In My Nest

In a radical break from tradition, the Easter Bunny did not deliver any books to any baskets in our house this year. Easter baskets past have had board books and chapter books, easy readers and cookbooks nestled beside chocolate bunnies and marshmallow chicks. Weird. I guess the Easter Bunny never got her act together enough to organize a trip to the bookstore. I, however, did give one book as an Easter gift to my adorable baby nephew. It was Susan Gillingham's adorable In My Nest which comes with the cutest little finger puppet bird and ends with that cute finger puppet bird in his nest with his parents. They put me in mind of a bird family version of my brother, sister-in-law, and nephew. There are others in the series like In My Pond and In My Tree. They would make precious new baby or shower gifts.

In other Easter animal news, on Good Friday, my son who is in the first grade played at a friend's house. They were playing by the pond in the friend's yard, and reported that they found "a dead snake and a lizard that passed out" in the grass near the pond. How they could determine the difference between dead and passed out, I don't know, but I've been laughing about the description ever since.

A Shortlist on St. Patrick's Day

St. Patrick's Day is one of my favorite holidays. As a lover of carbohydrates (soda bread, potatoes, green bagels) it's a no-brainer. I also like to affect a brogue and green is one of my better colors so it makes sense. There are also many great picture books based on Irish myths and legends that I've enjoyed with my children over the years. Our favorite is Tomie dePaola's Finn McCoul which I mentioned here a few weeks ago when deciding on a read aloud book for my son's fifth grade class. dePaola's Jamie O'Rourke and the Big Potato and Jamie O"Rourke and the Pooka are also fun reads for the three to nine year old set.

For older readers, eight to twelve years old, Marie Heaney's The Names Upon the Harp is a lovely book of Irish myths and legends illustrated by P.J. Lynch. P.J. Lynch is worth an Amazon search of his own as everything he illustrates is beautiful.

For contemporary Irish fiction for that same age group I of course recommend Eoin Colfer. I think I have made it clear in this blog that his Artemis Fowl books are utter brilliance. His Half Moon Investigations about the somewhat inept twelve year old private investigator Fletcher Moon, set in a modern Irish suburb, is great fun. I've read that the BBC made a TV series of this book, and I'm curious to view it.

For adults looking for a compelling story wrapped up in the history of twentieth century Ireland, Sebastian Barry's The Secret Scripture is perfect. My book club read this one in the fall and I have not stopped thinking about it or giving it as a gift. It is sad and wonderful at the same time, telling the story of Roseanne (Clear) McNulty an Irish woman sent to a mental institution for the bulk of her life. The book begins as the institution is about to close and her doctor needs to place her somewhere. Her story and their relationship grow from there. Roseanne's personal story and fate are tangled up in the national story and fate. Loved it!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Stuff I Love

As you know, Valentine's Day is just around the corner. It has me thinking of books about love. The loveliest of all those, in my estimation, is Margery Williams' The Velveteen Rabbit. I have written about this book here before, I know, but it bears mentioning again. Revisit it if you haven't read it in awhile. Even better, revisit it with someone you love, someone who has made you "real."

In case you you now think I only love sappy sweet children's books, here are some other things I love in no particular order. (Actually not true- I saved the best for last.)

I love KFC! I mean I love it in an unhealthy obsession kind of way.

I love Harry Potter books and movies.

I currently love Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard Book.

I love fuzzy socks.

I love teaching high school English.

I love the smells of Tide and Downy.

I love everything my mother bakes.

I love my mother and the rest of my family.

I love 80s music.

I love bubblegum and black licorice flavored jelly beans.

I love cute flip flops.

I love these three children and their dad!

Spend some time with who and what you love this weekend. Happy Heart Day!

A Holiday Cliche

We have been read ing a chapter or two of this each night this week. Everyone loves it. It's a classic, it has ghosts, and there is an illustration on every other page. What's not to love? Merry Christmas and happy reading to all!

