Meg Gray's Blog

Watch out. Things are about to get really bad
Excerpt from Super Bad :The classroom door opened and Sandra glanced toward it, along withthe thirty other kids in the room. She snickered and raised her eyebrows atLexa when a young man wearing a Hermes costume, complete with wings flutteringon his heels, floated in.“I’m not gonna lie,” Lexa leaned over to whisper. “I hope a draftlifts his skirt so we can see what’s underneath.”Sandra giggled. “My guess is bun huggers. Gold lame to match hisshiny winged cap.”Lexa waggled her eyebrows. “Shiny gold buns. I like.”The teacher frowned at the young man. “Can I help you?”“I have a delivery for Sandra Tohler.”Sandra gulped. This couldn’t be anything besides embarrassing. Atidal wave of heads turned toward her causing her cheeks to flush with heat.Seeing where everyone’s attention settled, the Hermes guy floatedbetween the rows of desks and came to rest near hers. “Sandra Tohler?”Reluctantly, she nodded.He cleared his throat before delivering a soliloquy in a clear,resonating voice that Sandra was sure the students in classrooms across campuswould hear.“Sandra, oh Sandra, my lovely, stormy vixen,hear my humble plea. Your essence has absorbed into my every thought and now Iwonder how I will sit for my exams. Will I answer essay questions by describingthe intense sable color of your hair, or the enticing moss of your eyes thatmakes me imagine us lying in each others arms in a fairy forest?”Sandra’s forehead hit her desk with a loud thunk, her voice a mumbleagainst the surface. “Please stop. Go away.”But the Hermes guy continued in his orator’s voice. “I’ve relivedour kiss uncountable times. Your lips were velvet soft, but demanding.”A chorus of “Ooo,” erupted through the room.
SUPER BAD The unexpected conclusion to theSuper Villain Academy series.

The world is in chaos. Violence and thievery reign. And withthe supers still balanced, it’s only getting worse. Without good versus evil,the supers care less and less. In order to restore purpose, the world needs itssuper heroes and its super villains, but the one who balanced them in the firstplace is missing.
Sandra’s concern over finding her brother, Jeff, isn’t heronly problem. Her pathetic excuse for super powers has left her needing a newankle. And though she’s still very much committed to her boyfriend, Source,she’s growing unreasonably attracted to Set, the boy who double crossed Jeff bystealing his girlfriend.
When Sandra is taken and held as bait by kids who want tounbalance the super world, it becomes the inciting event that changes thingsfor supers everywhere and forces them to answer the question, “Hero orvillain?”***Super Bad is scheduled for release in June, but there have been whispersof it releasing sooner. Don’t miss out. Subscribe to Kai’s mailing list and beamong the first to know. ***
King of Bad - Jeff Mean would rather set fires than follow rules. He wears his badboy image like a favorite old hoodie; until he learns he has superpowers and isrecruited by Super Villain Academy – where you learn to be good at being bad.Is Jeff bad enough for SVA?
Polar Opposites - Heroes and villains are balanced.After Oceanus is kidnapped, Jeff learns the supers are so balanced, they nolonger care to get involved. Ironically Jeff’s superpowers are spiraling out ofcontrol. Will they find Oci before he looses it completely, and will they findher alive?***Win a $10 Amazon gift card or an ecopy of either Kingof Bad or Polar Opposites. Plenty of chances to win. Open internationally. Enterhere:
a Rafflecopter giveaway



About the author:
Whenher children were young and the electricity winked out, Kai Strand gathered herfamily around the fireplace and they told stories, one sentence at a time. Herboys were rather fond of the ending, “And then everybody died. The end.” Now anaward winning children’s author, Kai crafts fiction for kids and teens toprovide an escape hatch from their reality. With a selection of novels foryoung adult and middle grade readers and short stories for the younger ones,Kai entertains children of all ages, and their adults. Learn more about Kai andher books on her website, www.kaistrand.com.

What is your dream? Are you living it? Are you on a path to living it?

I included this phrase in the book Beautiful Me because being fulfilled and being passionate bring about an internal aura that is beautiful. Our dreams are what drive us. I guess another way to look at it is your dreams are your goals. We all have them. You can have long-term and short-term dreams you want to fulfill.

