Melanie Wilson (00:00) Ruth, thank you so much for joining me here on the Homeschool Sanity Show. Before we get started with our topic, I would love to have you introduce yourself to our listeners and explain how the idea for Sociable Bunny came about. Ruth Wilkey (00:16) Well, I'd like to start by just thanking you so much for this opportunity. So exciting, so much to share. So I'd like to introduce myself. You can see my piano in the background. I was a piano teacher for about 30 years. So I had the opportunity to work with children because I taught the Suzuki method. I could start with children at four years old, but then I taught grandparents up to like 74. So very fun and I learned so much from them and through that time. As a Suzuki teacher, the very first thing we learned in Suzuki training, in fact, there's a book by Dr. Suzuki called Every Child Can Learn. The philosophy is every child can learn if taught well and nurtured by love. So when they struggled or made mistakes, I would say, I must not have taught that very well. me try again. You know, and they would just grow and thrive and they became so amazing as the kids got a little older that we started a little business called Touch of Class and they would play for weddings and parties and traveled around even and did events. So that's what can happen when children are taught well and nurtured by love. Melanie Wilson (01:16) Mmm. Ruth Wilkey (01:44) ⁓ One of them started playing for weddings when she was nine because she just had, she had talent, she had passion, and she had discipline with her homeschool mom. And so these kids just, you know, thrived in that environment. So it's very exciting to be talking to homeschool moms because I loved working with my homeschool families. ⁓ Melanie Wilson (01:50) Wow. Hmm Ruth Wilkey (02:13) I did not have children of my own, but the Lord has given me two children as adults later in life that he's allowing me to nurture and help them grow in their own spiritual formation. So that's been very exciting for me as well. ⁓ How sociable Bunny came about is about mid-career. had, yeah, I was single and I was in my mid forties. And I was still struggling. I was doing well in my career, but in personal relationships, I had just a series of broken relationships and heartaches. And finally I said, Lord, I can't do this anymore. Would you please just take me home? Instead, he took me on an adventure to Hawaii. And I knew I was gifted as a writer and I had intended for many years to write. my father's story because he has such an interesting story. And the opportunity came up to study for three months in a writer's school under my favorite living author, who's Bodhi Taney. I don't know if you are familiar with her. She's written the Zion Chronicles and Zion Covenant, and it's just fascinating. ⁓ so I knew that that she knew how to take a story and make it come alive. Melanie Wilson (03:25) Mm-mm. Ruth Wilkey (03:42) and I wanted to learn to do that under her. So I went to the writer's school intending to write my father's story. The morning we had a lecture phase and then we were going to start writing. The morning I was going to start writing, my roommate brought me breakfast in bed and she said, good morning sociable bunny. And this whole like series, you know, flashed through my mind and people had said during the lecture phase and stuff, We think you're going to write your own story. And I'm like, I don't have a story to write. You know, I didn't want to live anymore, you know, so it's going to hear my story. But, ⁓ you know, it says every child can learn if nurtured by love. I learned that every child can have an adventure with Jesus nurtured by love. And Jesus took me on a new kind of adventure, even though I had known him, you know, my whole life being raised in a Christian family. Melanie Wilson (04:17) Gosh. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (04:40) and always loving him, he developed a new kind of relationship with me. And so I learned so much and then some of those stories of my being bullied in school, I was, shy, was quiet, I was smart. And there's another girl that I don't know if she was jealous or just a power or whatever, but she became my bully and would turn the kids against me. And then one day they'd all talk to me and be my friends. The next day, nobody would talk to me. They'd all shun me. It's kind of crazy making. And it made me very insecure in relationships. So that's how the sociable bunny story started with this little bunny who's having struggles with a bully. And then Jesus, the lion, I love the Chronicles of Narnia, my favorite. Melanie Wilson (05:17) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (05:40) author who is no longer with us is C.S. Lewis. I love his stuff. So, um, it's like Jesus came to me as Aslan during that time because I had had a trauma with some men and it was hindering my relationship with Jesus as a man. But I had no walls against the lion. I love the lion. And, um, we had a Melanie Wilson (05:51) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (06:09) little class on listening to the voice of God and one of the questions we were to ask Jesus, Jesus how do you see me? And he said I see you as Lucy and you get to ride on my back and watch the wonders unfold. So that's what began to happen as I started writing and going for walks and he would give me like the next chapter and the next chapter and sometimes Melanie Wilson (06:19) Hmm. Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (06:37) I'd be totally surprised. I'm like, really? Seriously? But it went into the book and so it was very fun. And then, soon as I finished writing it, I ran into some teachers because I was trying to figure out what was the right age group. So I went to, I think, bookstore, maybe Barnes and Noble or something, and there were a bunch of teachers there. And we started chatting and I said, I'm trying to figure out what's the right age group for this story. So they invited me to the school. I ended up reading K through six. Every age loved it. But I felt like second grade was the target audience. And the second grade teacher said, please do not publish this Christian because these are the kids that need it. That particular school had a lot of domestic abuse and stuff. And you could see when Melanie Wilson (07:15) Hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (07:33) I would read the line that said, where the lion said, I see into your bunny burrow, I feel the bee stings in your heart. And the kids would be like, somebody understands. You you could just see. And they were just like on the edge of their seats and gripped. And so ⁓ I tried to get it published through some of the secular publishers. Melanie Wilson (07:46) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (08:01) and they weren't interested or if somebody saw it that recognized anybody who knows Jesus recognized the lion. But I read it in a classroom with a teacher who was hostile to the faith and it went right overhead. It's just a lion and a bunny, you know? So I thought, how do I do this? Because they would keep trying to direct it to Christian ⁓ publishers. Melanie Wilson (08:15) You Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (08:30) but that would close the door to schools. So she kind of went into hibernation for a while. And then my husband took me to lunch, not my husband, my brother, took me to lunch. He was coming to the end of his career. And during what he calls his fifth quarter, he wanted to help other people with their passions. So he said, Ruth, if you could do anything and money wasn't an object, what would you do? And I said, I would be sharing the sociable bunny with children. for the hearts of the children and their families. So he helped me ⁓ finance and brainstorm on turning my little manuscript into an actual book. So that's how our beautiful book came about. And then there was another gal, Jacqueline, who I met. These are all miracle stories. Every one of these is like a miracle story. Melanie Wilson (09:17) All right. Ruth Wilkey (09:29) But she came onto the team as my prayer partner and as our artwork partner. She read a book that my brother, this brother Ben and I had written together 20 years before, which was his, some of his stories. And she was very secular at the time. She was working for L'Oreal, traveling around the world, doing makeup things. She was, you know, this gorgeous little Brazilian gal. ⁓ And she said, if this God is real, I need to know him. And she went on a quest to meet God. And through this, she did meet him and she ended up becoming my partner in bringing the social bubble money to children. So she wrote the workbook. ⁓ which has all kinds of like it gives. the definition, we pull a word out of each chapter, that character quality. At the time, my brother was helping somebody get character curriculum into public schools. And that gentleman said, we need something for the elementary kids. And so that's how this came about. So we have little games that they can do. Melanie Wilson (10:32) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. ⁓ Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (10:54) activities, had coloring book pages, pages where they can do illustrations, and very gentle questions. We came up with ⁓ this little trademark of ours now, it's called SQJ, which is a Transformational Learning System. So through stories, you see something happening, but it's objective, it's out there. And we have gentle questions that begin to bring it into your own life. Melanie Wilson (11:23) Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (11:23) Fluffy wonders about your world. Have you ever felt like she did? And then places where they can write the answers or just discuss them, you know, with a hero mentor. And then because Ben was a grandpa at the time and had kids in our target age group, he said, let's do a hero mentor manual. And it was actually a school administrator that came up with the title. It's for parents and grandparents and