It was inevitable. My holiday stress and hormone levels reached the tipping point this week. After a few ridiculously busy weeks of work and motherhood and Christmas shopping, I was in the car with a dangerously full bladder and racing to meet my six year old's school bus when John Denver and the Muppets began singing "Silent Night." I immediately began weeping loudly. So I've reached that point in the pre-Christmas frenzy where just about anything can make me cry, throw up my hands, or bang my head against a wall. Luckily, I got the good kind of tear in my eye from our annual reading of The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey. It is such a beautiful book. I won't go into great detail about it now, as I believe I posted about it last December. It is just too wonderful for words anyhow. I will say this, however, the copy we own is pictured below, but the second photo here has a different cover. That cover includes my favorite illustration from the book.


That picture comes about midway through the book, the exact point when a lump forms in my throat and I have to pause in my read aloud to find tissues. My children love this book too, and reading it is a favorite holiday tradition. Speaking of holiday traditions, perhaps we instituted a new one. As soon as we set up and decorated our Christmas tree and decorated it last weekend, we sat in its glow and my husband and I taught the kids how to play poker, because nothing says Christmas memory like a good game of Texas Hold 'Em.

The True Gift: A Christmas Story

One of my favorite holiday traditions is reading Christmas stories with my children in the evenings leading up to Christmas Eve. We have some old favorites, but every year I like to find at least one new holiday picture or chapter book. I struck gold with this year's new selection, Patricia MacLachlan's The True Gift A Christmas Story. Perhaps you know Patricia Mac Lachlan from her lovely and now classic Sarah, Plain and Tall. The True Gift is a short (which is a bit of a gift to me during this busy time of year) and gentle chapter book that highlights the beauty of thoughtfulness, generosity, and community. Liam and Lily work to find a friend for White Cow, the lone cow on their grandparents' farm. In trying to help the cow, they help a young boy whose family is struggling financially, and they in turn are helped by the members of their grandparents' farming community. It could inspire some good conversations about whether or not animals have feelings and what it means to give. Brian Floca's pencil drawing are quietly gorgeous. I recommend this one for readers from first through fifth grade looking for a good holiday book that is not too Christmasy.

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween! While I LOVE these homemade costumes my children are wearing this year, none of them are particularly bookish. You could argue that my little guy's Frankenstein is inspired by Mary Shelly's novel, but it's not. He doesn't know the book exists. He just wanted to look creepy. I have seen some other people in good book-inspired costumes this year. One of my older son's fifth grade classmates is going dressed as a thesaurus! How great is that? A student at the high school where I work dressed as the other mother from Coraline, carrying around big buttons, a needle, and thread yesterday. And yesterday, on my drive home from work, I nearly crashed my car because I saw the cutest little girl, about three years old, walking down the street in a precious very hungry caterpillar costume. Whatever your costume and whatever you are reading, have a happy Halloweekend!

In A Dark, Dark Room

Every summer, my children attend a camp out on the beach at our local lake. They enjoy setting up tents, roasting marshmallows, racing around in the dark with friends, and two of my three children love to hear and tell ghost stories around the campfire. Ghost story fever stays with them from the time of the camp out until Halloween. They spend those months on the lookout for new ghost stories. I try to find good ones at the library, but it is a difficult task balancing high interest with low fear factor. They don't want any "babyish" books, but I don't want to be woken up by children crying from nightmares. One of the best books we've found to satisfy everyone is Alvin Schwartz's In a Dark, Dark Room and Other Scary Stories. It is an easy reader, perfect for first and second graders. It contains a good mix of spooky, creepy, and funny stories perfect for campfires or pre-Halloween reading. My daughter who is now in the fourth grade first checked it out of the school library when she was in the first grade. It has been a family favorite ever since. My six year old son now owns his own copy and does a spine tingling rendition of "The Green Ribbon" story in it. I imagine he'll graduate to Goosebumps and Stephen King someday, but happily he's satisfied with this book for the time being.

