Italian Pignoli (Pine Nut) Cookies, by, Gina Meyers

Italian Pignoli (Pine Nut Cookies)
1 cup pine nuts
1 tube 7 ounces of almond paste *cut into small pieces
2/3 cup of sugar
2 eggs (whites only)
1 teaspoon of lemon juice

Directions: Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  Mix paste, sugar, egg whites and lemon juice in a mixer. Drizzle extra virgin olive oil on a cookie sheet and form Pignoli Cookie Dough with a spoon. Drop about a teaspoonful of dough on the greased cookie sheet. Gently press additional pine nuts onto the top of the cookie. Bake for twenty minutes.

Bewitched, Bedazzled, Bewitched

Bewitched, reminiscent of all great television sitcoms, shows us our place in life.  It gives us a glimpse of the family we would like to be a part of, the job we wish to land, the person we would like to become, the friends we would like to have, and the dreams we wish to fulfill.  Like a fairy godmother’s magic dust, a good sitcom covers reality with fantasy and illusion and provides the modern liberated child in all of us with the security of reruns on the tube. 

Bewitched   teaches a valuable lesson, that there is “magic” in us and it is waiting to be freed.  A talent cannot be suppressed; a gift cannot be ignored in order to please someone else.  In Samantha’s case, her talent was witchcraft, and she tried to please her mortal husband Darrin by abstaining from her craft.

A gift is irrepressible and eventually it will emerge. Look at all the chaos that occurred when Sam tried to suppress her talent. 

Bewitched showed fans that we all have special hidden talents/ “magic” that need to be explored. 

The Magic of Bewitched: Trivia and More book is meant to be informational, fun, and a treasure to add to your Bewitched collection. You, the reader, are invited to the “magic” show. 

We want love to be magical.  We want to live simply and happily.  No one wants their life to be humdrum, married to an individual that sometimes acts like a dum-dum, live in a home in the middle of doldrums, with average children.  We all desire to be special and unique.  Not only do we want to meet Mr. or Miss Right, we want it to be a mystical experience.  In a life that has countless trying moments, we deserve something magical to cherish.  Just go back for a moment in time—look down memory lane.  What are your fondest memories?  Do they seem unreal, like a dream?  That is exactly why Bewitched was so appealing.  It made us secretly wish that there were real witches like Samantha that turned mundane life into magic!

Bewitched Banana Blueberry Bread

1- 6 ounce size of Light Vanilla Yogurt

2 bananas

½ package of Frozen Blueberries

1 Tablespoon of Vanilla Extract

1 teaspoon of Baking soda

2 eggs

butter (optional)

2 cups of flour

1 cup of sugar

½ cup of vegetable oil

Directions: Mix all ingredients (excluding flour) with an electric mixer on medium speed, scraping sides with the spatula until well blended. Add flour and blend. May add the blueberries early since they are frozen. If using fresh blueberries, wait until you have added the flour, then spoon in and fold fresh blueberries. Spray (or grease) a loaf pan and bake in a 350 degree oven for forty minutes, or until a tooth pick placed in the center of the bread comes out clean.

Put God First

Put God first.

 By, Gina Meyers

Putting God first means not being afraid to being open to God’s divine calling in your life. First, forgive yourself . That is the only way that you can truly FEEL God’s love. God loves you. Whomever you are, whatever you do, wherever you live. Forgiving yourself means letting go of the idea that you have to be a perfect human being.

Second, you have to believe in miracles and share these miracles with those around you. I have been a witness to many miracles. Miracles are a sign of God’s activity validating the divine message and the messenger. You can put your trust in God. I believe the worst thing a person can do is to deny God’s miracles.

I Have A Dream Speech on Equality with an ESL Lesson

Do you treat people equally? If you are a parent, do you favor one child over the other? Have you ever treated someone differently based upon appearance? There are a whole slew of things that make us different, and so many things that we have in common.

Respecting our differences.

Do you assume something about a person’s character if they have tattoos? What about body piercings? What about the type of clothes they wear or how they speak? What if you saw a disabled man or woman trying to get on the metro (bus), would you help him/her?

Do you treat people equally?

Aim: fluency based lesson: speaking, writing, and reading

Definition of: The Golden Rule: treating others the way you want to be treated.

Questionnaire

1. Is it ok to insult or make fun of people as long as they don't hear it? Why or why not.

2. What do you dislike most about the way people treat one another?

3. What do you think is Martin Luther King's message in his, "I Have A Dream Speech"?
4. Do you think racism exists?

5. Do you think people are afraid of differences sometimes?

6. What are some ways you can treat people lovingly and kindly?

Vocabulary

A put down

An insult

Respect

The Golden Rule

Positive traits

Characteristics

Negative traits

Personality

Anaphora (repeating words at the beginning of neighboring clauses, “I Have A Dream”, repeated eight times is an example, Anaphora is commonly used in speeches)

Alliteration (Device used most commonly in poetry, when the same consonants are repeated, “She sells sea shells down by the sea shore.” Alliteration is used for poetry mainly).

Fluency

Reading:  “I Have A Dream Speech”, by, Dr. Martin Luther King Junior

Listening:  Aretha Franklins’ “Respect” song

Writing: assignment

1)      Have you ever been made fun of for something you couldn't change?

2) Have you ever had a Dream like the Dream that Dr. Martin Luther King Junior describes in his I Have A Dream Speech?

Writing: Dr. Martin Luther King uses Anaphora in his speech. By repeating the words, I Have A Dream. Write your own speech using starting each of your five sentences with, I Have A Dream……..

On the board (write on easel)

Do's and Don’ts list for treating people that are different from us with respect, identifying behaviors that are both positive and negative traits.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

Gina is the publisher of Serendipity Media Group, a marketing, promotions, and publishing house. http://www.serendipitymediagroup.com