Why Baby Should Get A Job

Yesterday I helped Baby develop her curriculum vitae, so she can start job-hunting. She turns 15 at the end of May and will start Grade 10 around the third quarter of the school year, I think (she's on a self-paced curriculum). So she has decided that it's time to start earning money to cover all the lovely things teenagers seem to "need."

I was a bit sad having to acknowledge that my Baby is no longer a baby. But I'm also proud of her for her eagerness to make her way in the world.

No one had to prompt her to look for a part-time/weekend job. She made the decision, identified companies she wants to work for and which may also be looking to hire, did the CV (I was just an advisor on what goes into a CV) and then she emailed them  to the companies' HR departments.

For a moment there I was stumped, looking at the many things job seekers are required to supply a potential employer, and which they can only provide if they have worked before. Thankfully, she has done some hospitality and entrepreneurship courses at school and has volunteered for a caterer for weddings. So she did have some practical experience to include in her CV, even if she has never had a paying job.

The benefits of encouraging Baby to work


It occured to me that some people might wonder why we encourage a child under 16 to get a job. Isn't she too young? The fact of the matter is:

1. She wants to work. She is under no overt pressure to get a job, but she is growing up in an environment she is taught to make her way in life. And no job is too lowly, as long as it pays and gives you something to add to your CV.

2. Teenagers need lots of money to stay relevant with their peers and we're not wealthy. Not even comfortable. So while we can provide her with the basics, she will have to pay most of the luxuries herself or she doesn't get them.

3. It teaches her the value of money. Starting from when she was around 8 years old, I used to give Baby all of her allowance and what we both learnt is that she was more cautious about money when she knew she was responsible for all of it and there wouldn't be any more coming. I expect she'll be even more careful  and smart about money when she worked hard for it.

4. She needs to start gaining work experience early on. We've seen what happens to university graduates who finish school and have work experience. They struggle to find starter jobs, are too old and overqualified for other jobs and even when they do find something, they are at a disadvantage from competitors who have been working through high school or varsity. Then there is also the fact that they seem ill-prepared for the crap jobs, hoping that their degrees would make them exempt from having to pay their dues.

That's not going to happen to Baby. By the time she gets her degree, it will be a nice complement to her extensive work experience, so she does not enter the job market as a complete newbie. My sister and I did the same thing: I farmed her out to my working friends as an office drudge through her high school holidays and while some jobs sucked, she learnt a lot from the experience. By the time she left school and looked for a job, she had a rudimentary knowledge of creating filing systems, using computer programmes and the daily routines of an admin assistant ( of course she'd also done stints as a waitress and bartender, but she doesn't mention that in her CV:-).

5. Her time is better spent working and earning money, instead of finding what trouble she can get into. And we all know idle teenagers can easily find a lot of trouble to get into:-)

The legalities

I'm still pondering the child labour laws though. Baby plans to only work weekends, so that's not too many hours a week. I don't know what the minimum age to be allowed to work is. I think it's 16? I hope not, because she'd be really bummed if she had to wait another year before she could start working.

BTW, my nephew managed to fix my computer, so now the keyboard works well, and I reinstalled Firefox. Yep, it was a virus infection that caused my technical difficulties. So I've also updated my virus protection too.

Update: A big thank you to Po, who found out that the minimum age to work is 15 and provided this link.

https://www.labour.gov.za/legislation/acts/basic-guides/basic-guides-basic%20conditions%20of%20employment

Handbag Project Update & Baby Leaves

Just to let you know that they handbags, clothing, toys, toiletry and perfumes that you donated for The Handbag Project are now on the way to Durban, as promised. Many thanks to all of you who either donated something, or blogged about the initiative.

Special thanks to Laura at HarassedMom, who did both, and made time to come over Pretoria to deliver a lot of stuff at my house. Yes I know you had other business in Johannesburg, but still...All I can say is, you rock!

The past week was busy, as Baby and I hung out with people she's known and loved for the past 12 years, whom she no longer sees regularly.

It was lovely, except for the Justin Bieber torture devise, but now that Baby has left, there's a part of me that misses her, and another part that sighs with relief because now I'll have time to catch with writing and enjoy some quiet time and catch up with some writing.....