Foodie Friday- Easter Basket Edition

As you can guess from the Peeps on my dining room table, I'm getting excited about Easter. If I could have my fantasy job, I would be a custom Easter basket filler. You would tell me a bit about the recipient, and I would fill the ideal basket for him or her. It would incorporate a balance of elements, chocolate and jelly beans, fun novelties like wind up bunnies, seasonal gifts such as baseballs or golf tees, a great book, and of course, marshmallow chicks. I think every baby, toddler, and preschooler should find Kevin Henkes' Owen's Marshmallow Chick in at at least one Easter basket of their childhood. It is spring colored, charming, and relatable. Owen wakes up on Easter morning to find gumdrops, buttercream eggs, jelly beans, and a chocolate bunny in his basket.(I am salivating on the keyboard right now!) He enjoys them all, but his favorite is the yellow marshmallow chick which becomes a plaything and friend. Sorry about the pun, but it's too sweet for words.

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

Top of the morning to you! And a chilly morning it is here in New Jersey! The kids and I nearly froze our Blarney stones off waiting for the school bus this morning! Although my husband and I have a fair amount of Irish ancestry between us, we don't really have many Irish customs in our home. However, we've got a few St. Patrick's Day traditions the kids would mutiny over if we forgot them. First, the kids dress themselves head to toe in green. It may not be the most flattering color, but they earn points for enthusiasm. Their lunch boxes hold green finger Jello (aka Jello Jigglers and Knox Blocks) shamrocks wrapped in waxed paper. Why the waxed paper? Because that's how my mom sent finger jello in my lunch box. Finally, no Saint Patrick's Day goes by without a reading of Fin M'Coul. I know there are a number of versions of this story in print, but I prefer Tomie dePaolas's for the little tiny fairies and sheep hidden on every page and because I relate to " the great lovely lass, Oonagh," Fin's giant wife in this telling of the story. I've been five feet seven inches since the eighth grade and have a number of short girlfriends. In college one friend's dad referred to me as "the big girl." So, you can imagine how I root for Oonagh as she cleverly outwits the mean giant Cucullin. She dresses Fin up as a baby and passes him off as her child, saying to Cucullin who plans to beat him up, "That may not be as easy as you think. Fin M'Coul's a big broth of a man. Why, take a look at our little baby and you might be gettin' an idea of the strength and breadth of Fin himself." Of course I always deliver Oonagh's lines in my best brogue. Last week I was the guest reader in my daughter's class, giving my best thick as soda bread brogue, praying that the three Irish women from my book club with kids in the same school weren't in the hallways and thanking goodness my friends Marjorie and Patrick live in Dublin far from my performance. I fear they might all have cringed at the inauthenticity. But, like my kids self styled in green today, hopefully I get some points for enthusiasm. Have a fantastic day in whatever way you celebrate!

Foodie Friday: Spud Lover's Delight

Several weeks ago, I included Tomie dePaola's Jamie O'Rourke and the Big Potato on a Foodie Friday. It bears mentioning again with St. Patty's Day just around the corner, and it set me to thinking about other potato based books I know. Here are a few:
Potatoes, Potatoes is a great little antiwar picture book for preschool through third grade by Anita Lobel

The Greatest Potatoes is a fun historical fiction picture book written by Penelope Stowell and illustrated by Sharon Watts for that same age group.

For eight to twelve year olds, I highly recommend Patricia Reilly Giff's Nory Ryan's Song which deals with the potato famine in Ireland in the mid 1800's.

I'm no Martha Stewart, and certainly no one should be taking cooking lessons from me, but I recently tried a new (to me), easy and scrumptious way to make potatoes. I combined two recipes, one from a cooking show and one from a magazine, for Hasselback Potatoes. The result? Garlicky, buttery heaven on a fork. Jamie O'Rourke's neighbors might not have gotten tired of potatoes so soon had they tried these:

Christine's Hasselback Potatoes

14 small red waxy skinned potatoes

2 cloves garlic, sliced paper thin

1/4 cup butter melted with 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Clean potatoes.

2. Place one potato in the bowl of a large wooden spoon. Start at one end and make slices two thirds of the way through potato. Continue to end of potato. Stick two or three garlic slices in the potato slits. Repeat with all potatoes.

