Keep Your Brain in a Book

HA!
That is one of my secrets. Actually it's no secret. My family and friends know that I do this. And I might have even mentioned it here before. It's worth repeating.

With a lot of kids, the house, the cheese business...  my brain is hitting the overflow a lot of days. That is when I carry a writing book of some sort around with me.
With the cheese business it tends to be a yellow legal pad (easily picked up at any grocery store). I scribble down things to do, ideas, people to call, and other important information. Typically it's attached to a clip board which I have lots of other pieces of paper tucked under the clip. I call it My Yellow Brain as in "Hey! Does anybody know where my Yellow Brain is?" I carry it a lot in spring and summer when the cheese business kicks in gear.

 I also have a planner (which needs a good clean out one of these days) that really is my brain. It's red so I call it My Red Book or My Red Brain. I use it most for storing important information. All the really important cheese business info is there. When we have a family cheese meeting I scribble the plans there. Important info concerning my college kids. Passwords.It has calendar so when important stuff is going on those days are filled up and lists of things to do are outlined and delegated and checked off from the Red Brain. You should have seen it last spring before we had a graduation party, 50th Anniversary party, and a WEDDING. Wowza.
 I keep names and phone numbers in it.You might say that's what  cell phone does for you BUT I tend to let my battery die and sometimes I misplace it. AND I'm old school and still learning how to use my five-plus years old cell phone. I don't want to give it up because it has large buttons like the Jitterbug. Yes, my kids snort with laughter at me while they store info in their phones. But my Red Brain has no batteries so HA!
And my planner is my Source Book of where I get what when I'm online shopping. This is a good thing because some things I only order once a year (swimwear) and can't always remember where that thing came from.

I have a black bag that I can keep both of my brains in and carry them out the door with me when I know I'm going to have some time in a waiting room or at piano lessons or children's choir. Then I reorganize my info, check dates, and make plans.

A few days ago I found an old journal where I had taken notes and quotes from some book. This is a fun thing to find and also taught me a couple of lessons. First, I should start a real quotation book. A place where I can put down things from the books I read along with my own thoughts. It should be a serious journal, something pretty, and I should keep it with my current reading book. And it should be able to fit into my black bag with my other brains.
And second, I should use quotes around the things from the book. In looking at this old journal I can't tell whether what is written is a quote or my thoughts in response to reading the book. It actually seems to be blurred and it's frustrating to me. I won't do that again! I think I've said that a lot in my life. 


Jennifer McBride collected quotes and turned it into a beautiful book that is on my list of things to get this week during Vision Forum's big sale.
Queen of the Home: Essays, Poetry, and Quotes on the Honor, Nobility, and Power of Biblical Womanhood


I love the title. I think it's a book that will set on my bedside table for a long time to be read a little bit at a time.

I think it will be excellent things to put into my brain and I won't have to write any quotes down because Jennifer already did it for me and put it into a book. I'm really looking forward to this book. 


As I said, my Red Brain has a calendar in it and now I have something special to do on Wednesdays. I will be writing over at Time-Warp Wife! I wrote with Darlene Schacht years ago at Christian Women Online. She caught me at a good time, right when I had been thinking that I really should be more disciplined and diligent about writing, so I said yes. Writing for Wednesdays will be a nice little jump start. I have lots of things circling around my brain to write on and sometimes they hit the overflow and land in my Red Brain. When I sit down at the keyboard they come out pretty fast. Writing for Wednesdays will make me  sit down. I don't sit down very well. But you can't write when you're moving around.
Bookmark Time-Warp Wife and come visit there on Wednesdays!