What inspires #12-Spring Training with All-Star Baseball Movies for Kids
What Inspires Me? Spring Training!
Last season, the Atlanta Braves, after besting the Houston Astros in five games, became the 2021 World Champs. Shohei Ohtani, best 2-way player since Babe Ruth, swept the awards. But that’s old news now!
While the MLB teams are warming up, we’re warming up too. Here’s five movies we’re watching (rewatching) while we wait for the season to begin!
(Sorry I am not including viewing/buying links but they are all online & YouTube!)
Yep, you’re not seeing double! There are two posters for Bad News Bears: the original, 1976 Bad News Bears with Walter Matthau and Tattum O’Neal and the 2005 Bad News Bears with Billy Bob. Why not watch both and compare—But hurry! The 2022 MLB Baseball Season opens April 7!
Finpal to Finpal: Does Norman Look His Age?
Ready to read Norman’s answer? Scroll down . . .
Glug
Glug
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Did you know goldfish live about 15 years in an aquarium!
For more about how to care for goldfish so they’ll live a long fintastic life, watch this video from Tankarium.com
Do you have a question for Norman the Goldfish- about friends, school, pets, family, life in and outside the fishbowl? Send him a letter!
Don’t forget to order your copy of NOT NORMAN: A GOLDFISH STORY and NORMAN: ONE AMAZING GOLDFISH!!
Poetry Challenge #235-Everything You Do is Right
It’s Everything You Do Is Right Day!* That means nothing you do is wrong! (When was the last time you heard that?)
Poetry Challenge #235
Cause for Celebration
Write a list poem celebrating your accomplishments for the day, the week, the month, or even the year! Celebrate everything, no matter how big or small. Add details.
Start with: Today I… (or this week I… etc.) Remember nothing is wrong! You’re the best!
Set Your Timer for 7 Minutes
Start Writing!
Don’t Think About it, just do it!
*National Everything You Do is Right Day is celebrated every March 16th. Definitely a day to remember so mark it on your recurring event calendar now!
Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge 2000+ days ago. Now we take turns creating prompts to share with you. Our hope is that creatives—children & adults—will use our prompts as springboards to word play time. If you join us in the Challenge, let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.
Click on Fishbowl link and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):
All who subscribe, comment or share a poem will be entered in . . .
What Inspires Me #11-Strollers at the Border
This line of strollers stocked and waiting at the Polish train station for Ukrainian mothers arriving with young children made my heart sing. As I type Ukrainians are under siege. Bombs are exploding. Families are being torn apart. Homes, lives destroyed. While here, the sun is shining and my biggest worry is belly fat.
What can we do? How can we help?
Sunday, a friend shared a story of how, in response to a request for coats, hats, gloves to send to Ukraine, she emptied their winter closets and took everything to the collection center where her donations were turned away. The center was only taking the best of the best to send to the Ukraine. And, even at that, they were not sure how they were going to get the collected winter garments to the people in need. After being turned back, rather than being discouraged, my friend took the collected garments to a local mission where they were gratefully accepted. “We need your donations, right here, right now!” she was told.
Still…We Want to Help Ukrainian People. What can we do?
Do as those Polish families at the border do: Donate stuff locally. It might not be a glamorous to donate to organizations near home but think about it: By giving our stuff—clothing, food, time—locally, those organization and others can free up resources not spent here, there.
Donate dollars to Ukraine. Here’s a list of organizations put together by Global Citizen. 27 Meaningful Ways You Can Help Ukraine (globalcitizen.org)
Poetry Challenge #234-Cloudy with a Chance of?
Hip-hip Okay, it’s Meatball Day!
March 9th is National Meatball Day. A day set aside to honor meatballs, according to the National Day Calendar some restaurants even serve meatballs for free today. (What it failed to mention was whether that meant the restaurants would serve meatballs to customers or serve customers who were meatballs. . .) Moving on:
Poetry Challenge #234
Cloudy with a Chance of ?
According to Merriam Webster’s Dictionary, the #1 definition of “meatball” is “a small ball of chopped or ground meat often mixed with breadcrumbs and spices.” By this definition, the first written mention was in 1856 (although I didn’t follow up to find out where or by whom}.
But I did explore further.
Definition #2: “A stupid, clumsy, or dull person.”
Definition #3: “A pitch in baseball that is easy to hit.”
Other names for meatball include: netball, kofta, frikadelle, bitki, cheatballs (as son Max calls the store-bought frozen variety) and ala All in the Family: “Michael!”