Life gets crazy sometimes. It can be confining and constricting too, but that should never be an excuse to not dream. That is where it starts, as a seed of an idea.

The seed to become a writer was planted when I was thirteen. I didn���t like to read as a kid. I was a slower reader than all the other kids in the class therefore self-assigned myself the label of a bad reader���I know now that this not the case (more on self-assigned labels in a later post). However, feeling like I wasn���t good at reading lead me to resist it, but I also think, now, that I wasn���t moved by much of what was offered for me to read at this younger age. When I was in eighth grade that changed, I discovered historical fiction and fell in love with the genre. I finally found a book that spoke to me and my passion and I wanted to write too. So, I picked up a pen drafted the first page and hated every word of it���stinking self-critic. And I stopped writing, but I didn���t stop reading.

Jump ahead, oh I don���t know, maybe ten years. I was married, finishing a Master���s degree in education and teaching kindergarten. Loving what I was doing, but still having a yearning for creating. In my job as a teacher I was getting plenty of experience creating materials and designing lessons. For the moment, I was content. The dream to write was dormant, and who was I to even think about this when I had never excelled in my English classes??

As life continued to unravel and I changed schools and changed schools again and changed schools again, then left the profession to follow my husband as he pursued a career opportunity and we started a family. It was actually between the second and third school change that I really started to reconsider my career choice, not because I didn���t love teaching, but because I wasn���t sure this was how my life was supposed to play out, I kept feeling like there was something else I was supposed to be doing. But what? The desire to write eeked to life again. My degrees were in education and I had no idea, no authority to write a book. But it���s what I wanted.

I heard someone on the radio say if you want to change your direction in life, then change your mind/attitude first. If you want to be a writer, start telling people. Well, that just scared the living daylights out of me, because I had no plan. It���s what I wanted to do, but I didn���t know how to do it and if I told people, they���d laugh or tell me it wasn���t a viable career option especially since I was employed in the public school system with a consistent salary and benefits and my summers off, how could I want to change that?

Yeah, I listened to those voices in my head and kept my dream close to my heart sharing it with no one, not even my husband. I still remember the night I sat at the dinner table with my husband, our babies babbling around us and told him I wanted to write a book. He smiled, kind of laughed and then looked at my serious face and said, ���Really?���

���Yes,��� I said, ready to defend this sacred truth I had just spilled to him and that I was afraid he was going to attempt to squash.

���Okay,��� he said���because he is wonderful���and started helping me to find the time���to make the time���to sit down and start writing.

Now, I���m living this writing and publishing dream. It has been a journey to figure it all out, but now that I���ve started to explore this experience, my dream is morphing, changing and becoming more specific. There are more things I want to do with my writing, surrounding my writing, and connecting with other women and entrepreneurs.

I can���t help but wonder how my journey would have been different if I���d shared my dream, even with one person, earlier in my life. There are no do-overs, so I don���t dwell on it, but I just wonder.

So, go on and be beautiful���follow those dreams and start by sharing them!

I would love to hear from you. Please, share what dream you are following. Or be bold and share what dream you are keeping close to your heart.

What is your dream? Are you living it? Are you on a path to living it?

