MakeBeliefs 2 Help U Smile & Lift Your Spirits:
Gifting Someone with A Box of Joy and Happiness
Here’s the latest installment in our new Make Beliefs Series, ''MakeBeliefs 2 Help U Smile & Feel J_Y.'' They are created to provide comfort and hope to young and old who are feeling distressed and anxious in our too fast-changing and sometimes unforgiving world. It’s our way of making things better by helping you imagine! I created these MakeBeliefs as a way of finding hope.
BRRING! BRRING! BBRING! What if suddenly every electronic device in your home or desk or pocket started ringing at once – phone, laptop, tablet, PC -- each one displaying a different message of Joy. WOW! Wouldn’t that be amazing? Just terrific? Imagine that the people who love you and think about you, those who are family or friends, started sending you these joyous epistles. What a thrill to know you are important to others and that they wish you the best.
With messages like these to support you, you can now more confidently take your next test, complete that dreaded work task, shed your grumpy attitude. And don’t forget to take your turn to send a message of joy to someone you think could use one. (ALL OF US, I’D SAY!)
Send Messages of Support to 11-Year-Old Miah Cerrillo Who Lost Her Friends at the Uvalde School Massacre
‘’I don’t have friends anymore. All my friends are dead,’’ Miah Cerrillo tells her father after last month’s school shooting in Uvalde, Tex., that left 19 students and two teachers dead.
Miah, who was wounded, survived by smearing her best friend’s blood over her own face and body and playing dead so that the killer would not shoot her. She also took her teacher’s phone and dialed 911 for police help.
Her father, Miguel Cerrillo, said that his daughter has starkly changed since the shootings. ‘’This is not our Miah. This is not our TikTok dancer. This is not our playful Miah, you know?...she’s way different now.’’ Miah now startles at a dog bark and runs to hide when one of the family pets gets too loud.
The 11-year-old fourth grader appeared in prerecorded testimony for a House Oversight and Reform Committee hearing on gun violence. She was not there in person because the thought of bright lights and camera clicks was too threatening to her.
Her father said ‘’I just want my baby girl the way she was because we could sit and chitchat and play games all day or go run outside.’’
What does Miah want to come from the mass shooting? ‘’To have security…I don’t want it to happen again.’’
You can send a message of support and friendship to Miah Cerrillo by writing to her, care of the Robb Elementary School, 715 Old Carrizo Road, Uvalde, Tex. 78801. You may want to convey that your thoughts are with her and that she is not alone.
Are You’re a Fraidy Cat, Too? There’s Hope for Us!
Here’s A Journaling Book to Help Us Overcome Our Fears and Find Courage!
Someone once told me that in life you have to fight a lion each day. I understand this to mean that the lion stands for all the hard things that we face daily, such as our too many fears and also dealing with personal problems, with loss, with hurt, with heartbreak and illness.
Deep down, I know that I have been a fraidy cat much of my life, and in this journaling book I try to deal with some of my fears and make peace with them. I hope this book helps you do so, too. From my imagination I created Deering-do Dog to provide some wise advice and comfort for me. He helps the fraidy cats in the book deal with their fears and he explains what courage really is. The book teaches that each of us is stronger and braver than we think we are. Sometimes, just doing our best in a difficult situation and not allowing our fears to overwhelm us can be a courageous way to live.
This journaling book is formatted as an interactive digital journal. It will allow you to write directly on your screen into the areas with lines on each page in the Pet Talks section that begins on page 42. When you are done typing, simply save the document until the next time you are inspired to make new entries.
What’s the Magical Mysterious Book You Always Hoped to Find in A Crowded, Stuffy Wonderful Old Book Store?
This wonderful photo from Tom Jamieson for The New York Times captures all the magic one expects and hopes for in the old-fashioned book stores which still carry books (many used) on all kinds of subjects. When I step into such a store, it is like heaven to me and I hope for the best, that I will finally find the book that carries the secret of life, that will make me a better person, that will spur my imagination and take me into another world, away from the chaos and noise of the real one. Such book spaces are sacred and make me feel safer as I start thumbing through the books’ pages.
If you’ve ever been in such a store, did you find a treasure, and what was it? Now a hard question: What is the magical book you are seeking that may not yet have been written?
What’s your desert island reading list?
Free Books for Kids and Teens at New York Public Library Branches!
The New York Public Library is giving away 500,000 books to kids and teens up to 18. Visit your nearest library branch for a free book. A lifelong love of reading—and your own home library—begin with choosing your first book!
Talk about Craziness? Racing after A Large Wheel of Cheese? What Can They Be Thinking?
Atlantic.com reported on the Cooper’s Hill Cheese-Rolling and Wake which took place in Gloucester, England, continuing a tradition that dates back at least 200 years. Groups of fearless racers risk life and limb chasing an eight-pound (3.5-kilogram) round of Double Gloucester Cheese down an extremely steep and uneven hill, with a 1:1 gradient in some sections. The winner got to keep the cheese.
Watch the competitors tumble down the green slopes as they seek their prized cheese. What can they be thinking? (No cheesy thoughts, please.)
(For more pictures, visit The Atlantic)
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