3. Place potatoes on a rimmed baking sheet. Pour melted butter/oil combo on top. Roll potatoes around to coat. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Bake for one hour.

4. For total decadence, serve with sour cream.

5. Enjoy!

D is for Dragon Dance on Foodie Friday

I am going to continue my celebration of the lunar new year by sharing a great little alphabet book, D is for Dragon Dance, written by Ying Chang Compestine and illustrated by Yongsheng Xuan. Some element of Chinese culture or the celebration of Chinese New Year is presented for each letter of the English alphabet, going from a for acrobats to z for zodiac. Most of them include a bit of explanation. For instance, it is explained that (R) red envelopes given to children contain good luck money. As with most cultural celebrations, food plays an important role in Chinese New Year. D is for Dragon Dance includes n for noodles, o for oranges, p for Peking duck, s for steamed dumplings, and two recipes at the end, one for dumplings and the other for soy garlic dipping sauce. This nicely illustrated and informative book would make an excellent addition to a preschool or kindergarten classroom where you often find collections of alphabet books.

Happy New Year!

I don't know if or how you celebrate the lunar New Year, but if you do, have a happy one! Here's hoping you get plenty of red envelopes and much happiness in the year of the ox! My kindergartner was told to wear red to school today, and I put fortune cookies in all three kids' lunch bags. We'll be ordering Chinese take out for dinner tonight and reading Paul Yee's Tales from Gold Mountain. It's not really about Chinese New Year, but it has amazing illustrations by Simon Ng and fascinating tales of Chinese people in the New World. We may also read D is for Dragon Dance by Ying Chang Compestine and illustrated by Yongsheng Xuan, but more about that book on Foodie Friday. Gung Hay Fat Choy!

Thoughts on the Three Kings

Today is the feast of the three kings, also known as the Epiphany, celebrating the arrival of the three wise men who came to see the newborn Jesus. I knew I would need to cover this yesterday in the fourth grade CCD class I teach. CCD is religious education for Catholic students who attend public school. I teach the class for several reasons including the facts that the program depends on volunteers, it gives me an opportunity to meet my kids' peers, and I have a hole to fill in my resume. My background is in teaching English, and I delight in situations where I get to use it while teaching CCD, such as when a student asked me if God actually used words like "thou" and "shalt" when issuing the ten commandments. I'll be honest, sometimes I sneak literature in there as well. I love when I have an appropriate story or poem to share with the class. Tomie de Paola's beautiful Clown of God was perfect to read before Christmas and really got the kids talking, and yesterday I was happy to read Langston Hughes' poem "Carol of the Brown King" with them:

Of the three Wise Men
Who came to the King,
One was a brown man,
So they sing.
Of the three Wise Men
Who followed the Star,
One was a brown king
From afar.
They brought fine gifts
Of spices and gold
In jeweled boxes
Of beauty untold.
Unto His humble
Manger they came
And bowed their heads
In Jesus’ name.
Three wise men,
One dark like me-
Part of His
Nativity.

It was fun to spend a few minutes talking about rhyme and point of view. Speaking of fun, I didn't lecture them on parody, but I could have with a little ditty my Aunt Mary Alice and Uncle Peter taught me decades ago that begins "We three kings of orient are, smoking on a rubber cigar. It was loaded. It exploded..." I've included the music to the original below in case you care to sing it. I didn't teach it though, as I felt the lovely and dedicated nun who runs the religious education program at our church might not appreciate it. Not that she doesn't have a sense of humor. In fact, she shared a cute joke with me last year about how things would be different had it been three wise women visiting the Holy Family. They would have asked for directions, arrived on time, and at least brought a casserole.

If you are someone who celebrates this day by looking for a trinket in your slice of cake or a treat in your shoe, I hope you find it.

