Sherry Ellis's Blog, page 100

The Fashion Police

Yesterday, I went into my daughter's school to talk to the kids about my career as an author.  I dressed professionally, and thought I looked decent.

Well, my daughter informed me when she came home, that the most popular girl in the school did not like my shoes.  Supposedly she is the expert on fashion.

"Are you kidding me?"  I asked.  "What was wrong with my shoes?"

"She said they weren't fashionable enough. She said you should've been wearing UGGS."

"UGGS?  Aren't those the boots tweens and teenagers wear?"

"Yeah.  She said that would've been more fashionable."

I shook my head.  So apparently I'm not supposed to dress like someone over forty.  I'm supposed to look like a teenager.

Okay.  Next time I'm going to wear neon green sneakers.  Then we'll see what the fashion police have to say!   

New Favorite Snack

"Mom," my eleven-year-old daughter said.  "I have a new favorite snack."

"Oh, yeah," I said.  "What's that?"

"Sugar cubes."

What?  I had expected to hear it was some sort of chip or cookie.  Sugar cubes were not on the radar screen.  "You're kidding," I said.  "Why are sugar cubes your new favorite snack?"

"Our teacher fed them to us in school."

I couldn't believe it.  Teachers are feeding our kids sugar cubes in school?  This needed a serious explaination!  "What do you mean, your teacher was feeding you sugar cubes in school?"

"We did a science experiment with them, and since we were good, our teacher let us eat them when we were done."

Oh.

"Listen kid," I said.  "You're not eating sugar cubes here!  You had better find a new favorite snack.  How about a banana?"

She gave me a funny look and walked away.

So much for bananas.

Did I Notice Your Book Blogfest

Ninja Captain, Alex Cavanaugh, and Ciara Knight came up with a really cool idea:  inundate the blogosphere with awesome books, and then see if we can get the authors to notice that we promoted their books.

What book did I notice?  The Carousel Ghost, by Andrea Pelleschi.



When I saw the title, I knew I had to read it!  I'm like a little kid, and I love riding carousels.  So if you add a ghost to it, that's even better!

Here's the book description from Amazon: 

Fourteen-year-old Kate's traditional first day at Wildwood Lake Park couldn't get any worse. Besides problems with her best friend and the obnoxious, but cute, boy from school named Tommy, there's the new haunted carousel ride. When Kate goes for a spin, she finds herself transported back in time and into the body of a ghost named Isabelle, circa 1928. Isabelle's husband carved the horse, and the rumor is that he also murdered Isabelle.




Back in the present, Kate teams up with Tommy to solve the mystery of how Isabelle died, even if it means more terrifying rides on the carousel. As the investigation goes on, Kate finds herself growing closer to Isabelle than she is with Meghan. So when the carousel is slated to be dismantled for the park museum, Kate hurries to solve the mystery before Isabelle is doomed to wander the park--and Kate's dreams--forever.


Here's my review:

5.0 out of 5 stars Well-paced Mystery October 6, 2012


By Sherry Ellis VINE™ VOICE

Rumor has it that the carousel at Wildwood Lake Park is haunted by Isabelle, the murdered wife of the man who made the carousel horses. When fourteen-year-old Kate takes a ride on the carousel "war horse," she finds herself transported into the body of Isabelle and taken back to the year 1928. There, she discovers the truth of what really happened.



Carousel Ghost is an intriguing mystery which will compel readers to keep "turning the pages" to learn about the ghost and find out what really happened to her. There's also a sweet side story of a friendship between Kate and a cute boy named Tommy. The book is well-written with believable characters and a well-paced plot. It's a perfect read for kids ages ten and up.    


Doesn't that sound like a good read?  You have to check it out!

If you want to follow Andrea, here's her website  and her Twitter page.

Now to go and see if I can make her notice.  Wish me luck!

Killer Hermit Crab

My brother-in-law stopped by my house yesterday to visit the kids.  For some reason, he went upstairs to check out the hermit crab abode.  I heard a lot of giggling, and wondered what was going on.  Two minutes later, my brother-in-law came down with a hermit crab suspended between his index finger and thumb.

"What are you doing to that poor crab?" I asked.

"What am I doing with this crab?"  he said.  "He's a killer crab!  I'm going to boil him in a pot of water and then butter him up."

"Dude, he's just a crab.  A teeny tiny harmless crab."  I took the crab from him and let it crawl around in the palm of my hand.  "See, he's friendly."

My brother-in-law took the crab and put his fingers by its pinchers.  And what do you think happened?  Yep.  The crab pinched his finger.

"Ahhh!" shouted my brother-in-law as he shook the crab off his finger.  "See, I told you!  He's a killer crab!"

I shook my head.  "Dude, you're not going to boil him or use him for the secret ingredient in a Sponge Bob crabby patty. It's not his fault you're being stupid!" 

I rescued the poor little crab and carried him back to his abode.

Unbelievable!

Hungry Dog

My husband had just finished gnoshing on a Subway sandwich.  He threw the remains in the garbage and took off to go do whatever he does.

Two seconds later, our German Shepherd, Schultz, stuck his big black snoot in the garbage to investigate.

"Schultz," I said.  "Get out of the garbage!"