aunties, uncles. Melanie Wilson (11:27) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Okay. All right. Ruth Wilkey (11:54) ⁓ I just went through it with my god grandchildren, you ⁓ So it's very, it's very fun that way. So that's how the sociable bunny came about. Long answer to the short question. Melanie Wilson (11:57) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. All right. Well, that's very interesting. Yeah. It's a very interesting story, though. So I just I just loved ⁓ reading about how you were called sociable bunny. I just think that is the cutest nickname to give somebody. ⁓ And I think it's such a healthy, happy thing to be is to be a sociable bunny. What are some of the things that can keep kids from being sociable bunnies. Ruth Wilkey (12:40) Well, ⁓ First of all, what we talk about is bee stings. There are many ways that we receive bee stings in our hearts. And we can end up closing our hearts to protect ourselves from the bee stings if we don't know how to handle them, right? And that pain can get trapped in our hearts and it can color how we view life. So, Melanie Wilson (12:47) Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (13:11) Some of the ways that we get these things are just harsh words, bullying, abuse, trauma. Or sometimes we have disorders. Like I have somebody very close to me in my life who's on the spectrum. And because at the time, he's in my age group, and so at the time, nobody knew what autism was, you know? So you're just the weird kid. Melanie Wilson (13:28) Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (13:42) Or they may be very intelligent, but not learn the same way as everybody else. And so they can be called all kinds of nasty names, right? That creates a lot of beastings in the heart. And it can bring about self-rejection or feeling rejection from others. ⁓ For me, the bullying felt like rejection and then it turned into self-rejection. must be something wrong with me. So that's why the bunny will say. Melanie Wilson (13:52) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. For sure. Ruth Wilkey (14:10) Is there something wrong with me? There must be something wrong with me, you know? And we start feeling that way about ourselves. Just lack of understanding of how to build a relationship that's healthy with somebody. How to build trust, how to build respect. Or some kids just have hostility in their own hearts for whatever reason. And I might share a little story with you a little bit later on that. Melanie Wilson (14:34) him. Ruth Wilkey (14:40) Sometimes there are a lot of messages that come through music that are creating an environment of hostility that makes it look like this is normal to be hostile about everything, right? Especially in our culture right now, there's a lot of that happening. So these are all things that can keep us from becoming sociable bunnies, right? Melanie Wilson (14:52) Hmm. Sure. Yes. Right. Mm-hmm. So as a homeschooling parent myself, I was able to protect my kids from having a lot of the very negative experiences that I had as a student in school and that other kids in school are still having, like the bullying. ⁓ But why do you think it's... still important for the loving, dedicated parents who are listening to us right now to address the emotional needs that kids have and the social needs that kids have directly instead of just like hoping that everything works out okay for them because they have a great home. Ruth Wilkey (15:51) Right. Well, we have tested the sociable bunny and with like 120 families, some of which were homeschoolers, and we're testing it now in a school, a Christian school as well. We tested it last year and they're adopting it into their curriculum this year because they loved it so much. But ⁓ one of the homeschool students, his grandma brought him to meet me after they had finished the Melanie Wilson (16:02) Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (16:23) the curriculum kind of. And I said, so Will, what did you learn through Sociable Bunny? Did you like it? And he said, my gosh, today I'm a very happy boy. But if I had not met the Sociable Bunny, I would be a sad boy. I'm like, really? Why would that be? He said, I got a lot of, I'm a very unique person. And I learned through this that it's good to be unique. Melanie Wilson (16:41) Yeah. Ruth Wilkey (16:51) But he said, I got a lot of these things in my heart this year because I'm unique. But I learned where to go for comfort. And I learned the importance of courage. And he started going through, he opened up the book and went through the words in the workbook. And he just told me how each of these became part of his life. And he's like, today I'm very happy. So I think. Melanie Wilson (17:03) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. You Ruth Wilkey (17:18) You know, scripture says train up a child in the way he should go when he's old and not depart from it. I think this gives tools of how to train up your child with emotional intelligence, to build resilience, to give a