I think sleep is going to a nice little luxury for a while, because I have a huge load of contracted work to get off my desk.

Enjoy the rest of the week.

Join the conversation

And if you have time, please take part in some of the discussions on my client sites:

• Read SA -What do authors owe their readers? What do readers owe writers? ( the author/reader loyalty dynamic)

• OneLove - Do you think HIV prevention campaigns are working?
• Does polygamy have a place in a democracy?
• Shukumisa - If a woman co-habits with a man for years, without their ever getting married, what is she entitled to when the relationship ends, if she was not earning any income/siginificant income? ( This is a new Facebook page for a client that I've just set up. Please join if the issue interests you.)
  

I love Baby. Really I do.

BUT, I do not love Justin Bieber. And I'm not happy that I have to spend time listening to him in order to spend time with Baby. He sounds like all the other teeny boppers who have come before him. His greatest advantage is that he actually sings - some of them just growl or something. Gah!

Today I have published a nice feature article on Poverty and the decision to have more than one sexual partners on the OneLove web site. As one of the readers says: “A girl who has multiple partners keeps them for financial reasons. One of them could pay her school fees, another takes care of her wardrobe, one other could just be for events and general entertainment(girls like to be proud of a guy that them out), another could be specifically for pocket money and she could have another one who she officially tags boyfriend.”

Read the full article

Also spent some time chatting to an old friend I haven't seen in over 3 years, though we live in the same city. We keep talking about actually meeting, but never get off our butts enough to make it happen. Thank God for email and Skype and mobile phones, because we still talk a lot, as if we see each other in person regularly.

My friend is a digital strategist, and she says: "A colleague of mine wants to meet with editors in the online and magazine world." My first thought was, "I hope there's some advertising revenue to be had from her clients!"

Anyhoo, if you have a South Africa-based IT pub I don't know about send me an email at damariasenne@gmail.com about your pub and I'll pass your details to my friend. The pub can either be print or online.

Now I'm off to arrange a series of interviews for feature articles for GradX. I always feel a sense of accomplishment once the articles are finished, but damn they're work!

And then I'm going spend the rest of the day writing web copy for the new web sites.

On Being A Consistent Writer, Exams and Life Changes

Ja, I know I've been very quiet, somewhat erratic when it comes to talking about my writing life. I've posted before that I wished I was a more consistent writer, who delivers good writing on call, everyday. I definitely don't feel like one.

Even though I felt like I was stumbling along, I have been somewhat productive in the past couple of weeks. Have increased the number of posts on the OneLove web site to an average of four per day, and am initiating more discussions on the Facebook page. I'm also launching a monthly electronic newsletter for the project - the first issue goes out early December.

Kwanda has slowed down a little - the TV series is now down to final week for the last team. Next week viewers will be asked to vote for the team that they feel performed the best - that is, a team that met their goals, navigated their challenges wisely, raised more money and had greater social impact in their community. Voting will be done by SMS. If you're not sure which team to vote for, check out the episode summaries on the Kwanda web site. Or you can check out the discussions on the Facebook pages.

Creative Writing News

The Read SA social network on Facebook is going very well too. We now have about 568 members (at the time of blogging). We are also publishing profiles of South African authors, along with details of their books, on the READ SA micro site. To date, I have published profiles of:

• Megan Voisey-Braig, author of Till We Can Keep An Animal (Winner of the European Union literary award 2007/2008)
• Zukisa Wanner, author of The Madams (2006), Behind Every Successful Man (2008) and the upcoming (Men Of the South).

Also look out for profiles of Louis Greenberg, author of The Beggars' Signwriter (2006) and Richard de Nooy, author of Six Fang Marks and a Tetanus Shot. These two profiles are going live this week on the Read SA micro site. Bookmark the site and check them out later; you might discover a new to you writer, or fall in love with a book.

Life news

On the life front, Baby is in the middle of her Grade 5 exams, finishing on Friday. I'm more stressed about it than she is. She says she printed out her notes, studied them, researched where she needed to, and did the mock tests. She's confident she'll do well. But I can't help but worry. Not because I fear she'll fail, but because she's her own worst critic and if her end of year marks don't meet her expectations[winning the academic merit], or even one of her subjects is out of par, she won't take it well at all. So I try to prevent the situation from arising by making sure she's well prepared.