He gave me one of his looks.  I gave him one of mine.

He walked away.  I figured that was the end of it.  I went off to do my work.  A couple minutes later, I heard a funny ripping noise.  I went to the kitchen to investigate.  Sure enough, Schultz was tearing apart the Subway wrapper, trying to get at the sandwich.

I grabbed that thing from him.  "No, Schultz!"

I threw it in the garbage and gave him another look.  I  kept an eye on him for a few minutes, then went back to my work.

Three minutes later, he was at it again.

"Schultz, crate!"

He gave me a pathetic look with his soulful brown eyes and marched off to his crate.  Now he's in jail.

So I don't know what the problem was.  Either I don't make mean enough faces, or he just really likes Subway sandwiches with turkey, pepperjack cheese, lettuce, tomato, mayo, salt, and pepper!

Biology Lesson

Sometimes I have the strangest conversations with my kids in the car.  This morning was one of the strangest.  We were on our way to dance class, when my daughter posed this question:  "Mom, are eye sleepies the same as nose boogers?"

What?  I wasn't exactly prepared for such a topic at nine o'clock in the morning, but I gave it my best scientific answer.  "They're your body's way of cleaning your eyes.  And, yes, you have mucous to clean your nose, so basically it's the same thing."

My daughter thought about that a minute.  "So why do we have ear wax instead of mucous in our ears?"

"Because it would be too messy to have mucous dripping out of your ears."

Fortunately, that answer satisfied her.  Now aren't you glad I told you this?  I bet you just learned something new.

Flour Sandwich

It's party time at my place again.  The never-ending birthday celebration continues.  This time, we have out-of-town family coming in.  You know what that means - more cake!

My eight-year-old son asked if he could help make it.  I let him crack the eggs and add the oil and water.

"Can I eat the flour?" he asked.

"No, Bubba.  That would taste pretty awful."

"But I want to try it."

"No, Bubba."

I turned around to get a spoon.  Not even a second later, my son had flour all over the front of his shirt.

"Bubba," I said.  "You ate the flour, didn't you?"

He gave me one of his guilty looks.  "But it was so good, Mama! Can have some more?"

I shook my head.  "No, Bubba.  No more flour."

"What about in my lunch next week? Can you make me a flour sandwich?"

Yeah, right. (He sure is persistent, isn't he?)

  

Chicken Butcher

I was practicing my violin, when I heard a yell from the kitchen.  "Woman!"

It was my husband.

"I'm kind of busy," I said.  "What do you need?"

"Woman, get over here," he said. 

I sighed and put down my violin.  I walked into the kitchen to see what the man wanted.

He was standing next to the chicken I had made.  "Woman, you do not know how to cut a chicken."

"You intererupted my practicing to tell me that?"

"This is a disgrace.  Completely unacceptable!  You mutilated this thing!"

Yeah, so?  I had pulled off the legs and wings, and sliced through the breasts.  Then I plopped them on a plate and served them to my kids.  What was the big deal?

"Woman, you need to be taught how to properly cut a chicken."

So now I have an assignment.  I am to go to the store, purchase another chicken, prepare it, and then attend my husband's school for the culinary arts to learn how to properly cut it.

And all I wanted to do was practice my violin!  Oy gewalt!   

Brain-damaged Beast

Schultz, our two-year-old German Shepherd, likes to play rough.  That beast is downright dangerous when he's pulling on his tug. In fact, he scratched up my face pretty good one time when he jumped for it.  I'm lucky I didn't lose an eyeball!

Today, I took that hundred-pound creature outside to play.  I threw him his rubber ball which is attached to a rope.  "Fetch," I said.

He bounded off like a bullet and brought that thing back to me.  "Good boy," I said.  "Now drop it."

Apparently he didn't feel like dropping it.  He felt like thrashing his head from side to side.  The ball swung back and forth from the rope, bonking him on the head.

"Goofball, what the heck are you doing?"

He kept bonking himself.  This went on for a good five minutes.  Finally, he stopped. 

He dropped the ball toy and stumbled sideways.  He looked like he was drunk.

"What's the matter, boy?  Did you beat yourself up?"

He looked at me - one ear straight up, the other tipped to the side.  I shook my head.

It is now two hours later, and his ear is still tipped to the side.  I think he has permanent brain damage.  What do you think? 

Peanut Muncher

My daughter received a package in the mail that was loaded with a bunch of styrofoam peanuts. After she had taken out the item that was inside, she left the box on the floor.

"You had better clean that up," I said, "or you-know-who is going to mess with it!"

"Yeah, Mom," she said.  "Later."

Later never came.  But you-know-who did.  Yes, our furry German Shredder, Schultz, made an appearance and stuck his big black snoot in the box.  He sniffed around, and decided that those peanuts looked good enough to eat.  He grabbed a mouthful.  A couple got impaled on his bottom fangs.

That dog shook himself like a mad man trying to get those things off.  And then he pawed at his face. You should've seen it!

"Schultz," I said.  "Come here, you goofball."

I made him stay still and slid the peanuts off of his teeth. (Fortunately, he didn't eat my fingers!)

"Next time, stick with doggy kibbles!"  

We'll see if he listens.