We spent the late morning / early afternoon at the mall with friends - it’s B’s 3rd birthday today and he was getting portraits done. We stayed in the studio with them chatting and playing - a little Go Fish and a lot of impromptu sports. H and I have gotten to be very friendly with the two permanent photographers there and so the four of us were talking and having a very nice time. Then H and I took the 4 kids out to lunch where I thought I could try having ice cream after - that turned out to not be a great idea, for after one stop at a kids’ clothing store I could tell I needed to get home. Sigh!
JediBoy spent a good hour outside just playing his own imaginary games - wandering around the house and porch, swinging bats, moving chairs, and drawing triangles and writing his name on the scrap wood left over from yesterday’s bookshelf-making. When he came in from that I was feeling better enough to curl up with him on the pillows in the living room and read for an hour. We took turns pulling books off the shelf, and here’s what we read:
The Big Orange Splot by Daniel Pinkwater - this copy was mine when I was little. It’s a fun story with a serious message about being confident in your individuality in our cookie cutter world. “My house is me and I am it. My house is where I like to be and it looks like all my dreams.”
Go Away, Bad Dreams! by Susan Hill. Originally we read this book at the library. To me, the illustrations seem dated and the story of a little boy overcoming his nighttime fears didn’t seem comforting enough. But it really resonated with JediBoy and he wanted to hear it all the time. We found our copy at a garage sale a few months later. He sought this book out today because listening to the Junie B. Jones book on CD (from Wendy’s Kids’ Meal) about monsters under the bed has him a little frightened.
Swimmy by Leo Lionni - I’ve always loved Lionni’s illustrations, and JediBoy has always loved the simple stories about friendship and bravery. This is the story of one little black fish who teaches his brothers and sisters to swim together in the shape of a bigger fish so they won’t be eaten and can swim about admiring the sea.
Mickey Mouse and the Treasure Hunt is a very simple pop-up book JediBoy chose at a garage sale earlier this summer. Seeing that he was looking for a little more interaction, I chose…
The Jolly Postman by Janet and Allan Ahlberg. We love this book full of fairy tale characters and letters in envelopes to pull out and read. It takes me back to the early days of Griffin & Sabine! JediBoy loves taking the letters out and putting them back.
Randy’s Dandy Lions by Bill Peet is another longtime favorite that started out as a much-requested library book. Randy is a good lion trainer, but his lions are too shy, so he’s replaced by a mean trainer (”He was armed with a chair and a pistol and whip / A long snaky whip with a sting on the tip.”) But the cruelty only makes the lions sob all night long, keeping the rest of the circus awake, so Randy is brought back for a happy (and cruelty-free!) ending.
Chrysanthemum by Kevin Henkes - this fiesty book about a little mouse who is teased (in a public school, wouldn’t you know) because her name is too long and unusual. Both JediBoy & I have unusual names, so we have a place in our hearts for this story.
The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse by Lorinda Bryan Cauley. This is a fair retelling of the fable, with nothing particularly remarkable about it - our copy still carries the 10 cent garage sale sticker!
Big Bird and Little Bird’s Big & Little Book - JediBoy jumped in with a second choice here! He has always been fond of the Sesame Street books. This one is simple enough, with Big Bird saying he likes mountains, whales and Great Danes (JediBoy’s current wishful-thinking pet-of-choice) and Little Bird saying he likes molehills, goldfish and Chihuahuas.
Moongame - we love all the Bear books by Frank Asch. JediBoy likes knowing what’s “really” going on when Bear thinks he’s talking to, dancing with, or, in this book, playing hide-and-seek with the moon.
He headed outside to play some more (I hear the words “Sir Bedivere” and “Lancelot” floating in the window, along with his own version of “All Star” from the Shrek soundtrack) leaving me a dollop of time to read and write in the blogosphere.
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