A Warm Little Tree to Share

This small book, Little Tree, written by e.e. cummings and illustrated by Deborah Kogan Ray, is so sweet and warm that I actually expect the pages to be warm to the touch like a mug of cocoa or a slice of buttery toast. The text is e. e. cummings' lovely poem in which a child addresses a Christmas tree. It begins, "little tree, little silent Christmas tree, you are so little, you are more like a flower." The boy goes on to wonder if the tree was sorry to leave the green forest, and comforts it with offers of a hug and a kiss and decorations. He says "look the spangles, that sleep all the year in a dark box, dreaming of being taken out and allowed to shine." He tells the tree to put up its arms to be dressed and he and his sister will sing Noel.

The gentle words are matched with soft illustrations which depict a young boy and girl bundled up against the cold bringing a little tree home from the lot, decorating it, and setting it in their front window for passersby to admire.

I've had my copy of this book for nine or ten years, and I've read it over the years to students and my own children. I've never focused on the setting. A recent visit to my son's suburban kindergarten class gave me another way to discuss it. The teacher was talking to the students at circle time about books that are set in cities and apartments. Apartment living seemed so glamorous to that group of five year olds. They mentioned two of my favorites, Knufflebunny and Corduroy. When we took Little Tree out this year, we talked about the setting. My kids think it is set either in Hoboken, NJ or my brother's Brooklyn neighborhood. It started us wondering how people in different parts of our country and world might decorate for the holidays. Isn't it great when an old favorite can inspire new conversations?

Pop Go the Holidays

The ultimate Christmas book to me is a pop up book. We've all seen pop up versions of The Night Before Christmas and The Twelve Days of Christmas and the like. Pop up books make great gifts as well. Robert Sabuda is, of course, the master of the holiday pop up book. My daughter has his version of Alice in Wonderland, a gift from her aunt and uncle, that is a source of endless wonder and fascination to her. He has a great segment floating around the internet from Martha Stewart's show where he teaches Martha to make a pop up Christmas card. Although you kind of always get the sense that Martha is not being taught anything new by anyone and could have figured it out on her own. It was educational to me though. Anyway, since pop up books say Christmas to me and I love all of you for stopping by at this busy time of year, but I don't know where you all live to send you gifts, this video is my little Christmas present to you. I've picked up this book ABC3D at the bookstore and played with it. It's addictive, I warn you. Happy viewing!

The Well Stuffed Stocking

I love an old school Christmas stocking. Not one with an orange and some penny candy from the general store. That's a little too old school for me. I really feel Santa and the elves were at the top their stocking stuffing game in the 1970s. During that decade, my older brothers and I were always sure to find a candy cane, a Matchbox car (pink for me), an interesting coin like a silver or half dollar, a ChapStick, probably some Silly Putty or a bouncy ball, and various other small fun items in our stockings. That is exactly the kind of stocking I hope my kids will receive this year on Christmas morning, fat with hands on fun, and thin on electronic gadgetry. I imagine Santa might round out their state quarter collections with Hawaii. We'll see. They'll probably also each get a book or two. That's how Santa has been doing it for the 2000s. There have board books, easy readers, and first chapter books. One year, Dan Gutman's Miss Holly is Too Jolly was quite popular. His entire My Weird School series is terrific for first and second graders. If Santa wants to go old school, he might throw in a Nancy Drew or Hardy Boys for the older kids. For my kindergartner there are several Christmas and wintry Geronimo Stilton and Jigsaw Jones books he could choose. New in paperback this year is Megan McDonald's holiday offering from the Judy Moody and Stink collection, The Holly Joliday. Santa has so many paperback books to choose from, but if he asked my advice, I would suggest Bart King's The Pocket Guide to Mischief. It is the perfect size to fit in the toe of a stocking, it is full of fun, and has a retro look and feel that make it seem like it belongs in one of those 1970s stockings that thrilled me so.

God Bless Reading Teachers, Every One!

