Do You Like Green Eggs & Ham?

This guy showed up at Coco's today.  Clearly, he got his dates mixed up.  Looks like I will be spending the next few days rhyming.  He will be taking up residence in the sweet shop.  Not sure where he is going.  I do know it has to be a spot where children can have their pictures taken with him.  He is large!
I am all about promoting a Dr. Seuss day to bring children and their parents into the shop.  Even more than that, I am all about having children enjoy books.  I truly believe the love of reading can help people throughout their entire lives. 
The Mrs. will be jumping over from One Carbon Hill to be my reader.  She is going to bring a few books.  I know she will do a great job.  My job is to have enough sweets, children, some contests, and
throw in some activities.  I am very excited.  I hope so many people show up, adults have to go outside and wait.  A crowd would be nice.
Some of my friends say they will be making an appearance.  Oh The Places They'll Go.  If they like green eggs and ham, they will be disappointed.  Breakfast will not be served at the sweet shop.  They might be able to find one fish, maybe even two fish, I know I have red fish, not blue fish.
I'll stop.  Hope to see you Saturday.  All the cool kids will be here.

Sorry I Have Been Gone

I have been busy making a few changes at Coco's.  I was losing my confidence over the super slow month of January.  I had a couple of friends come over for coffee and to give me a lift.  They made some suggestions.  My friend that owns The Paper offered up some free advertising and a discount on advertising.  Tru Stories came in and took some great pictures.  I was able to use one in a beautiful colored ad in The Paper.  Really stood out.  Had many compliments on the ads.
I also made the decision to change bakers for my cake pops.  The other lady was fine.  The new lady is amazing.  She lives in my town.  She frequents the shop with her adorable children.  She has a HUGE group of friends.  Her cake pops are adorable.  Using her has sparked some additional business.  One day I will get some new pictures up of all the adorable cake pops.  I sold around 40 the week of Valentine's Day.  Sold a few already this week too.
The other change I made was finding a bakery to buy additional fresh baked items.  It is in a town about 25 minutes from here.  Not a bad drive at all.  At the most, I will go twice a week.  The week of Valentine's Day I sold cupcakes, brownies, and crème horns.  Yummers!  When I met the man that owns the bakery, I asked him if he made a fried cinnamon.  He said he could.  I told him that my town craves a fried cinnamon of days gone by.  For years we had an AMAZING bakery.  The favorite item was a fried cinnamon.  People talk about it all the time.  They want the fried cinnamon back.  I say the fried cinnamon is like any legend.  Very exaggerated.  It has been years since people have had one.  Above is the fried cinnamon the bakery made for Coco's.  It is HUGE.  It smells amazing.  I am not sure if it tastes exactly like the "original."  I do know it is darn good.  Several people have sampled Coco's.  Most think it very close to what they remember.  I hope it is close enough to get people to crowd into the shop. 
Valentine's Week reminded me what it feels like to be busy.  It was a great feeling.  Gave me some hope.  The best part is people came in that have never been here before.  A few people have started coming in for gifts.  In order to succeed, Coco's has to become a habit.  The first place they think of when they want to give their kids a treat, take a nice sweet gift to someone, a place to come and hang out for coffee. 
Next week we will celebrate Dr. Seuss at Coco's.  The Mrs. will be coming into the shop to read stories.  There will be pictures to draw, activities, contests, and sweets.  Adorable themed cake pops.  Should be fun.  I hope it will be crazy busy.  I hope it is filled with children.  Come to celebrate at Coco's.  You come by too.  It will be a party.

Fridays Are Fun

During Christmas Break Tink's teacher came into my store.  She received a Coco's Gift Card from Tink for Christmas.  While she was in we started talking about the education system.  From the conversation I made the decision to volunteer in her classroom.  Wish I would have thought to do it before.  I love it.  I delay opening my shop one hour to go to the school.  What a great thing to be able to do.
If you read this blog, you know my passion is reading.  My super power is reading.  I spend my volunteer time testing the children.  They are first graders.  State Standards (dislike State Standards), dictate what is the words per minute the children should read for their level.  Every week they have a different store I test them on.  It is a one minute timed test.  I track wpm and errors.  The kids put their times on a graph and color their score.  It ends up being very time consuming.  Their are students on a watch list.  They read the weekly story and a second story as well.  The extra story is to test their ability to sound words.  I am thankful they are working on this skill.  If a child cannot sound words, spelling is very difficult. 
Today was my fourth visit to the school.  Last week I took candy and they each got two pieces after their reading.  It has become time consuming because I have to do make up tests if the kids missed the prior Friday.  There are extra charts to complete for the students that have the second story.  If the teacher were doing it herself, she would have to dedicate 90 minutes or more a week for this.  It would be impossible.  I sit in the hall at a table with the students.  That way we are not interrupted.  The teacher would never have the ability to have such a large block of time for one on one reading.
Tink loves my going to her classroom.  The students love that I give out candy after the test.  Some of the students are getting their parents to bring them to the shop now.  Bonus for me!!  Being able to go in and help the teacher is only going to make things easier for my grandkids.  Tru Stories does volunteer for her kids.  Unfortunately, a germ infested school is not a good place for TS to go in the winter months. 
Today I noticed a huge increase in the reading skills.  It is like a light went on for some of the kids.  For the readers that have exceeded their level, next week we move onto putting punctuation into the timed reading.  I am blessed to get to see children learning to read.  Seeing a passion begin to grow in a few of them.  It is obvious that some students have the advantage of reading being a part of their lives.  Probably, had parents reading to them since they were born.  My grandkids have always been surrounded by books.  TS does not have time to do her own reading.  She does make time to keep books in her children's lives.  I was not read to on a regular basis.  I remember having a few books when I was young.  I made sure books were always there for my kids.  There were not many nights they went to sleep without being read to.  Proud that is something that is continued with my grandchildren. 
Not sure I would have made a good teacher.  I should have been a librarian.  I spent all my free time in the school library from 6th grade through high school.  While I was in junior high I did story time for the younger grades.  Loved that!  Reading opens up the world to all of us.  Even if it is on the computer, reading about bugs.  Reading is learning.  One hour a week I am part of the process!