Entries Tagged 'books' ↓

Sometimes Eric and I have those moments when we don’t feel like the best parents. When we are exasperated and yell at the kids. When we forget a class we signed up for because life is extra busy. This photo is just to show that the evidence points to excellent parenting – with occasional lapses.

Looking at some photos of a gay wedding with two brides in white dresses. Ezri asked what they were doing. I said the two brides were getting married to each other.
Ezri: Two brides!
Amanda: Yes, when two women fall in love and get married there are two brides.
Ezri: I know, but shouldn’t one of them get to be the groom?
Amanda: Well, usually we call the woman getting married the bride, but I suppose if one of them wanted to call herself the groom she could.
Ezri: That’s good. I would want to be the bride.

E (sounding a little exasperated): Ivan, I need you!
i (bounding towards his sister): I am right here. I am right here, Ezri.
She needed him to help her carry stuffed animals upstairs to the pet salon (bathroom).

Ezri asks questions that are hard to answer and they are never the ones I am prepared for. I try to answer them.
1) What is a church? We are secular. She doesn’t have a church, so how to describe it – the building? the faith community? what faith is? why there is more than one? what a deity is?
2) Are there still pirates? Her vision of pirates is Captain Hook and silly, scurvy seadogs that never truly existed outside of media and stories. Piracy happens today. There used to be sea going pirates. The whole thing was a tricky conversation that boiled down to the historical pirates that inspire the Disney show Jake and the Neverland pirates do not exist, but piracy still does.
3) Who will live in our house when we die? This one wasn’t that tricky to answer because I don’t know and won’t ever know, but it started a discussion of death as a separation from knowing and I still don’t know exactly what gears I turned in her head about what it means to die.
4) Why is it bad to be old? This question was asked after a discussion of how it is not nice to say to be “wow, you are really old” which she had done. I don’t believe it is bad to be old, but culturally it is not nice to point out someone’s age. I think I said something about how we avoid talking about certain things and tried to explain taboos and included some ramblings about how we don’t show our underwear even though we all know people wear underwear. So, sure you are going to notice people’s wrinkles and know they are old and they know they are old, but we still don’t mention it.

That’s the last night of Hanukkah celebration. Each kid got a Zelf toy, but could not hold still for a group photo. At least it’s a decent photo of the zelfs (zelves perhaps).

We continued our now annual outing to buy books for disadvantaged kids this year. This was the first year I think Ezri understood the spirit of this action. She kept asking about people who didn’t own many books. “How many books does she have? Does she have only like six and then the ones from the library?” We talked about how if you don’t have much money and struggle to pay for food and your housing you might never buy a book because they are important but less important than food and a place to live. She kept coming back to, “How many books does she have?” I think the idea of a home without books was understandably inconceivable to my kid.

Ezri bought a book for a 5 year old girl and after carefully considering all the Pinkalicious books (and only the Pinkalicious books) in the store she chose Emeraldalicious.

Ivan happily pointed and said “Dat one! Button. Read it.” at the book,Don’t Push the Button by Bill Cotter. Which I took to be his choice for a 2 year-old boy.

I picked a title for a teen girl who I hope likes Matched by Ally Condie. It seemed a good wide appeal book with its dystopian romance.

Here’s Ezri with our completed Menurkey who she has named Menurka.

Here’s what bedtime stories looked like in 2011.

Here’s bedtime stories now.

Books the Blau family is sad to return to the library include:

Little Mouse by Alison Murray in which a girl tells how her mommy likes to call her “her little mouse.” But she likens herself to brave lions, hungry horses, loud elephants, and ends headed for bed saying how she sometimes likes being mommy’s little mouse. The illustrations make this one. They are both uncluttered and detailed in one artistic stroke. By which I mean the facial expressions fit perfectly and the animals the girl compares herself to can be found in the final spread of her bedroom in subtle details like a single lion tail hanging out of her toy box. This one is lovely and Ezri likes it and her little brother is an even bigger fan.

Llama Llama Time to Share by Anna Dewdney
The parents here are enjoying all the puns about Llama’s “gnu” friend Nelly Gnu. It’s a perfectly pitched story about how hard it can be to share, but how friends are worth sharing with because of the joy they bring. The rhyming meter makes it a particularly pleasant read aloud book.

What Happens on Wednesdays by Emily Jenkins
A city girl tells us what happens on Wednesdays in her family from getting up in the morning to going to bed at night. You see her neighborhood, her relationship with mom and dad, She tells about her day from a child vantage point including the important things like putting her things in her cubby at preschool or maybe it’s kindergarten and putting band-aids on her stuffed elephant Looga. It is a great book to start discussion of what we do in any given day and how a Wednesday’s schedule might be different from other days of the week. Ezri and I talked all about what happens on her Wednesdays.

Squid and Octopus Friends for Always by Tao Nyeu
I would liken this to Lobel’s Frog and Toad in the best way. Two friends with particular personalities helping each other, making funny mistakes (Ezri loves that they wear boots on their heads), and sharing. Really easy to read repeatedly and we have. The artwork is lovely and more copious and detailed than Lobel. including cartoon speech bubbles. I mean who doesn’t want to see an Octopus and Squid in mittens, socks and hats. The page of Squid describing his dream that he has X-ray vision and looking into a submarine has a dye cut page with holes for the windows that opens to a detailed interior of the submarine and its passengers. Ivan loves this page and it can be hard to continue the story as he wants to stay with this page a long time.

