Lobel's Lucia

Today is Santa Lucia Day, which may or may not mean anything to you depending on whether you're Swedish. I'm not, but my husband's grandfather was, and we celebrate the day with Santa Lucia buns and books (I've written about Lucia and the Light by Phyllis Root and Hugo and Josephine by Maria Gripe here in other years, but somehow haven't gotten around to Kirsten's Surprise by Janet Shaw, from the American Girls Collection. Maybe next year). My son outgrew his starboy hat a couple of years ago, but my daughter still wears her (battery-operated) crown.

This lovely image of a "Lucia bride," wearing the traditional white gown and crown of candles, is by Anita Lobel, from Christmas Crafts: Things to make the 24 days before Christmas by Carolyn Meyer (Harper & Row, 1974). It's one of my favorite Christmas books, with international Christmas traditions and projects for every day. Some of them are a little dated (there's macrame), but many others have become our family's Christmas traditions, too: from making homemade advent calendars (December 1) to decorating a tree for the birds (December 23) and baking a chocolate yule log (December 24).

Lobel's black-and-white illustrations (and there are lots of them) are a big part of the charm of Christmas Crafts. I love Lobel's work any time of year, but at Christmas, don't miss her illustrations for The Night Before Christmas: A Victorian Vision of the Christmas Classic by Clement C. Moore (2000) and The Stable Rat and Other Christmas Poems by Julia Cunningham (2001). Come to think of it, A New Coat for Anna by Harriet Zeifert, with pictures by Anita Lobel (Knopf, 1986) is a Christmas story, too--and it's still in print. Happy Santa Lucia Day!

Caldecott Hopefuls: Building Our House

With a publication date of January 8, Building Our House by Jonathan Bean (FSG) might have been the very first Caldecott-eligible picture book I read in 2013. I had it in the house when my Mini Mock Caldecott Committee met later that month, and it was all I could do to resist sharing it with them. My fondness for Building Our House has only grown stronger with time, and this morning I had the pleasure of reading it again with my daughter, after she had a chance to discuss it at Caldecott Club (this one is run by her elementary school librarian).

Here's what we think: Part of what makes Building Our House such a satisfying book is the way it's made. As it should be, since the book itself is about building something to last. Everything from the trim size (taller than average) to the creamy, matte paper it's printed on speaks to this point. And the Author's Note includes vintage 1970s photographs of the Bean family at work on building their house, rounding out the reader's experience, too.

Of course, the illustrations themselves are full of satisfying details and subplots, continuity and change. There's also plenty to learn about construction, from setting the corners of the foundation by the North Star to machines and tools and good old-fashioned hard work. Check out Mom on the cover with a circular saw.

One thing we were curious about was the evergreen branch visible at the peak of the house on framing day (and for a few months after, until the cold rains fall). We did a little research: apparently, when the last beam is placed at the top of a building there is a ceremony called topping out--on skyscrapers, even!

I could go on and on (I sort of already have). Building Our House. It's our favorite.

[See Laying the Foundation for a Great Picture Book at Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast for so.much.MORE. Thank you, Jules and Jonathan!]

Caldecott Hopefuls: This Moose Belongs to Me

My Caldecott Hopefuls are picture books I like a lot, for various and idiosyncratic reasons, and not necessarily ones I think will win the award (although one can hope). Here's what I love about This Moose Belongs to Me by Oliver Jeffers (Philomel, 2012): the contrast between the grandeur and solemnity of the landscape backgrounds (many of them reprinted from paintings by 20th century American artist Alexander Dzigurski) and, well, Wilfred and his moose (as seen in the image above, which wraps around the covers of the book). Now that I think of it, this style of illustration--Jeffers's artistic borrowing--is especially appropriate to a story about ownership (see Caldecott criteria 1.c). Does this moose belong to me?