sense of identity, a sense of purpose. So in the book, the little bunny goes from being the bullied one who feels like there's something wrong with her and very rejected. Melanie Wilson (17:30) Mm-hmm. Right. Ruth Wilkey (17:48) to becoming at the end, the leader. She leads them on a little adventure and even the bully ends up following because it's gonna be such a good adventure. And so I think it also creates an immunity towards some of the messages of the world system. you speak, if you address these things directly, these are things that happen and through your own life story, Melanie Wilson (17:56) Mm-hmm. Right. you Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (18:18) You know, for kids, something happens. It's the first time ever. And that feels like the end of the world. You can say, you know, believe it or not, I went through that too. And this is how I felt, but this is how I dealt with it. So you're giving them an immunity towards things that may happen down the road. And one of the homeschool dads told me, well, the mom initially said, boy, this gets dark kind of fast, you know, with some of the bee stings. Melanie Wilson (18:22) Right. Mm-hmm. ⁓ Ruth Wilkey (18:48) And then like a month or two later, ran into the dad and he said, my gosh, my daughter just had her first bee sting, but she knew how to put words to it. And we were able to process it as a family and she just was able to move right out of it. So that's one of the things that helps as well. And I think with loving instruction, like every child can learn if nurtured by love, they can learn their identity. Melanie Wilson (19:04) Right. Ruth Wilkey (19:17) their purpose and you're kind of formatting their hearts and their character. And believe it or not, my son that the Lord brought into my life had been adopted. He was raised in Bulgaria. He'd been adopted out of an orphanage at the age of three. So his dad raised him and I met him when he was about 15 or 16. He felt like I was the mom he never had because he was adopted by a single dad. And so I was able to Melanie Wilson (19:22) Mm-hmm. Mm. Ruth Wilkey (19:48) now be part of his life for the next 15 years. And he told me recently, said, mom, I'm the person I am because of you, how you formatted my soul. And I think that's what loving instruction does, helps build character. And he has found favor with so many people because of that. So, and the Holy Spirit transforms. Melanie Wilson (20:00) Mm. Mm-hmm. Why do you think story is such a powerful way to talk about emotions and, and hurts and our needs and character. Ruth Wilkey (20:31) I love that question, thank you. I'm a story person and you know, scripture, the whole Old Testament tells stories of how God interacts with people. And that's why I loved C.S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia because I felt like I learned how to relate to God through Hallucy related to Aslan. And I learned so much through story and you can, it's objective. It's, you're not on the hot seat, right? It's non-threatening. You watch somebody else go through these things. I was the youngest in a family of seven. I got to watch my siblings go through things and to learn from them. And I love learning through other people's stories. And so I think it's a very non-threatening way to learn something. Melanie Wilson (21:09) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (21:30) But then through our SQJ questions, these are gentle little questions, but they kind of bring it into your own heart, right? And so now we're not only learning from them, but we're learning how to relate and go, yeah, you know, I did feel that way once upon a time, or I'm going through that, or, you know, and the bee stings I think is a nice way to... Melanie Wilson (21:39) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (21:59) about those hurts in the heart without feeling like you're pathetic. It's not like, ⁓ I'm overly sensitive and there's something even more wrong with me because I'm feeling this way. It's like, no, that was a bee sting. You need to take responsibility for that. You know, he put his sting in my heart. Now I have to deal with my sting. And now we learn how to bring it to the Lord. We learn where to go for comfort to trusted individuals. We learn Melanie Wilson (22:07) you and you Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (22:30) how to reflect, how to discuss things. so this teacher that now they're using this in school, she did it last year and now she's teaching at kindergarten first and second. ⁓ She said the first grade teacher came in and watched her and was blown away by the depth of the discussions, what these kids were bringing up. So things that maybe you wouldn't normally talk to your child about. Maybe they wouldn't quite learn how to Melanie Wilson (22:53) Hmm. Thank Ruth Wilkey (23:00) put things into words, but we give them a vocabulary to bring their hurts and where to find comfort in a safe place, you know. Melanie Wilson (23:07) Thank you. Mm-hmm, right. So along