I know she needs to learn some balance, see the big picture and enjoy her accomplishments and not just things she needs to improve. It's something I've been trying to teach her since she was in pre-school. And something I don't talk about much with other mothers, because many of them complain that they have to push their kids to study, do well academically, and I just want mine to be better socialised and understand that the key to life is learning from your failures/mistakes.

Anyhoo, there is a big, somewhat traumatic life change coming on in my life. I initiated it, prepared for it since May this year. But that does not necessarily mean that emotionally, I welcome it wholeheartedly. Sorry for being cryptic - I'll explain at the end of November, when this change has happened.

Why Do I Feel I Have To Leave School To Learn About Life

Today I'm publishing a poem that I used on the OneLove web site to motivate why schools should make life skills education a priority. I thought you might also find the poem interesting.

......................................................................................................................................................
By Anonymous

You taught me the names of the cities of the world
but
I don’t know how to survive the streets in my own city

You taught me the minerals that are in the earth
but
I do not know what to do to prevent
my world’s destruction

You taught me how to speak and write in three languages
but
I do not know how how to say what I feel in my heart

You taught me all about reproduction in rats
but
I don’t know how to prevent pregnancy

You taught me how to solve math problems
but
I don’t know how to solve my own

Yes, you taught me many facts and thank you
I am quite clever now
but
Why is it I feel I know nothing?
Why do I feel I have to leave school to go and learn about coping with life?

Source: The poem was published in the Soul City Life Skills Grade 9, Teacher's Guide

Teaching Children How To Start & Manage A Business

Tomorrow is enterpreneur's day at Baby' school, so she's going to run a jewellery stall for a day. Essentially, the kids choose the merchandise they want to sell, borrow money from their parents to buy stock and pay R10 for the stall, develop promotional materials like posters and invite the general public to attend their fair.

On the day, the kids sell a variety of goods including curries, burgers, hot dogs, cakes and drinks, as well as jewellery and many other things primary school kids find interesting.

As far as I'm concerned, buying stock is the hardest part of the job. We visited a number of wholealers, argued about whether the stuff she wanted could be sold at profit, discussed the profit margin we wanted and calculated it, then had to work out if we would pay that amount of money for cheap jewellery.

The selling part will be easier: last year Baby showed me that she did have the makings of a good salesperson. She had no qualms walking around the "fair" hawking stuff and encouraging students to go to her stall. I even heard her negotiate for a discount to encourage a mother to buy 3 pairs of ear-rings, instead of one. I was so proud!

After the fair, the kids who made a profit are upposed to pay back their parents their seed money and donate 10% of their profits to charity. I can't think of a better way to teach children about how to start and manage your own business.

Do Children Need To Learn How To Use Maps?

Baby picked up Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery and Where It Stops Nobody Knows by Amy Ehrlich from her school library.

I always enjoyed Anne of Green Gables, so I'm looking forward to stealing moments here and there to read it. But I started out with Where It Stops Nobody Knows and out loud a couple of pages near the end of the book while we prepared supper. [I always read the end of a book first before I decide if I like it].

There's a part where Nina, the teenage main character, looks through maps with another girl to show her where the many places she has travelled.

Baby: What's a map?
Me: Oh, you know. Those big books that have drawings of all the countries in the world. You use them to find places, even street addresses.
Baby: [looking puzzled]: Sounds like waay too much work. Why can't the person just use Google Earth to find places? Or GPS if you only have an address but don't know how to get there?

Ja, I know it comes from growing up with a geeky mother who relied heavily on GPS. But I think it's time I invested in a map. I don't know whether Baby will understand why I want her to look for countries and places using it, rather Google Earth. I'm not even too sure if I'm romanticising something that is actually obsolete. But %^$#%! I can't have my child growing up never having touched a map and thinking GPS is the answer to all directional troubles!

So what do you think? What's the advantage of teaching our children how to use maps, rather than relying GPS?

Guest Post: Help Me To Understand The World Of Mean Girls

I promised Baby that I was going to blog about her being bullied by girls at her school, so we can get more input from other women because she feels that what I am saying is not helping her much. So I did a post about it for Female2Female.

Check it out, and if you have some words of wisdom, please share.