According to the copyright page, "the art for this book was made from a mishmash of oil painting onto old linotype and painted landscapes, and a bit of technical wizardry thrown into the mix here and there." In case you want to try this at home (yes, you do), Oliver Jeffers has helpfully made a video called How to Draw a Moose. We didn't have any landscape paintings lying around, so we drew our moose (meese? mice?) onto pages ripped from old National Geographics instead. Kind of like this:

Except at Macchu Picchu.

Olive and other Halloween book+costume ideas from Penguin

Welcome to Penguin's Halloween blog tour, which pairs spooky middle grade books with great costume ideas! I love the idea of dressing up as a character from a book, and I know lots of families and schools choose to celebrate Halloween this way, too. Today's (seventh and final) tour stop features the first book of one of my favorite middle grade series (my review), plus a fantastic giveaway! Here's Penguin with the details:

Step into some creepy stories this Halloween and become your favorite middle grade character…from the ghoulish undead to mischievous pirates, the costumes are endless.

The Book: Books of Elsewhere: The Shadows by Jacqueline West

When eleven-year-old Olive moves into a crumbling Victorian mansion with her parents, she knows there's something strange about the house - especially the odd antique paintings covering the walls. And when she puts on a pair of old spectacles, she discovers the strangest thing yet: She can travel inside the paintings, to a spooky world that's full of dark shadows. Add to that three talking cats, who live in the house and seem to be keeping secrets of their own, and Olive soon finds herself confronting a dark and dangerous power that wants to get rid of her by any means necessary. It's up to Olive to save the house from the dark shadows, before the lights go out for good.
The Costume
Halloween is the perfect time to be Olive and travel through paintings and beyond! This costume is great for a school-day costume:
  1. Olive wears a red striped shirt over a long-sleeved white shirt, jeans, and red shoes. Don’t forget her yellow headband!
  2. Find the oldest, biggest glasses you can find. A grandparent might be able to help with this one!
  3. Now comes the fun part! Find a big piece of cardboard and cut out the shape of a BIG picture frame. Make the edges curvy and decorate with markers and paint. 
  4. You’re ready to be Olive! Carry around your new picture frame and wear your glasses for quick escape – but keep an eye out! There are people who might want to make sure your Halloween is full of more tricks than treats….
Find The Books of Elsewhere online at thebooksofelsewhere.com
Purchase The Books of Elsewhere here: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, IndieBound 
And check out the rest of the blog tour for more great book+costume ideas:

M 10.22 In a Glass Grimmly by Adam Gidwitz
T 10.23 Gustav Gloom and the People Takers by Adam-Troy Castro
W 10.24 Undead Ed by Rotterly Ghoulstone
Th 10.25 Deadweather and Sunrise:Chronicles of Egg by Geoff Rodkey
F 10.26 The Creature from the 7th Grade by Bob Balaban
M 10.29 Wereworld: Shadow of the Hawk by Curtis Jobling
T 10.30 Books of Elsewhere:The Shadows by Jacqueline West
right here at Books Together
 
[Me again.] And now for the giveaway! Courtesy of Penguin, I'm giving away a set of all seven books featured on the blog tour to one lucky reader (and commenter) on this post. Just leave a comment by midnight Friday, November 2 to enter [deadline extended due to Hurricane Sandy!]. If you'd like, let me know who you're going to be for Halloween, too. Olive, perhaps?

Extra Yarn, hold the needles

At last count, Extra Yarn by Mac Barnett, illustrated by Jon Klassen (Balzer + Bray, 2012) had received four starred reviews. It's Klassen's second picture book--his first, I Want My Hat Back (Candlewick, 2011), also got a lot of attention and went on to win a well-deserved 2012 Geisel Honor. I'm not so sure about Extra Yarn, although I do love a picture book about knitting. I think Mars is a great name for a dog, too.

But back to the knitting. There's only one illustration in the whole book of Annabelle actually knitting something (it happens to be a sweater for a pickup truck, but that's another issue). And I'm pretty sure that the needles aren't supposed to be pointing up like that.

Does it matter, though? After all, the book is about a box that holds a never-ending supply of yarn of every color: Annabelle can probably knit it however she wants. And knitters as well as critics seem to love the book anyway. Maybe you are supposed to hold the needles that way, at least in picture books! Just don't try it at home.

