Lone bird on a wire
At a decision crossroad
pondering options
Lone Bird
POG Coins
In my school district, our system gives out silver Portrait of a Graduate (POG) Coins whenever a student demonstrates competencies in various aspects of citizenship and humanity.
Two months ago, six of our humanities students in our ninth grade academy took part in a state-wide presentation through Georgia Tech to share their work learning about poverty and the local projects they took on to address poverty in our community.
This will be our third year working with Elia Moreno of Texas as we move from Aha! to Action! to Advocacy! The first year, we Zoomed with her because of Covid constraints and travel hiccups. The second year, we brought her to our county (I had Covid on the day she came to visit), and this year she is returning in person- today – to stand with the students on our auditorium’s stage and continue the good work that she has helped shape in our rural Georgia county.
Students will enter a time of reviewing their work and then begin the next phase by entering a think tank to create ways to meet the needs of our community. Each year, they bring proposals to local elected officials for feedback on their ideas and suggestions on ways to make good things happen. We are building a community garden and providing food through a backpack program for children and families.
We’re blessed to be part of a community that steps up to help meet needs of others.
Goal Update for October
At the end of each month, (or beginning), I review my yearly goals and spend some time reflecting on how I’m doing in living the life I want to live ~ a way of becoming my own accountability partner and having frequent check-ins to evaluate my progress. I’m still in the process of revising some of my goals as I encounter successes…..and setbacks. New goals have asterisks for the month of November, when I will report on them in a few weeks. For the month of October, here’s my goal reflection:
| Category | Goals | My Progress |
| Literature | Read for Sarah Donovan’s Book Group Send out Postcards Blog Daily | I participated in the October book discussion with Sarah’s reading group for Reader, Come Home: The Reading Brain in a Digital World. I’ll participate in the book discussion for Assessment 3.0 this month. Time for reading has been scarce lately, but Audible is a good way to try to keep up the pace when all I can do is multi-task. I sent no postcards this month. I continue to blog daily, and the daily writing and reflecting is a wonderful habit for me. I don’t feel complete without some form of daily writing, and the blog is a way of continuing the habit. I had a Zoom meeting with Ruth Ayers of Choice Literacy about writing for her website. I look forward to spending some time writing about local literacy events. |
| Creativity | *Decorate for fall *Create Shutterfly Route 66 | I created a surprise ducking of our office. I used tiny ducks left over from my brother in law’s birthday ducking and put them to use in the office, even adding Halloween ducks to the lineup. I have been trying to get to Shutterfly since July, so if I haven’t accomplished this goal by the end of October, I may give up on this one. Update: I’m giving up on this goal. |
| Spirituality | Tune in to church Pray! Keep OLW priority | We have been tuning in to church. With Dad preaching every Sunday in October and a few Sundays ahead of that, it makes the church home hunt take a back seat until my childhood church gets a new preacher, since I have the opportunity to hear Dad. My car is still my prayer chamber for daily prayer, and there’s so much to give thanks for. I continue my conversations with the good Lord each morning and afternoon. I’m still keeping my OLW my priority: pray! |
| Reflection | Spend time tracking goals each month | I’m tracking goals, revising, and considering some new categories as I look at my goal table. |
| Self-Improvement | *Reach top of weight range | This is a setback for me this month. I’ve hit major stress and gained weight, despite joining WW. I need to set a firm date and get the mental mindset that it takes to stay on track. I have work to do. Update: every day, the diet is starting “tomorrow.” I seriously need a good mindset to start back. I’m keeping this goal. I need to get on track. Tomorrow. |
| Gratitude | Devote blog days to counting blessings | I begin the days this way and end them giving thanks as well. |
| Experience | Embrace Slow Travel Focus on the Outdoors | I’ve taken a trip in October to F D R State Park for a Little Guy Southern States Meet Up. We met people who have the same kind of camper we have, and we even signed up for next year’s meet up in Tennessee at Roan Mountain State Park. My brother and his fiancee came for a visit during Fall Break, and it was wonderful having some time together with them. I’m still focusing on the outdoors with birdwatching adventures and camping. We also built our own fire pit foundation for the fire pit my son gave us for Christmas last year. |
Halloween Office Shenanigans – Tiny Ducks: The Continuing Comedy
Tiny ducks keep popping up everywhere!
Who could be doing this, sneaking into the office under the cover of darkness to let these cuties in, bringing smiles and prompting Post-It notes of thanks to “The Duckmaster?” No one knows.
witches on broomsticks
flying through the kitchen…..
and everywhere else
glittery pumpkins
backward Halloween laughter
nothing eerie here!