The Beginning Of Third School Term; Kwanda Site Ready For TV Series Launch

It's the first day of the third term of Baby's school year, and we'd gotten lazy over the past month, because we didn't have to wake up early. So I woke up an hour later than I would have liked, then rushed Baby through the morning rituals.

It helped that she's an oddly organised small person and she'd taken out her uniform and all other necessities the night before. So there were no tears ala "I can't find my socks!" and she was out of the house by 7h10.

Then I checked the Kwanda site and the design had improved so much. MANY THANKS to John Phillip, web designer extraordinaire, who worked his butt off to make sure that concepts are turned into an attractive site that does what it's supposed to.

P.S. I can't pimp John enough. He's talented, he'll work late into the night [though maybe the calls after midnight to explain stuff to me was unusual:-)] and he's very easy-going.

Kwanda premiers on SABC1 tonight at 9pm.

P.P.S - The OneLove regional campaign is still rocking along too. And I'd really appreciate your input on this reader story: "I've just found out that my husband is cheating on me!"

No, this is not a True Confessions type of thing. It's a real story from a woman who is clearly hurting and would appreciate some words of encouragement. Especially if you've been there, felt her pain. Because sometimes, it's comforting to know that you are not alone in the dark, scary room.

What's The Point Of Buying A Book?

I’m doing a very quick survey for a publisher on reluctant readers and I was horrified to find out that one of my relatives who I thought had a nodding acquaintance with books was no reader at all.

In fact, his views on books, and willingness to pass those views to a child, made me consider that he's not as sensible as I thought he was.

The following is a scene took place this past weekend while we were visiting my family in Phokeng. Baby was just chilling, reading AIR HEAD – BEING NIKKI, by Meg Cabot.

Adult Male Relative: Why do you read so much?
Baby: Because I enjoy it.
AML: [grunt]And what do you do with the book once you’ve finished reading it?
Baby: I put it on my bookshelf. Then whenever I want to read it again, I can do so.
AML: I really don’t understand the point of buying a book. Once you’ve read it, you know the story and there’s no point of reading it again. It's a waste of money, and you might as well throw it away afterwards.

"How can you learn anything new if you never read," I wanted to ask him. I would have understood if he at least non-fiction in a variety of subjects, but he told Baby that he only reads material that has to do with his job.

I decided not to interfere while Baby tried to explain why reading was important to her, and why good books were worth reading again. Sadly enough, AML blew off her explanation, saying he had better things to do with his time and money than spend them on books.

Now keep in mind that AML is in his early twenties. I shudder to think about his spending the rest of his life - and it could be a long life - never reading a book unless he has to. Grrrrrrrrrrr!

OK, now tha I got that out of my system, my question to you as a reader, writer, blogger and parent is this: Put yourself in Baby’s shoes. How would you have answered the question?

Bonding Over Buffy and Junk Food

Baby's Spring holidays began today and we had a lovely time last evening just hanging.

I became a fan Buffy the Vampire Slayer back when it used to play on TV.

So when I saw a box set of the first 4 episode of the series retailing for R29 at CNA, I grabbed it, thinking to introduce Baby to the series.

After a dinner of cheeseburger meal from McDonald's for Baby and a packet of fries and salad for me, we spent the evening cuddles in front of the TV set watching Buffy kick butt.

And she loved it!

It was a bonding moment.

I'm definitely going to back to CNA to buy the next 4 episodes (retailing for R49). They get you hooked by selling the first 4 at a low price and then raising the price when you want more:-).

Awkward Moments

I mentioned previously that I would blog about some of the awkward questions that Baby asked when we had the Big Sex Talk.

Anyway, check out the post on Female2Female, where I ask about the appropriate age to start talking to your child about sex. And what are the most important lessons that you feel that your sons and daughters need to learn about their sexuality?

Read the full post and join the discussion.

Teaching Your Child About Sex

Last night Baby and I had the big sex talk. An educational theatre group came to their school to help them learn more about sexuality - the way their bodies are changing, sex etc.

We've had similar discussions, so a lot of the info was not new to her. But she did have more questions she wanted to ask (some of which were so awkward they rate a blog post on their own).

Thank God for the work I do for the OneLove campaign, because I had a lot of resource materials aimed at young people which I could lend her.