with that, why do you think parents might want to skip having these kinds of deep discussions? Ruth Wilkey (23:26) Maybe they have their own unresolved conflicts that they haven't really... come to grips with, maybe it triggers something in themselves. So this teacher, I keep coming back to her because she's so amazing and she's taught me so much. She said, Ruth, this doesn't only transform the children. Then she shared with me this summer how it transformed her own heart. And she had a conflict. She's carried her whole life and she's in her 70s. She said, I never knew how to deal with it, but I learned through the sociable bunny. It brought it to the surface. It gave me tools. I know I learned how to go to that person and talk with them. I went to my priest and had confession and it's gone. It's, you know, it's been resolved in her own life. So I think I had a counselor tell me when he first read the manuscript, he said, Melanie Wilson (24:06) Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (24:33) All of my clients need this. Everybody needs this because it gives the tools to deal with those things that we all encounter and might not know how to deal with. And, you know, it's not my brilliance. This is what the Holy Spirit gave me on my own little adventure when I hit bottom and he like recreated my heart. He told me why I am unique the way I am. Melanie Wilson (24:37) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-mm. ⁓ Ruth Wilkey (25:02) what my purpose is for sharing it with others. He gave me tools, you know, he gave me. haven't told many people this, but now they're gonna, you know, he put a scepter in my hand to pray blessings over others. You know, I never would have had that if I hadn't hit bottom and the Lord took me on an adventure. And I don't believe it's just for me. I think that's why he gave me the sociable bunny. So I feel like my purpose verse of life is blessed be the God of all comfort. Melanie Wilson (25:19) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mmm. Ruth Wilkey (25:42) who comforts us in our distress so we can comfort others with the same comfort we ourselves have received from God. And I feel like that's what this is all about, really, you know? Melanie Wilson (25:47) Mm-hmm. Yes. Mm hmm. Yes, I love that verse. And I was actually thinking about that before you shared it. ⁓ OK, so we have talked a lot about the sociable bunny books, but you have a special gift for our listeners ⁓ that I would like you to tell us about before I ask you where they can find your books. So you have a free lesson available. Can you tell us about that? Ruth Wilkey (26:27) I ⁓ If they sign, if they go to our website, sociablebunny.com, the first thing, by giving us your email, you'll immediately receive the five questions to ask your child at bedtime. And you don't have to ask them the same questions every night, but there are five things that you can talk about that maybe wouldn't normally come up in a conversation. Melanie Wilson (26:46) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (26:56) One of them I learned from my niece who was going through a divorce. so, you know, the kids go back and forth between the parents and stuff. And she wanted to build the kind of relationship with her kids where they knew they could talk to her about anything, that it was safe, was loving. She was very careful not to speak badly about their dad, you know, which was really interesting to me and amazing. And ⁓ Melanie Wilson (27:00) and Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Ruth Wilkey (27:25) But her question was, what was your high of the day? What was your low of the day? And they would talk about basically what the bee stings and the celebrations. So I've actually, so that's one of the questions. What was your high and low? And then I'm not going to give it all away because they'll get, they'll get all the questions immediately if they do that. Melanie Wilson (27:31) Mm-hmm. Right. Right. ⁓ so good. Okay, so is sociablebunny.com the best place for our listeners to find your Sociable Bunny books? Ruth Wilkey (28:04) It's the best place to learn about it. It shows samples of Some of the illustrations kids have done. But to purchase it, then there's a link and it'll take you right to Amazon. Melanie Wilson (28:14) then Ruth, do you have any social media where you connect with people? Ruth Wilkey (28:21) Yes, we're on both Instagram and on Facebook. We haven't started TikTok and I know a lot of the younger generation are TikTok and they purchase things there. We're not there yet. Melanie Wilson (28:30) Yep. Okay. Okay. Thank you so much for taking the time to share this with us. I know that it's really going to speak to people and I think encourage them and I know they're gonna be excited to download the resources that you have for us. Ruth Wilkey (28:50) ⁓ good. Yeah, I just hope and pray that it can transform and bless others as it has to some that have already done it. So thank you so much. Melanie Wilson (29:01) You are very welcome.