I included this phrase in the book Beautiful Me because being fulfilled and being passionate bring about an internal aura that is beautiful. Our dreams are what drive us. I guess another way to look at it is your dreams are your goals. We all have them. You can have long-term and short-term dreams you want to fulfill.
Life gets crazy sometimes. It can be confining and constricting too, but that should never be an excuse to not dream. That is where it starts, as a seed of an idea.
The seed to become a writer was planted when I was thirteen. I didn’t like to read as a kid. I was a slower reader than all the other kids in the class therefore self-assigned myself the label of a bad reader—I know now that this not the case (more on self-assigned labels in a later post). However, feeling like I wasn’t good at reading lead me to resist it, but I also think, now, that I wasn’t moved by much of what was offered for me to read at this younger age. When I was in eighth grade that changed, I discovered historical fiction and fell in love with the genre. I finally found a book that spoke to me and my passion and I wanted to write too. So, I picked up a pen drafted the first page and hated every word of it—stinking self-critic. And I stopped writing, but I didn’t stop reading.
Jump ahead, oh I don’t know, maybe ten years. I was married, finishing a Master’s degree in education and teaching kindergarten. Loving what I was doing, but still having a yearning for creating. In my job as a teacher I was getting plenty of experience creating materials and designing lessons. For the moment, I was content. The dream to write was dormant, and who was I to even think about this when I had never excelled in my English classes??
As life continued to unravel and I changed schools and changed schools again and changed schools again, then left the profession to follow my husband as he pursued a career opportunity and we started a family. It was actually between the second and third school change that I really started to reconsider my career choice, not because I didn’t love teaching, but because I wasn’t sure this was how my life was supposed to play out, I kept feeling like there was something else I was supposed to be doing. But what? The desire to write eeked to life again. My degrees were in education and I had no idea, no authority to write a book. But it’s what I wanted.
I heard someone on the radio say if you want to change your direction in life, then change your mind/attitude first. If you want to be a writer, start telling people. Well, that just scared the living daylights out of me, because I had no plan. It’s what I wanted to do, but I didn’t know how to do it and if I told people, they’d laugh or tell me it wasn’t a viable career option especially since I was employed in the public school system with a consistent salary and benefits and my summers off, how could I want to change that?
Yeah, I listened to those voices in my head and kept my dream close to my heart sharing it with no one, not even my husband. I still remember the night I sat at the dinner table with my husband, our babies babbling around us and told him I wanted to write a book. He smiled, kind of laughed and then looked at my serious face and said, “Really?”
“Yes,” I said, ready to defend this sacred truth I had just spilled to him and that I was afraid he was going to attempt to squash.
“Okay,” he said—because he is wonderful—and started helping me to find the time—to make the time—to sit down and start writing.
Now, I’m living this writing and publishing dream. It has been a journey to figure it all out, but now that I’ve started to explore this experience, my dream is morphing, changing and becoming more specific. There are more things I want to do with my writing, surrounding my writing, and connecting with other women and entrepreneurs.
I can’t help but wonder how my journey would have been different if I’d shared my dream, even with one person, earlier in my life. There are no do-overs, so I don’t dwell on it, but I just wonder.
So, go on and be beautiful…follow those dreams and start by sharing them!
I would love to hear from you. Please, share what dream you are following. Or be bold and share what dream you are keeping close to your heart.

Goal Setting…ugh!!
It’s a new year and time to make those resolutions again. I am not a fan of that at all, yet I know through setting goals things get done. But the disappointment of not reaching a goal or having the unexpected arise and delaying a goal have led me to back off setting goals, let alone sharing any of those goals with anyone.
But, I’m going to change that this year. I’m not going to throw out a tedious list of what-I’m-going-to-do’s, but rather just document the things that I am working on and how that’s going. One of the first goals I have for 2015 is to write more. I’m already on track with that by having committed to a short story blog, Lightning Quick Reads. So, I know I will be producing one short story a month, which not only will help me to produce more writing, but fine tune my writing. I’m long winded and write novels. Short stories have always scared me and I’ve steered away from them, but when Kai Strand invited me to join this group of writers, I took it on as a challenge and after sending my acceptance email I started to panic—seriously panic. I didn’t know where to start. I didn’t know what to write about. How could my readers enjoy just a short sampling of words when there was so much more to the story I wanted to tell?
It was a struggle, but I pulled it off. Step it Up, is my tribute to working moms everywhere. It is how I imagine returning to a nine-to-five would be (not every day would be this bad, but still…), now that I’ve been a stay-at-home mom for seven and a half years. I admire all women who balance family and work, whether they work at home or outside the home. Whether their work is paid or volunteer, moms are always balancing a lot. And that’s another big goal I have for this year is to balance it all better. 2014 was pretty heavy with life and not as much of the work got done as I’d hoped.
I remember hearing someone say once how they wished they could be an author, sit around in their pajamas all day and just type away on their computer. Yeah, that sounded good to me too, but that’s not the reality of my life. So, check out this video we put together of me commuting to work. It’s a little different than the picture I paint in Step It Up.
If you work from home or are thinking about working from home leave me a comment or connect with me via email, Facebook, or twitter. I’d love to hear how you’re making it work or answer any questions you have about making it a possibility. 