The one she liked the most was Choose Life. I guess she's going to be reading about sex for weeks on end!

My question for you is: what was the most awkward question that your child/niece/nephew asked when you had the big sex talk? Did you answer the question? Why/not?

Nurturing tomorrow's leaders

Sent out the media statement about the ICT leadership programme early this morning. A number of publications picked it up, which is great.

CoachLab ups innovative thinking
Universities partner for ICT leadership programme

Launch event is this evening, and two pubs have asked for stories: a 300-word piece and pic, and a longish piece looking at the issue from an HR perspective.

Contact me if you want to write/blog about this and need more information.

Life Should Be Lived Physically, Not Just Virtually

It's mid-term break and Baby is home all day for the whole week. So I'm facing the challenge of keeping her busy even as keep my normal work hours.

The challenge is that she will happily spend all day IMing her friends, playing on barbie.com and similar sites and watching girly movies ( The Cheetah Girls, Bratz, High School Musical etc).

I don't think that's healthy for a child to spend too much time watching stuff that doesn't even reflect real ife, or living life virtually, insteading of DOING fun things with real people she can see and touch.

So I became the heavy that said she was restricted to real life things. That is surfing, IMing, watching TV or DVDs is banned in this house.

Instead, she has fabric to sew, beads to make necklaces and bracelets and stuff, and a recipe book to cook/bake/whatever. She can also go for long walks, go play in the park ( accompanied by my helper), brush our dogs' fur. ( Edward is a Chow mix, and has really long hair that makes him look like a lion).

I wonder if she noticed I didn't ban reading novels? Ja, I'm a hypocrite, because reading novels is not a real life event.

Meanwhile, if you have a minute, hop onto the OneLove web site, where a discussion is going on about the emotional pain one sufffers when breaking up with a partner, even when tha person is already married to someone else.

Reading Pride and Prejudice

I'm reading Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice to Baby as a bed-time story.

She picked it up at her school library for her two-week read. And despite the difficulty she has with the language, she's thoroughly enjoying the book. We're now on Chapter 5.











She already knows the basics of the story, as she watched Bride and Prejudice (the Bollywood movie) several times.


And to answer your question BeckyJoie, no, Baby's not really into fantasy. She did enjoy the Twilight series, but she still has a hard time getting into unfamiliar worlds.

A friend of mine bought her the Abhorsen Trilogy by Garth Nix, and she didn't even finish Sabriel. Maybe when she's older, she'll appreciate the books more.

Grudgingly Learning How Stuff Works

The responsible parent in me knows we need to give our children as rounded an education as possible, so they get useful skills, gain understanding of how the world works and can find their own career interests.

But as an individual, I couldn't help but why my 11-year old daughter needs to know how hydroelectric power stations and geothermal power work.

Today I was testing her on sources of power; specifically looking at how hydroelectric and geothermal power is made. She has a cycle test tomorrow and wanted to brush up on stuff. Boy, was it hard on my old brain.

Her books explained some of it, but not wanting to rely on only one source of info, I suggested we do Google searches and see what other reports had to say.

Lots of it was incoherent tripe. OK, maybe that's a bit harsh, but why couldn't some of these writers explain things in simple English?

Amid lots of giggling over silly old Mum not getting it, we managed to work our way through the stuff. Hopefully, she'll pretend she's explaining things to idiot me during test, and be as simple but thorough as possible.

Desperately seeking used tween novels


Also spent a frustrating evening at CNA trying to find a book for Baby to read. The shelves were full of High School Musical and Hannah Montana books, with a bit of Nancy Drew thrown it.

I know High School Musical and Hannah Montana are extremely popular - and therefore cash-cows for the bookstores - but for goodness' sake, do they really think that's all young girls want to read/ should read?

And where can international and local writers who write for tweens ( but not based-on-TV series crap) sell their books in South Africa if CNA does not carry them?

Sometimes I think writers are really optimistic creatures, spending hours creating characters that hopefully, people want to know more about. Sometimes it works and people fall in love with the characters and want it as a movie too. (Harry Potter series and the Twilight series being good examples in my own household).

But too many times, young readers are fed the book franchise version of what's on TV.

Bah!

