We Give Books

I just read three picture books online at We Give Books, and so three books were donated to Room to Read, a non-profit providing books to children in Zambia.

We Give Books donates a book for every book read! There are thousands of books to choose from. You choose a campaign to support, sign up with only your email or facebook (seriously, two seconds!) and get reading! You can even "bookmark" if you don't finish a book in one sitting. When the campaign you are supporting has reached its goal, you choose another campaign.

So far, I've read:

and

It's fun and the format is easy to read in and navigate around. You can search for a particular book or click on a keyword or a category to get suggestions. I'm using We Give Books at home, but schools (including homeschools) are supporting and benefiting from it, too. If I sound gushy, its because I'm SO excited to find a high-quality activity that supports children and literacy. Thanks, Jen of Chestnut Grove Academy, for telling me about it!

I hope you all take a look, spread the word, and enjoy it even half as much as I do.

Just curious, do you read online often?

P.S. We're carving our pumpkins tonight (finally!), and in case you didn't see it last week, we're using these free pumpkin stencils to support March of Dimes.

Vacation Thoughts

On the best vacations, you:

• wish you could stay longer
• learn new things about the world and yourself
• lose track of time and forget to check your phone/facebook/email and
• are happy to come home.

We had the best vacation.

I did remember a fun book about southwest desert animals on our long, long drive from Utah to southern California.

I Howl, I Growl by Marcia Vaughan, illustrated by Polly Powell, shows a couple of animals doing there thing on each page, with a lyrical description. It is fun to read out loud, and opens up discussion about animals that are left out of most other picture books.


We drove mostly at night, and stayed in the city, so we didn't get to see any of the animals in this book, except the skunk. But we did admire the sand, mountains, cactus, and bush that they live in.
While we meandered around Balboa Park, got our feet wet in the ocean, and took in the dolphin and whale shows at Sea World, I was thinking of what I could share with you about children's literature. But mostly I was not thinking about that. The only take-away I have so far is an idea for a picture book, in which seagulls are the villains and Goldfish crackers are the victims, but I can't think of a hero. I could be the hero, except I'm not sure I'd call this holey-pecked, sandy bag reclamation a victory.

What's your favorite part of vacationing? Have you written anything funny or sweet or reflective about your vacation experiences?  

Pumpkin Stencils

I'm still in San Diego, but I wanted to drop in to let you know about this:
(You can't download these adorable stencils from the image below--I just wanted to share the info.) Go to Better Homes & Gardens Online to download as many stencils as you'd like, and BH&G will donate to March of Dimes and other charities. The "catch" is that you enter your email address to register, but you can de-select the free newsletter offers. Then you enter your address for March of Dimes post mailings, which I don't mind, because they don't over-solicit and they give good health information about pregnancy and infants. After that, you choose the stencil you want to download (I chose both "Holding Hands" and "Butterfly") and you get a .pdf with the stencil and directions. 

It only took a few seconds, and I donated to a cause I care about, plus I have an alternative to my standard crooked smiley-face jack-o-lantern. If you want more stencils, you can download other fun designs to support  Rebuilding Together, Big Brothers Big Sisters, Humane Society of the US, and Susan G. Komen. 

Happy carving!

Taking Candy from a Baby

 

Are you trick-or-treating this year? I have been debating whether a nearly one-and-a-half-year-old is too young to solicit gluttonous portions of candy from strangers. But then a friend of mine pointed out we could keep her candy for ourselves... I mean, she could have the lollipops. She's been eating lollipops for months, thanks to a friendly neighbor who carries them around in his pocket just in case. I wasn't going to give Baby A candy until she was two, but apparently I did not have the willpower to stop my well-intentioned neighbor from introducing the one thing other than a pacifier that will quiet a toddler forced to go along for one more errand. 

When do you think kids should get candy? And did you wait for a certain age to start trick-or-treating?

P.S. I'll be playing hooky in San Diego the rest of the week! Maybe I'll find a new picture book at Sea World. Let's catch up Monday, yes?

Skeleton Storytime

 What's Halloween without some spooky music? Did you learn "Ghost of John" and "Dry Bones" in fourth grade, like me? 