Best Horn Book Cover Ever?

My long-awaited copy of the January/February 2012 issue of The Horn Book arrived today and it is gorgeous.  The cover illustration is by Salley Mavor, who illustrated the 2011 Boston Globe-Horn Book picture book award winner, Pocketful of Posies: A Treasury of Nursery Rhymes (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; link is to my review). You can see and read more about the process of making the cover illustration (I love the way she renders the Horn Book logo in particular. Also the little girl dressed as a lamb) and enter a poster giveaway on Salley's blog, or just order your poster directly from The Horn Book.

I've been a Horn Book subscriber for two years now (the inside of the magazine is just as good). Other favorite covers are Marla Frazee's hollow tree (May/June 2011), which also appears in her illustrations for the picture book Stars by Mary Lyn Ray (Beach Lane Books, 2011); and Anita Lobel's guardian angel (November/December 2010).

Which are your favorites? [There are lots more to choose from in the Horn Book Magazine's gallery of covers, too.]

Angela Barrett and The Hidden House

Children's illustrator Angela Barrett was featured in the Guardian's series A Life in Pictures last week (April 14, 2010).  This gorgeous image, the first in the slideshow, is from The Hidden House by Martin Waddell (1990), now out of print. I picked up a copy at a library sale a couple of years ago and promptly fell in love with Barrett's mysterious and beautiful work. The story itself is about the passage of time; both poignant and a little strange, I love it, too.

Bruno the lonely doll-maker makes three dolls to keep him company in his house in the woods before he dies and leaves them to rot away. Years later the house is brought back to life by a new family. The glorious splash of yellow in this double-page spread breaks away from the sombre greens and greys of the early part of the story.

Not to mention the blue jug of flowers, which looks like something by de Heem; and in fact several of the images in this book have the carefully composed quality of a Dutch still life. We like to count the cats here (there are five--no, six of them, one of which has tangled a spool of thread around the legs of a chair) and imagine climbing the curving blue staircase behind the yellow door.

[I've missed books together this spring.  I hope you have, too!  In any case, it's good to be back.]

Yoko's Show-and-Tell

Yoko, an adorable Japanese-American kitten, is starring in her fourth picture book by Rosemary Wells, Yoko's Show-and-Tell (Hyperion, 2011).  In this one, Yoko's grandparents in Japan send her an antique doll for Girls' Day.  Yoko's mother says ("in her Big No voice") that Yoko may not take Miki to school for show-and-tell, but Yoko can't resist: "Everyone in my class will love you!" she said to Miki. "I will bring you right home, and Mama will never know!"

Well.  Miki ends up significantly worse for the wear after the Franks toss her around the school bus--she doesn't even make it to show-and-tell--and Yoko has to confess to her mother ("Do you still love me?"). They rush Miki to Dr. Kiroshura's Doll Hospital, and she's good as new by the time Obaasan and Ojiisan arrive for their springtime visit from Japan: "Obaasan admired Miki's new kimono. "She is so beautiful. And not one scratch after all these years!"

Yoko's Show-and-Tell is a quiet and lovely little book, just 9" square. It's economically told and always attuned to Yoko's feelings, which will be painfully familiar to anyone who has ever done something against her (or her mother's) better judgment.  I do think it could have ended with Obaasan's comment above; we don't really need to see the consequences for the Franks, only for Yoko.

Yoko herself is an exceptionally expressive kitten. Wells's illustrations combine ink-and-watercolor with patterned paper collage in small square panels, one to a page; the endpapers, featuring Miki in a variety of kimonos, are especially cheerful and cute. Look for this one if you, like me, love Yoko's Paper Cranes (2001) and traditional Japanese art and culture. Just in time for Girls' Day on March 3!