Ended up buying The Tracy Beaker Trilogy by Jacqueline Wilson. The deal-maker was that fact that I was getting three books in one, and the store had slashed the original price by 50%.

OK, I'm sure you can tell I'm not in a very good mood, so I'll toodle off to bed early. As Scarlett says, "tomorrow is another day."


P.S.

Work was great thanks, so it's not the reason for my mood .The grey, wet and cold weather and little life irritants are the sources of my discontent.

Finally figured out how to sort a web design glitch that was bugging me all week, had a good meeting with one client, posted content up as usual, and am working on a small article that stretches me out of my comfort zone.

Things are also rocking on the OneLove web site. In addition to the usual comment/chatter, I had three poetry submissions for the OneLove Poetry Competition today, and an online writer asked out of the blue if she could contribute an article in exchange for a link. So all the blog promotion I've been doing for the site ( and other sites) is starting to pay off.

P.P.S - Just found out that my post on blog promotion was published on the 12th Editiion of "Bringing More Traffic To Your Blog Carnival."

Nice! I should do more carnival submissions over the weekend.

Control Freak Mommy Has To Let Go ( A Little)

“You and relaxation are complete strangers, aren’t you?” 11-year old Baby said this morning.

I laughed, but there was a part of me that was horrified by her insight. Last night she announced that she was old enough to get herself ready for school, and I didn’t have to wake up in the morning to supervise her activities.

She took the alarm clock, set it for 5.30 and set out the day’s uniform. Breakfast was going to be a cold cereal, probably Wheatbix, with milk. “Enjoy the extra hours of rest and relaxation in bed,” she said.

We didn’t consider that I am a control freak when it comes to her, and couldn’t just relax, assuming all her morning tasks would get done.

I felt a little lost, not being in control of the alarm clock. So I didn’t sleep well, because I was worried that it would ring and she’d miss it.

As if!

She got up on time, ran a bath and did all the things she was supposed to do. Except Control Freak Mommy woke up before the alarm rang “ to make sure all was in order” and kept asking, ”Are you done taking a bath?” “Why haven’t you finished dressing yet?” “You should dress faster; you won’t have time to eat breakfast at that rate.”

“Stay in bed and get some rest,” she’d say. “I’m fine.”

I suspect what she meant was, “for the love of all the rotten tomatoes, will you just shut up and let me do this by myself?”

I know what Baby’s move to be independent in the mornings means: it means she’s no longer a baby.

And Control Freak Mommy has to let go a little. She has to trust that her baby can do certain things without help. She has to stay out of it while Baby gets ready for school, even if the tension becomes unbearable. And if Baby does not cope well, and ends up late for school, she has to be allowed to take responsibility for her actions.

Gah!

German publisher knocks on my door

On Friday I received a Facebook request from the rep of a German publisher asking me to send him my contact details.

The publisher wanted to publish one of my articles in a textbook under development, and they wanted to send me details.

Within hours, the whole process was ironed out: they’d already worked out how the story would be used and had a draft lay-out of the page.

All they needed was to finalise the legal stuff and find out if I was happy with the way the piece was used.

It was a lovely experience, and improved my mood tremendously (I was very angry because I’d been robbed that morning/previous night).

Birthday celebration

Saturday Baby took a couple of her girlfriends to the movies. They eventually decided on Night at the Museum 2, as none of them had seen it before.

They had a lot of fun – lots of popcorn, slushies, sweets and McFlurry’s. Ja, I wanted to sneak in something nutritious in the mix, but the girls wouldn’t have it. And it was a birthday celebration, so I let it slide.

The girls spent the rest of the afternoon window shopping at the mall (under parental supervision of course). Baby used some of the birthday gift money to buy herself 2 DVDs – Beverly Hills Chihuahua and 5 episodes of the Mew Mew Power cartoon.

One of the mothers sent a big bottle of Givenchy’s YSATIS as a gift. She must have forgotten about Baby’s birthday (and felt guilty about not buying a gift).

I had a lot of fun trying to talk Baby out of it. Eleven-year old girls who still watch Beverly Hills Chihuahua and Mew Mew Power don’t need YSATIS, do they?