 

 

"The Ghost of John/Tom" is a round, remember? These songs work great as part of a storytime, maybe with this format.

I'd pair them with:

 

Skeleton Hiccups by Margery Cuydler and S.D. Schindler. A ghost helps a skeleton with hiccups.

-and/or-

You can't go wrong with Eric Rohmann! In Bone Dog, a boy helps his recently passed dog in the skeleton yard. Doesn't that sound oddly sweet?

Both of these books would be on theme for a skeletal Halloween, but they could lead the discussion in a different direction--like hiccups, grieving for a lost pet, or what the skeletons of other animals look like.

Reading in Finnish: Jade

I recently finished reading Jade by Taru Makinen. My godmother gave it to me for my return flight from Finland in 1997. I started it (again) when I was six months pregnant (apparently I'm still measuring time by the age of my daughter) so that means it took me a whopping eighteen months to finish, despite enjoying every page of teenage friendship, parent relations, dating, in a conflict involving no less than bank robbery and trans-gender disguise. It took me that eighteen months because it was lost for a couple of months, but mostly, I just read really slowly, because it is in Finnish. Funny side note: it took me about 10 pages to figure out which characters were boys and which were girls, because I wasn't familiar with the names and Finnish uses a neutral he/she pronoun. I hope I will read more young adult novels in Finnish because it is a great way to practice language skills, obviously, but books like Jade which are original in Finnish and set in Finland are an awesome cultural immersion.

Jade and my running list of vocabulary words to learn

These points apply to any text, of course--building vocabulary and shaping a cultural viewpoint.

What have you noticed, specifically, that you've learned from reading a book? 

Do you read in languages other than English?

ABC Gifts

There are so many alphabet-related books and resources. I just gathered up a few special ideas for gifts, or just for fun:

P is for Paintbrush mural:

This is a one-of-a-kind, handpainted watercolor, in an 8x10 frame. Can you find all the a words? I'll give you a clue: there are eight, not counting Alexandra nor and. The artist of P is for Paintbrush is Baby A's Auntie Jenna, and if you'd like to order one, email me, and I'll send you her contact information.

Baby shower activity:

 I recently attended a baby shower for my cousin, and each guest colored and wrote at least one letter for her baby's first alphabet book. How neat! He'll get clever messages from people who love him. This was a scrapbook kit plus markers--easy peasy! And it's fun for people whether or not they like cheesy baby shower games.

Alphabet book that's not just for tinies:

Alison Jay's A Child's First ABC Alphabet follows an adventurer through vibrant and full illustrations with a vintage flair (soft crackle paint look). But the grown-up readers can have just as much fun searching for patterns--a clue about the next page is in every picture. This book was suggested by a friend of mine who bought it at BYU Museum of Art, and when you see it, that seems fitting.

Fun words and animals alphabet book:

 I saw this suggestion at Design Mom, and I trust her taste. I haven't found it yet, but I will! Here's her review of it.

If you're bored of the standard alphabet song, here's a quirky one from none other than our Canadian friends, the Barenaked Ladies', kids' album:

Who would you give these to? (In my head, I'm saying, Actually, I think it is: To whom would you give these? because, yes, I'm crazy.)

W is for Wishing you a Wonderful Weekend!

Fall Leaves

That was Monday. We had quite the summery start to fall. But by Wednesday, it turned from sunny and a high of 78 to rainy and a high of 60--with a chance of snow later this week. I'm happy for fall, but soon I'm going to get tuckered out and want to curl up in the leaves for hibernation like this sweet bear:

Baby A reading Leaves with her Mummi, who gave her the book

His naive concern for the leaves falling off the trees is endearing, and the illustrations are a lovely combination of crisp colors, soft lines, and whimsical shapes.

Baby A is mildly interested in the leaves here and there in our apartment complex yard. But we'll have to go on an adventure up the canyon to get proper piles of them. Maybe even when all the leaves have fallen onto the frosty grass, I'll be having too much fun to hibernate. But I'll still greet the spring as cheerfully as the bear. Curl up somewhere cozy to read David Ezra Stein's Leaves. Then go find all the crunchy leaves.

What's your yard like? Any favorite fall reads?