In honor of the day, using one of the definitions of meatball above, or the popular picture book, movie & series, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (first published in 1978), to create a meatball of a poem. But . . .
Do not use the word “meatball” in your poem.
Do use one or more of the synonyms for “meatball” in your poem.
Set Your Timer for 7 Minutes
Start Writing!
Don’t Think About it, just do it!
Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge 2000+ days ago. Now we take turns creating prompts to share with you. Our hope is that creatives—children & adults—will use our prompts as springboards to word play time. If you join us in the Challenge, let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.
Click on Fishbowl link and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):
All who subscribe, comment or share a poem will be entered in . . .
What Inspires Me #10-Kindness Rocks
Kindness Rocks! Colorful, Thoughtful, Delightful stone nuggets sharing words of encouragement, hope, love from strangers to strangers.
“Our mission is to inspire intentional kindness in others, one rock at a time”
The Kindness Rocks Project was begun by Megan Murphy, a “ Women’s Empowerment Coach, Business Mentor, Kindness Activist, Meditation Instructor and Lecturer,” when after losing her parents in her early teens she’d walk the beach looking for guidance/messages/signs from them in the form of rocks. In the website video she shares how, finding a heart-shaped rock meant her parents were telling her she was on the right track. Listen to the rest of Megan Murphy’s “How the Project Began” with a tissue.
“Wherever there is a human being, there is an opportunity for Kindness”
I don’t know if the Kindness Rocks Project is an offshoot of, part of, inspired by The Kindness Project, begun by Dr. Joanne Cacciatore in 1996, as a way of coping with the death of her daughter Cheyenne or not but the two projects are so aligned that on some level—the heart level—they totally are!
Here’s what I do know:
Gathering rocks is a cheap, easy fun!
Painting rocks is cheap, easy fun!
Deciding what to write and draw on those rocks is cheap, fun—not always easy—definitely thought provoking.
Placing those Kindness Rocks with hopes that a stranger will find them is exciting, fun and makes our hearts happy.
Kindness is something humans of all ages, shapes, sizes, social-economic situations can give.
If you need more, here’s a Step-by-Step tutorial from The Kindness Rocks Project to get you started:
Besides:
Kindness is a renewable energy!
Fin Pal asks Norman: "Up to New Tricks?"
Norman T. Goldfish answers letters from readers. Click on the link to read his reply.
This drawing is not from Miss Racz’s class. It was sent by another friend at another school but we are pretending those are first graders asking questions. “Pick me! Pick me!”
Dang! That’s a lot of questions isn’t it?
Miss Racz’s first graders sent an email after viewing the Norman One Amazing Goldfish read-aloud on World Read Aloud Day #WRAD
There was no way we could answer them all in one note—there wasn’t room on the paper. But, we gave it a try.
Scroll down to read what we answered. And then, we have a question for YOU! . . .
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Glug
Glug . . .
What cool tricks do you think Norman the goldfish should try? And what do you think Norman’s next adventure should be?
Do you have a question for Norman the Goldfish—about friends, school, pets, family, life in and outside the fishbowl? Send him a letter!
Poetry Challenge #233-Ho Hum, Humdrum, En-er-ee!
Ho-Hum, Humdrum, Second verse same as the first…
Exactly one month after Groundhog Day are you still doing things the same old way? Getting up on the same side of the bed? Tying your shoes the same way? Drinking coffee the same way—from the same cup, singing the same verse of the same song over and over—and maybe slightly off tune: “I’m En-er-ry the Eight I am/En-er-ee the Eight I am I am/I got married to the widow next door” . . . Enough!
For today is officially National Old Stuff Day! A day to look at your life and make some changes. Or, in the words of the Little River Band, Time for a Cool Change. But first:
Poetry Challenge #233
Ho Hom, Humdrum, En-er-ee
In honor of Old Stuff Day, look around your room. What treasures do you have?
Write a non-rhyming poem describing one (or more) of your treasures. Make it as descriptive as possible using as many senses as you can. What does the treasure remind you of? Is there a story that goes with it?
Set Your Timer for 7 Minutes
Start Writing!
Don’t Think About it, just do it!
M&M turned this junkyard Hoosier into a bar!
Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge 2000+ days ago. Now we take turns creating prompts to share with you. Our hope is that creatives—children & adults—will use our prompts as springboards to word play time. If you join us in the Challenge, let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.
Click on Fishbowl link and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):
All who subscribe, comment or share a poem will be entered in . . .