Baby wouldn’t budge: it was her gift, even if it was inappropriate and the fact that I wanted it so much must mean it was a good thing. Eventually, I managed to negotiate some usage priviledges:-)

Marketing is critical to business success

We spent most of Sunday with a good friend of mine and her daughter. My friend is a very versatile, talented artist and has recently finished doing artwork for a big hotel (artwork in my post was in line with interior designer's brief).

Unfortunately, she’s terrible at marketing herself, operating from the premise that all she has to do is produce good art and the work will come in. Hah!

Thankfully, she recognises that business doesn't quite work out that way ( and she has to be to a business person in addition to being an artist). So we spent a lot of time talking about how she can get her name and work out into the market, given the difficulty she has putting herself out to people.

I think it would be really lovely she could find a business development manager/artist’s rep who would take care of getting clients and doing the business management end of things. It would free my friend up to focus on what she does really well.

But I have no idea where she can find one ( not being in the business myself) and suggested she do a lot of internet research. Hmm. We’ll see if something comes out of it.

OneLove Poetry Competition: The call for love poems continues

Over the past month, we received a couple of entries (poems) for the OneLove Poetry Competition. Not as many as we need, or what I hoped for. So we’re going to run the competition again for the next couple of months.

So if you write poetry, please submit your poem to the competition? The theme is love and respect.

You can submit the poems directly on the comments page ( which no one had done:-) or you can email me at admin@onelovesouthernafrica.org ( as some people have done)

A Special Day

Yesterday I mentioned that today is a very special day for my family. It's Baby's 11th birthday. And the reason I mentioned that Gaynor would know what I'm talking about is that his 11-year old son was also born on the same day, effectively making them twins.

So happy birthday, kids!

Of course the day was hectic yesterday, getting the cake organised for her to take to school and printing invitations to 7 girlfriends she's taking to the movies over the weekend.

The girls are divided: a couple of them want to watch Coraline, while others want to watch 17 Again. I voted for Coraline - it's based on Neil Gaiman's novel of the same name and I think he rocks.

Speaking of entertainment choices, Baby and I have discovered the joy of liking the same books and reading them at the same time.

I have previously mentioned that she loved Twilight by Stephenie Meyer. Well, she worked her way through New Moon and she's now half-way through Eclipse. And she loves sharing bits and pieces of the book with me; sharing something that she finds funny or strange etc.

Of course, for the most part she skips the kissing/romantic bits. Too mushy, she says. Or when she doesn't skip them, she reads them as a parody.

Huh! I give her five years and then she'll be ooing and aahing over the romantic bits.

Yesterday, today and tomorrow

I typed up a poem titled "Yesterday, today and tomorrow." My 20-year old nephew, Agisanang Mokua, wrote the poem as part of a collection of poetry and lyrics.

Baby is going to use the poem for her solo performance in this year's Eisteadford, which I think takes place in September. Maybe? Gosh, need to double check dates. Anyway, her teacher has already approved the poem, so it's all systems go.

Agisanang is really into romantic poetry and songs, and even though he has no plans to go into the creative arts, I hope he keeps up the writing. If nothing else, it is an outlet to express himself creatively.

Check out Yesterday, today and tomorrow in my African Tales blog. I didn't do any edits or changes; I simply typed it up ad published it as it is, to showcase the raw talent Agisanang has.

As for work-related writing:

Watch this fun video on How to Heal A Broken Heart which I posted on the OneLove web site. The video is aimed mainly at young women, but the humour has universal appeal.

You can also find out how you can get your community involved in the OneLove campaign.

I won a CD!

This morning I woke up to find out that I had won a Beatles CD by Rockabye Baby from www.momz.co.za.

According to Momz:

Rockabye Baby! transforms timeless rock songs into beautiful instrumental lullabies. The soothing sounds of the glockenspiel, vibraphone, mellotron and other instruments will lull your baby into a sweet slumber.

Users of the Momz web site were asked to submit articles to the portal, and a winner would be randomly selected.

I rarely write for competitions, but there was no subject restriction, so last night I decided to submit an old article that was never sent out . God knows it was doing me no good languising in my hard drive. And just in time too, because I turned up the winner. Yay!

This CD is the perfect Christmas gift for my younger sister, who is 2 months pregnant. I would never have thought to buy her something like this for Christmas, but now that I'm getting it, I'm excited about it. I'm sure she and the baby with enjoy it.