Happy weekend everyone!

As I have mentioned before, all the events of my days, big or small, play out like chapters in the long novel of my life. Today was no exception. I had to run to the grocery store for a few items, and I came across all sorts of characters ideal for a story. And let me mention to you now that I like to give interesting strangers made-up names that identify their most obvious traits.

For starters, upon entering the store, some piped-in music annoyed me to the core. I usually don’t pay attention to the music in the grocery store, but this was unavoidable. There were 6 words to this song, and they were sung over and over again. “And so I danced with Cinderella, and so I danced with Cinderella.” This phrase was repeated no less than 56 times. Unfortunately for my daughter, I started to sing it when I got home, and now she cannot get this horrendous phrase out of her head.

When I could finally stop starring at the speakers in the ceiling, I came across a woman at the deli counter who was rifling through the baskets on the counter of thrown-out numbers on people used for getting service. I finally figured out that she was trying to find an earlier number so that she would not have to wait in line for her number to be called. I guess Ms. Number Thief did not realize that any recent number she would find in the basket would have already been served and would not again be called for another 100 numbers or so. I can’t say I blame Ms.Number Thief for trying, since the service at the deli counter is atrocious. The people who work there are always running around and carving meats, but they are rarely helping the customers at the counter.

This event made me recall Mrs.Pork Rind Squeezer, I has encountered a year or so ago. This lady parked her shopping cart on the diagonal so no one could get by. (I really resent those selfish shoppers!) Anyway, she walked up to pork rind bags that were hanging on a turning rack. She looked to the right. She looked to the left. (She forgot to look behind here where i was standing.) Then she sniffed a bag of rinds, literally wiping her nose on it and then suddenly squished the entire bag, crushing the rinds into powder. I startled her by demanding, “Excuse me, but what in the hell are you doing?” She quickly put those crushed rinds back on the rack and ran away. If I live to be 300, and spent all those years in front of the turning pork rind rack, I can be guaranteed to never see anyone else doing that again.

Gettig back to today….Right in front of the steaks and burgers was a young lad, about 7 or 8 years old, karate chopping the air and subsequently the shopping cart. He let out quite a yelp. When his frustrated Mom shouted at The Karate Kid to stop, he karate chopped her purse off her shoulder, and it landed on top of a few boxes of Entenmann’s Doughnuts. No great loss there as I find those particular pastries to have no taste whatsoever.

At the checkout counter was a nervous-looking man who was purchasing 10 gallons of pre-made iced tea, 10 – 2 liter bottles of Mountain Dew and 4 large cans of caffeinated Folgers coffee. I think he was perhaps trying to stay awake for about a week to 10 days. I feel sorry for Mr. Caffeine Addict’s wife – if he has one.

The cashier who checked me out closd the cash drawer using her 8-month pregnant tummy 3 times. Mrs. Belly Buster seemed to be quite entertained by that. I wonder what the fetus thought of that jerking motion? I envisioned a set of identical twins being born, but only one with a flat head in the shape of a cash drawer. I guess they would not be identical any more then.

On my way out, an old man with a shopping cart walked right in front of a car and did not even flinch when the driver slammed on his breaks to avoid him. The driver yelled some (very creative, I must say) obscenities out the window at the guy, but it was as if Shopping Cart Man could not hear or see Mr. Irate Driver. How I wish I could go through my life that way – not noticing anything I would find annoying if I were to notice.

And with that I am back to those haunting words, “And so I danced with Cinderella, And so I danced with Cinderella, And so I danced . . .”

Try something new. Here are 5 ways to challenge yourself:

1. Go to the library and stand in front of a shelf. Close your eyes and pick a book with your finger. No matter what that book is, (unless you have already read it) take it home and read it. I did that once in the fiction section and found a wonderful writer. (J California Cooper) You kids can do this in the kid section of the library as well.

2. Read a young adult novel. So many of these are fantastic!

3. Read a how-to book about a subject you know absolutely nothing about. You might find it surprisingly interesting.

4. Chose a Shakespeare play to read and look at all the reference notes to see if you can truly learn the meaning of those eloquent words.

5. Read an informational or how-to book that is way outdated about any subject and laugh at or respect the opinions of way back when. You might be able to find one of these at an older relative’s house, yard sale, a used bookstore or antique shop.