Project S’mores Pie
cool night for s’mores pie
after our chili supper
next to the campfire
family dinner
Sunday evening gathering
sharing old stories
new memories made
conversations under a
starry nighttime sky
Project Fire Pit
Our son and his family gave us a fire pit last Christmas. They know we love camping and sitting outdoors by the campfire, so this fire pit has been a treasure – especially during the fall months.
But it needed a place to live. We’d been dragging it all around the yard, charring spots in the grass and even having fires on the sidewalk so we could put the TV on the front porch and watch baseball. That’s one thing we love about the country – we live on the backside of nowhere with no neighbors in sight, so we can get away with backwoods stuff like that.
But we needed a little more classy setup, so on Thursday, we invited some family members over on Sunday evening for a chili campfire dinner around the fire pit that we didn’t have yet – and a s’mores pie that lives in my mind but has never been made by me.
On Thursday evening, I asked a friend of ours who delivers wood to please bring me a load. He delivered it on Friday morning.
Project Fire Pit took place Saturday morning. We got up and got dressed – (a weekend accomplishment all its own) and headed out to find materials.
I had checked on Pinterest to scope out a plan and found a photo late Friday night – 10:36 p.m. to be exact. It seemed simple and pretty, so we settled on this design in the photo above. Even though our pit is square, we figured we could probably put a square pit in a round base.
We went to Lowe’s and purchased 20 rounded side bricks, 4 pavers for the fire pit feet, and several bags of white marble rock. We bought 5 busted bags since they were half price, 3 un busted bags, and used an old piece of steel we had in the barn to lay on the bottom.
Several years ago, we’d had a load of gravel delivered for our rock beds, so we jumped in the farm pickup truck and drove over to the gravel pile. We raked it off and used a load of this for the base rock under the pit. We positioned the tailgate over the center and offloaded the gravel, spreading it out as a base layer.
Next, we spread the white marble rock to cover the base layer and match the brick wall holding the rock inside.
I gave the top cover of the metal pit a quick coating of Rustoleum, and about two hours later, our fire pit had a nice new base – and a top that looks brand new!
No more charred lawn!
Next up: Project S’mores Pie!
Follow me for more daring dinner invitations to fire pits that haven’t been built and pies that haven’t been tested. The chili and cornbread? We rely on Bush’s Best Chili Magic and Jiffy Cornbread. There’s nothing like a family gathering to light a little fire under our feet to get things done!
Autumn Walk
I had a meeting in our local coffee shop yesterday and treated myself to a Hex Latte while projecting next year’s budget and goals with a community partner. From inside, the vintage paned windows make the outside world look a little bit like a dripping realistic painting – the kind of windows that have candles and snowdrifts in the winter and don’t have 20/20 sharp focus. It’s like I’m in a world of my own in there.
I confess: I was.
I had a moment, looking across the town square, when a brilliant flash of fall colors caught my eye. “I’m walking this square when I leave here. I’m sharing these pictures with others – this Hallmark Movie charm this time of year is too beautiful to keep all to myself,” I decided, right then and there in the middle of a business meeting.
We finished. I walked along, thinking in Haiku, as I mostly do. Here is part of my walk that I’m sharing with you:
charming small town vibes
fall displays on courthouse square
spiced chills in crisp air
Halloween Shenanigans
Broom-riding witch ducks
Halloween shenanigans
coming on Monday!
Tiny Ducks
tiny ducks popped up
everywhere in the office
bringing us all smiles
hidden duck prankster
spreading joy of quackery
with mini swimmers
Taking a Boon Canine for a Walk
Today’s host for our final day of the October Open Write is Anna Roseboro of Michigan, who inspires us to write Take a Word for a Walk poems. You can read her full prompt here, along with the poems of others and the responses to writers.
Anna writes: Take a word for a walk. Students might choose a word from the class generated vocabulary list or from a list of concepts or abstract terms. Move this word through the poem so that it appears in each “X” position. There can be six words in each line. Use color, abstraction, or other poetic devices in your poem. Use this formation:
X – – – – –
– X- – – –
– -X- – –
– – – X – –
– – – – X –
– – – – – X
Master of the House, Doling Out the Charm, Ready with a Handshake and an Open Paw
Boon – blessing, benefit, favorable, friendly, chipper
Everybody’s boon companion – one convivial mister
Les Miserables boon lyrics loop de-loo
We have a boon canine: Boo,
who sleeps under the boon moon
awakening soon, our Boo boy boon
Common Threads 