It’s the Girl in the Yellow Hat and her monkey. . . and her bear.

What have we been reading?
Tiny Titans collections of comics by Art Balthazar
Dr. Seuss’ ABC Book
I Can Do it Myself (A Sesame Street book highlighting all the things the different muppets can do themselves).
We’ve rediscovered a couple old favorites this week in Naughty Little Monkeys by Aylesworth and Slinky Mailinki Catflaps by Lynley Dodd
Ezri still enjoys reading Babybug Magazines together with her little brother. She often picks one as a bedtime story for Ivan as we read our stories all together these days.

This is our egg dying fun at Blau haus. Ezri loved drawing on the eggs with crayons and putting on stickers after dying.

Today I told stories at Ezri’s park district preschool. It was a blast. I spent an hour with books and preschoolers. We sang, danced, ROARED, and had a lot of fun. At the end of my visit Ezri came to give me a hug and a number of her classmates followed her lead, so I got heaps of preschooler love. I feel very lucky.

To the DGPL librarians who will see this same group of children in a couple weeks I read Dinosaur Vs. The Library, Shark in the Park, Barry the Fish with Fingers, Grumpy Bird, Do You Know Which Ones Will Grow?, The Doghouse, I am Invited to a Party, and A Cheese and Tomato Spider. We sang Alice the Camel, The Day I Went to Sea, and listened to BOOTS by Laurie Berkner. We made mixed-up animals on the flannel board and my blue kangaroo hid behind flowers in the garden. All the stories went over well, so if you end up repeating some of them I am sure the kids would be pleased.

Can one take too many photos of her children in boxes?

Another collection of quotes from the girl:

“Look, I am a chicken – a magic chicken.” She was flapping her wings while jumping on her trampoline.

“I will always have this hair until I am a skeleton.”

Talking to her own reflection in the window, “Hi, Ezri, what are you doing?”

“After I put on my cupcake pajamas I am going to be a weeping angel.” Her dad taught her to play “weeping angel.” It’s like red light, green light – but creepier. She’s very good at moving a step and then holding the exact position she had before.

“Let’s scratch the back of Baby Agent.” This is a quote during Ezri’s game of secret agent. Ezri likes to play secret agent after reading the book, 006 and a Half by Kes Gray. She has enjoyed several of Gray’s Daisy Books. I think Daisy is a kindred spirit. Daisy makes up a spy language that reminds me of Ezri’s made up “friendly alien” language. So, Ivan is the Baby Agent and I am the Mama Agent and Ezri is 004 and a half. She’s not that old yet, but I let her play more mature. She likes telling me how sneaky she is. Announcing your sneakiness may not be the way to practice the art of stealth.

“I am really really old. I am SIX!”

“We are having a underwear and fur party.” When I looked Ezri was wearing only her underwear and was in the cardboard box with Sushi, the cat.

Ezri: Tweet Tweet Tweet
Amanda: Are you a bird?
Ezri: No, I have a bird in my brain

Better late than never, here’s a round-up of our favorite holiday reads of the past year.

Santa Duck by David Milgrim
with the refrain “Jingle quack Jingle quack Jingle all the quack” this was a winner about a duck who while wearing a Santa hat is mistaken for the man himself and collects other animals’ Christmas wishes taking them to Santa. He forgets to tell Santa what he wants himself, but discovers helping Santa was a great gift in itself. He’s still pretty pleased with a ride-around jeep that appears for him on Christmas morning.

Bad Kitty Christmas by Nick Bruel
Bad Kitty destroys an alphabet of Christmas decor and preparations. Bad Kitty runs away and meets an old woman who tells Bad Kitty about an alphabet of family. Bad Kitty reunites with his family and brings a guest to share the Christmas joy.

Christmas Daddy and Hanukkah Mama by Selina Alko
Sadie describes two holiday traditions one from each side of her family. I think it is obvious why Ezri responded to this one.

Fancy Nancy Splendiferous Christmas by Jane O’Connell
A treasured holiday decorations is destroyed in an accident and a homemade one takes it place. Fancy Nancy and her Fancy words continue to enthrall Ezri.

We enjoyed both
How do Dinosaurs say Happy Chanukah? and How do Dinosaurs say Merry Christmas? by Jane Yolen

And lastly my favorite that was appreciated by Ezri:
Dinosaur versus Santa by Bob Shea
Roar! Roar! Dinosaur tackles Christmas prep in style always coming out on top. He also wears some great holiday sweaters.

Book Angels –
Again this year we picked book presents to be given to less book-gifted people than us.

Ezri’s pick was Max and Ruby’s Treasure Hunt which she picked for a 3 year-old girl.

Ivan pointed and said, “BEE-bo!” which I took to mean he had selected a large edition of The Belly Button Book for a 1 year-old boy.

I selected two paperbacks for a 15 year-old girl being Papertowns by John Green and Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor. I could not pick just one without knowing her genre preference.

Recently a friend was talking about her daughter’s drawings inspired by Ed Emberley’s drawing books.
So, we busted out an Emberley drawing book on making drawings with fingerprints and some washable markers.

We had a lot of fun. These are turtles climbing a mountain and assorted other doodles from The Complete Funprint Drawing Book.

In my basement book collection I still have the 1979 Big Green Drawing Book my mother got signed for me at an ALA conference. We’ll have to pull it out for more ideas.