Check out these cute little decorations. It is a perfect way to spend an afternoon with your little crafters, not to mention the way it will cinnamon-scent your home! Here are the quick and easy directions:
 **Warning it can get messy, but so much fun!



What you need:
1/2 c. cinnamon1/2 c. applesauce~1 T. glue BowlStraw
In a mixing bowl combine the three ingredients, use a wooden spoon or your hands to mix. If the mix is feels too wet add some cinnamon, if it is too dry add some applesauce. We found a 1:1 ratio to work well of ours.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly cinnamon dusted surface and roll to about an 1/8" thickness. Use desired cookie cutter shapes to cut out the dough. With a straw cut a small hole out of the top for hanging.

Place cut outs on wax paper or a parchment paper lined cookie sheet. Can be left to air dry for two or three days or bake in a 200 degree oven for about an hour.

Once dry, add the string, and a little paint if desired, but they are also plenty cute all on their own.

**As an alternative you could add a little glitter to the dough to give your ornaments a little sparkle.

But, most of all have fun and create some memories together!!

 The pile of gifts is growing under the tree. Only fifteen more days until Christmas, I was informed this morning by a bubbling little girl.
Presents are a huge part of this upcoming holiday. The trick for parents, I think, is to balance the getting of presents with the giving of presents. And it's made even harder when the first question out of most people's mouths to my children is, "What do you want for Christmas?" The wants are first and foremost on their minds and their list is long. So, as a parenting team my husband and I try to make an equally big deal about what they are giving for Christmas as well.

We take each child shopping, especially for the other, and he takes them shopping to find something for Mommy and tomorrow we'll be going out to shop for Daddy. And during the next week we'll be cooking and crafting the rest of our gifts for family and friends to help add the idea that gifts don't always come from a store, but also from your creative talents.

How are you balancing the "I wants" this holiday season?

I have so many things to be thankful for in my life. My family, my home, my friends, and especially my readers.

I'm so incredibly thankful to all of you who have bought the books, shared the books, and commented on the books. Without readers I would not be a writer.

I appreciate the thank you notes I have received and the reviews people have shared. I write not only to entertain, but also hopefully to inspire and empower others to follow their dreams, whatever their dreams may be.

I'm so excited about the new books I will be releasing this next year and want to make sure all of you fantastic and wonderful people out there are getting updates before anyone else, so if you haven't done so already sign-up for my newsletter. All you need to do is enter your email and confirm you want to be on my list and I will get those monthly updates to you, plus special sneak peeks.

Have a very blessed holiday and thank you again for reading!

As Thanksgiving approaches we are seeing turkeys everywhere.

Today, during our homeschool time we took a few minutes to create one of my favorite Thanksgiving art projects, Handprint Turkeys.

I have been doing the project for years, first as a kindergarten teacher and then as a homeschooling mama.

These little turkeys make a cameo in my novel, The Teacher, when kindergarten teacher Emma Hewitt is stapling them outside her classroom. So, here's a little peek at the project. I've included written as well as video directions. They are so simple and so fun, because the kids love getting the paint on their hands!!

How to:
Paint the palm and fingers with kids' washable, non-toxic paint. Then, press the hand print to the paper. When the turkey is dry add an eye, a beak, some legs and any other features you'd like to include.

Check out this video link to see the project:


Here's the final project with all the eyes and feet in place:
  

