Greetings everyone!
Spring is in the air, and I couldn’t be more thrilled!
I don’t know about any of you, but I’m ready!
I’ve been waiting (although I don’t know how patiently, lol) for spring to come. This winter was long and arduous to say the least. I can’t fully write it off as so many of you helped me launch my coloring book! I couldn’t have done it without you. In fact, I’d love for any of you who purchased it to leave an honest Amazon review. As I go along my author journey, I’ve been picking up more “tricks of the trade” so to speak. I’ve been trying to learn the business side of things. I’m not a business woman by nature, but as I put it to my best friend last week, I am a hustler!
Anywho, those reviews are CLUTCH when it comes to helping make my books more visible to the Amazon algorithms. I get it, leaving reviews is a huge pain. I hate to say it, but over the years, it has been like pulling teeth for me to even leave reviews for the brands and products I absolutely adore!
However, I will say that now that I, too, am in this here entrepreneurial struggle, I’ve become a little more softened as to how important they are to a company’s life blood. In fact, how many times did a bad review make you abandon your cart at check out when you were doing some online shopping? Or, in contrast, how many times has a rave review left you feeling like you couldn’t grab your wallet fast enough?
All that to say, I covet your reviews my friends and am extremely grateful for the time you’d take to leave one for either of my books!
I’ve got some rather exciting book related news to share.
A fellow author friend of mine, Sheryl Smiley-Oliphant, who I did the Her(story) book tour with last month, is super talented! As I’ve gotten to know Sheryl, I’ve become a huge fan! Not only are her books, My Daddy Doesn’t Need a Cape and New Baby Coming, New Baby Here, super super cute, I am learning how much of a beast she is beyond that! She’s got this great YouTube channel, in which she’s coined herself as the Activity Author. I’ve checked out her videos and she really is the Activity Author! Sheryl is currently doing a March craft challenge in which she posts a craft every day this month. Her Leprechaun Craft is perfect for today, since its St. Patty’s Day. We’re going to be doing it as soon as we are finished with our studies later today. 😉
Over the weekend, I was thrilled to learn she also posted THEEEE cutest craft for my book! I couldn’t stop smiling y’all! I wanted to share it because it was so freaking good! I told Sheryl she literally has the perfect “Youtuber voice”! lol She really is a natural. I thought I’d share this with you since you’ve all been trekking along with me on this authorship journey. Here’s a video to the craft if you’d like to see for yourselves how amazing it is! I’m going to try it out with Nyla (my three-year-old) and see how it goes. I’ll keep you posted. 😉
In other news, in light of my excitement over spring guys, I thought I’d show you what our co-op worked on yesterday.
We started our garden!
Now, the one thing you’re going to learn about me is how much I am NOT a green thumb! I honestly say this to my shame. My grandmother was an AMAZING gardener. Most of our Sunday meals when I was a kid were shared around her kitchen table. The food we’d often enjoy came straight from her garden. I can still picture the expansiveness of her garden out back when I close my eyes! My momma is also a wonderful gardener. She doesn’t have nearly the amount of land to grow hers on, but her vegetable and flower gardens are nothing to snuff at!
Me…on the other hand…
Well, let’s just say an early R.I.P. to any plants who are so unfortunate as to enter my domain.
However, last year, and now this year, I have been determined to conquer this agricultural travesty. I want to redeem the “Turner” name (in case you didn’t know, that’s my maiden name, lol). So, as I planned our co-op’s activity for this week, I purposely boxed myself in to committing yet again to another garden exploit.
We studied Nebuchadnezzar II, king of Babylon, and then covered the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. One of which is, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. You see where I was going with this one don’t cha?
Well, as we talked through the expansiveness of this fabled garden (to my surprise, no evidence of its existence has ever been found!), I decided what better way to have at it than to make our own home gardens? So, that’s exactly what we did.
Check out our seed starters. Aren’t they cute?
We also had a short lesson on estimation in which I had all the kids estimate how many seeds were inside a small tomato. Their answers were comedic! Some said one, others shouted 55, and my own child randomly called out 13!
I then sliced it in half and scooped the seeds onto a plate. As the kids planted their gardens, I proceeded to count the seeds. Would you believe there were 115 seeds in this little guy??
The kids were floored!
I even invited one of the parents to share how the very important math concept of estimation plays into everyday life. She shared how she estimates various ingredients as she cooks and how, when she was a kid, her parents would estimate how tall she would be the following year, given her growth spurts.
I then encouraged the kids to try their hand at estimating once the first sprouts pop up in their gardens. I directed them to estimate how much they thought the plant would grow from week to week and then take its measurement with a ruler or tape measure, and record the results. As time passes, they’ll be able to see how accurate their educated guesses are. You can try this activity, too, if you plan to start your own garden this spring!
If you do, please let me know! Share pics and even tag me on social media if you feel so kind to do so. I’d love to see how things are coming along.
Thanks for reading!
Blessings,
Courtney
