Well I did it. Jumped right in! And dang it’s a little rough, but it’ll do the job. Just thought with how busy teachers are, doing a video tutorial talking about how they can use Big Red Lollipop in their classrooms to teach point of view would be very helpful. So here it is. I’m […]

Phew! What a year it’s been. I’m exhausted! Doesn’t help that I started a new diet this week. I’ve been struggling along on limited rations, and it’s affected my speech patterns I swear! But then anything can affect your speech patterns. Lack of sleep, distractions like noisy special needs kids, all kinds of things can […]

What with the wonders of modern travel, I’m writing this on the plane back from Istanbul. Still trying to digest what happened in Kapadokya. The last evening we were in Kapadokya, which is a wonderful little area where the people have carved their houses in granite chimneys formed 25 million years ago by volcanic action. […]

Hubby said I should fix my first post from here to indicate that yes, indeed, I’ve been talking about Turkey, but I can’t be bothered, so I’ll just mention it now. I’m writing this from Turkey. It certainly isn’t what I expected! Our guide is a petite lady with pretty good English, very secular, and […]

Omigosh! Today I was invited to do some entertaining at the Islamic Society of North America (Canada) conference. So I dragged myself down to Mississauga. Before my gig in the children’s program I took a breath and went through the bazaar and the weirdest thing! I met Farkhanda! I’d been thinking of her for ages! […]

to pray that the Leafs lose. Hubby summed it up well. He said, “They’re grown men with bent sticks chasing after a piece of black rubber!” LOL. Omigosh. Why oh why do we search for these vicarious victories? Is it because real victories of a personal nature are so hard to come by? So that we […]

A few days ago I was at a school talking to the librarian about some of the nominees for a local reader’s choice award and when I mentioned a particular author she said, “Oh he’s so arrogant.” Just like that. And it was a bit jarring for me. And it reminded me of a moment […]

Every once in a while you go to a special school where they just…GET you! Yesterday was just such a school. The flavour the school hearkened back to gentler times. The kids were sweet! Not jaded in the least! And the staff! They had scheduled a pot luck multicultural luncheon for the day I was […]

So yesterday I presented at an event called Sister2Sister and the whole experience was fascinating and yet left me feeling a little sad. These were grade eight girls from inner city schools, coming together to receive inspiring advice from women professionals in all kinds of fields: law, police, firefighters, construction/trades, government liasion, dance, boxing, singing […]

The last day of this tour was spent first with little anklebiters (the head start program children) reading them first Silly Chicken and then telling them my Big Red Lollipop story. It’s funny how the tone of my voice changes completely when I’m dealing with these tiny little children. Most of them are three or […]