I love to see my kids smile. I love to see my husband smile, my friends, my family, my neighbors. And I love to smile. It lifts me up when I give a smile and receive one in return. That's why I think it is one of the best ways to show off our beauty and say, "Look at Beautiful Me". It is one of our most attractive qualities. A smile is the most inexpensive, easiest, and most powerful gifts we can give to anyone, including ourselves.  Need proof? Check out Ron Gutman's talk--which is very good and very short. So, even if you don't need science as back up to the benefits of smiling it is still a worthwhile video--about the power of smiling. I believe in the power of a smile simply based on the evidence in my life, like the time I heeded the advice to give everyone I met a smile, because it might be the only one they get all day. Yeah, think about that. Have you gone through a day with no one smiling at you? Or you not smiling at anyone else? Yuck, huh? That's just a recipe for stress and icky feelings all the way around. And I'm not lying when I say I've stood in the longer line at the super market just to be helped by the more smiley checker or chosen one service provider over another based on the fact that I could hear the smile in their voice when I talked to them on the phone. It is so simple and yet so overlooked in our society, because we make up excuses all the time--too busy, too tired, too much work, too into my problems, too much effort. I get it. I'm an introvert and smiling gregariously and initiating interactions with strangers is hard for me. But that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about receiving a person warmly. Bullies shut us down with their hideous scowls and fake smiles--smirks and jerks, who needs that? A lot of times our self-consciousness drives us to smile less when we think our teeth aren't white enough or straight enough. Or that our lips look funny, but that's us being too critical of ourselves, and if someone does judge you on that then that's their shallow problem. So, don't miss out on a chance to share your beauty with the world because you think there is something a little off about the way your lips curve or because smirky-jerky over there is leveling you with a scowl. Bring on that smile and show off that beauty. How to teach it:  Model it: I will say it again, your children are watching you and they will see how you interact with people. And be sure you aren't short-changing your little ones with the beauty of your smile. Even if they've tipped over their cup at dinner for the hundredth time this month and they're ten. It's okay. Smile. If they feel the power of a smile they'll know how important it is to share it.  Follow their example: Honestly, kids are way more likely to smile than us adults. They still haven't been tainted by all those frownies out there yet! Which is good, so watch your children engage. I'm always amazed at how our daughters so openly offer a smile to someone new that they meet and I see how good it makes others feel. It makes me want to be more like them. Hop on over to my Facebook page and join the smile campaign I'm starting. See the beautiful smiles from my life and share some of your own.

This is the first line of my Mom's Choice Award-winning book, Beautiful Me. It is basically the premise for the whole book. When the wild idea to pen a book for young girls about inner beauty popped into my head I first had to decide what beautiful looked like.

Google (notice how Merriam-Webster is no longer our go to these days) defines beautiful as something that is "pleasing to the senses or mind aesthetically". Now, to me that means more than just a pretty face. Anyone can doll themselves up and put on a beautiful mask, but as we all know that artificial beauty doesn't last long nor does it "aesthetically please" the mind for very long.

So, I sat down with my bright idea and did what any sensible writer would do, I brainstormed. (I say sensible here, because I have been known to lose my sensibility while writing and forget the power of brainstorming when I enter that dreaded zone writers fear called, "writer's block".)

When I took a moment to really think about the beautiful people in my life or those people that I just genuinely gravitated toward, they were people who showed kindness. It is authentic kindness that I believe is at the root of true inner beauty. Show me a kind person and I will show you a flock of people attracted to that person.

Kindness can be hard to come by in this world. Why else do random-acts of kindness make such huge headlines in our newsreels? We seek kindness from others, because it makes us feel good, makes us feel valued.

Where kindness is absent, ugliness spawns. It is where malice, fear, and defensiveness brew. This is where parents jeer the other little league team that wins the game against their child's instead of extending a heartfelt congratulations for a game well-played and an experience shared. Kindness is absent when we refuse to tell the woman next to us that she looks fabulous in her $700 dress because you feel inadequate in your $40 bargain bin frock--when in all reality does it really matter what the price tag is???

Kindness is simply a choice. A conscious choice to be made and shared with the world. I would love to live in a world that blossomed with kindness, wouldn't you?

How to Teach Kindness:

Model it: You will hear me say this a lot. Parents and caregivers are children's most immediate teachers. If they see you acting with kindness they will likely follow suit. If they see you help the neighbor take out her trash, they will more likely grow up to help their neighbor take out the trash. And don't be afraid to teach your kids that they can help a neighbor or a grandparent without getting paid, to simply do it because it is the kind thing to do.

Talk about it: Bring attention to a moment when someone was kind to you that your child observed and let them know how that made you feel. Try to help your child talk about times when they felt someone being kind to them or when someone was not kind to them. This teaches empathy and helps kids to realize the impact of their actions.

Be patient: Young children are developmentally at a stage where their world's are all about them. This egocentric phase is normal and makes unselfish behavior less of the norm, but that will change and when their eyes open to the world around them all that teaching you have been doing about being kind to others will start to sink in. Don't give up hope if your little one isn't ready to share her mittens with another child right away. This takes time and consistent modeling.

Please share a story about how you have witnessed kindness from the beautiful people in your life.