I've rewritten Tiny Tim's famous line for the title of this post because people who teach others to read give a priceless gift. We've been quite blessed in this family that my children have become strong, enthusiastic readers thanks to some awesome teachers. They are also much more sophisticated (?), reflective readers than I ever was at their age. I think that is in large part due to the way reading is taught in our school district. My kids have greatly benefited from mini lessons, reading workshops, and reading conferences with their teachers. While reading Raymond and Graham Rule the School the other night, my son said, "I can make a text to text connection between the character of Mrs. Gibson in this book and Spud Murphy in The Legend of Spud Murphy." Their reading lessons at school have given them the vocabulary to make text to text, text to self, and text to world connections. While they would still love when Spud Murphy "accidentally" gives Marty an I LOVE BARBIE hand stamp and when Graham shaves off his eyebrow, their reading is more meaningful when they make connections about these incidents. They are active readers, and I am so grateful for it. As I wrote yesterday, Raymond and Graham inspired my daughter to read a version of A Christmas Carol (nicely retold by Pamela Kennedy and illustrated by Carol Heyer). Now, no two books could be more different, but Hayden has learned from her teachers that reading one can enrich her appreciation of the other, and that inspired today's blog post. My son Aaron suggested that I attempt to make a plum pudding so they can eat it and make a text to self connection to both books, but they don't need that meaningful of a reading experience.

Foodie Friday: Gingerbread Round Up

(Gingerbread house picture courtesy of the Burt children)

For me, two of the most enjoyable activities in the weeks before Christmas are baking gingerbread cookies and decorating gingerbread houses. The smell of ginger, cloves, and cinnamon in the house and all of that candy to nibble is a little bit of heaven. It's nice to complete such an afternoon with reading some version of the gingerbread man story. There are many to choose from, but they all provide the satisfaction of seeing that impish, trash talking cookie get his comeuppance in the end. Here are three we've had fun reading over the years.

The Gingerbread Baby by Jan Brett is as beautifully illustrated as all of her other books. There is a twist at the end; the gingerbread baby isn't eaten by a fox, but gets what's coming to him all the same for his mischief and taunting. It's worth noting that Jan Brett has a great website with many fun activities and printable pages at http://www.janbrett.com/.

The Gingerbread Boy by Richard Egielski remains true to the classic storyline, but is set in New York City. He eludes his captors by jumping off a fire escape, riding the E train and so forth, but eventually meets up with a fox in Central Park.

The Gingerbread Man by Jim Aylesworth and illustrated by Barbara McClintock is a good retelling which comes with a recipe. I just love a book that comes with a recipe!

These books are a yummy way to get into the holiday spirit and teach a lesson about the dangers of talking smack. Now, run, run, as fast as you can, and read a version of the gingerbread man!

7 Ways We Used "The Night Before Christmas" and Not One of Them Was "Reading Material"

Thanksgiving is behind us, the lights are on our house, gingerbread houses have been decorated. It's time to start reading those classic Christmas books with the kids, right? Sort of. One of my children took Clement C. Moore's The Night Before Christmas illustrated by Mary Engelbreit down from the shelf last week. We never got around to reading it, but we did use it in the following ways:

1. Lap Desk It ended up in the minivan (everything we own ends up in the minivan), and my daughter used it as a hard surface on which to write out her homework. That's right, homework gets done in the minivan also.

2. Artist's inspiration The same child who used it for homework also used it when looking for a model from which to draw Santa Claus.

3. Weapon The hard cover and substantial weight made it a good choice for my five year old when he chose something to pick up and whack his brother's butt with.

4. Object of delusion I kept telling myself it wound be the linchpin in a cozy evening of hot cocoa and snuggling together for a good book. Didn't happen.

5. Paper flattener It flattened a Thanksgiving drawing that came out of a backpack all wrinkled and "ruined" last Wednesday. After a few hours in this book, the drawing was good as new!

6. Bribe I tried in vain several times to say, "If you'll just ___________ or____________. we can drink hot cocoa and read some good books later. See #4- it didn't happen.

7. Upper arm workout Carrying this book along with other books, hockey equipment, and backpacks in and out of the car and up and down stairs hopefully provided my upper arms with some desperately needed definition.


A Merry December to all and to all a good night!

Check out more lists over at abdpbt.com.