Pocketful of Posies

Maybe the skill and artistry of Salley Mavor's hand-stitched, sewn, and collaged illustrations for Pocketful of Posies: A Treasury of Nursery Rhymes (Houghton Mifflin, 2010) are best appreciated by other needleworkers, but their appeal is so much greater than that--after all, Pocketful of Posies is a Horn Book Fanfare Best Book of 2010 and an ALA Notable for Younger Readers.  I hope it received serious consideration for the Caldecott, too.  At our house, every page has been pored over and marveled at multiple times, and it's inspired lots of reading and singing, collecting and making.

My favorite are the double-page spreads, which often illustrate several nursery rhymes in a single scene.  The one below includes Humpty Dumpty (an actual egg!), Peter Piper, and Two Little Blackbirds.  It's dfficult to appreciate the richness of the color, the depth and detail of the original in this image; nothing I've found on the internet comes close to the photographic quality of the printed book.

Or, of course, the real thing: the original illustrations from Pocketful of Posies, with new embroidered felt borders and shadowbox frames made by Salley's husband, are being exhibited in a traveling show.  At this point, most of the locations are in New England.  [Charlotte, please go on my behalf.]

Fortunately, there is plenty of information about Mavor's process available online: this interview with Salley at Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast is a good place to start.  And if you'd like to make little dolls like these, Mavor's Felt Wee Folk: Enchanting Projects (C&T, 2003) is a great resource.  There's even a section of Projects for Children to Make.  Also for those of us who still struggle with the French knot.

Library party at our house next month--save the date!

The March issue of Family Fun hasn't been in our house for 24 hours and we've already picked a date and time (a Wednesday afternoon in March) for our library-themed party, complete with book-pocket invitations and in-house library cards for all the guests.  The party was designed to celebrate Read Across America Day on March 2, but I hope to be celebrating the Arlington Public Library's brand-new catalog and account system myself.  The library is transitioning to the new system this week, which means the catalog is offline and my holds (all those shiny new books waiting to be reviewed!) are temporarily...on hold.  While the staff is working hard, I need a suitably old-school distraction.  Ssh, it's party time!

Hansel and Gretel, costume design by Zwerger and Stemple

The costume and set design for the Amherst Ballet's Hansel and Gretel is faithful to Lisbeth Zwerger's watercolor illustrations of the Grimm tale, "right down to the shingles on the witch’s house [and] the patterns hand-printed on the dancers’ skirts" (Shop Talk, 8/25/2010).   If you know me at all, you'll know that I love this project.  Premiering at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art.

BraveMouse Books: Benjamin and Bumper to the Rescue

When Benjamin Middlemouse's mother goes missing from their home in the armoire, Benjamin and his friend Bumper (a small elephant who lives on the bed) go on a search-and-rescue mission that takes them into the kitchen, out to the garden...and straight up the stairs to Sir Pouncelot's tower.  Will they free Mrs. Middlemouse from her cage before Sir Pouncelot (ha!) bakes her into a casserole?  Well, yes, but how they do it--and make him promise never to eat mice (or moles) again in the bargain--is part of the homespun, handmade charm of Benjamin and Bumper to the Rescue by Molly Coxe, with photographs by Olivier Toppin (BraveMouse Books, 2010).

Benjamin, Bumper, Mrs. Middlemouse, and Sir Pouncelot, not to mention the miniature world they inhabit, are quite literally the creations of author Molly Coxe.  (You can make a BraveMouse like Benjamin, too!  Molly and her daughter show you how.)  They were photographed for this book by Olivier Toppin, who specializes in lighting effects that set a magical mood.  It doesn't hurt that the photos were taken in a medieval French village, either.

The interior scenes, like the one in Benjamin's bedroom (above), are filled with a combination of repurposed, miniature, and handmade items that child readers with an eye for detail will love to discover.  I especially liked the outdoor shots, too: the whole thing, from kitchen to garden, feels very French.  [A good thing!  More sample pages at BraveMouse Books.]

It's clear that great care and love have been lavished on this book, the first in the Adventures of Benjamin and Bumper series to come out of "mouse-sized" publishing company BraveMouse Books (a story in themselves).  The next book in the series, Posie and the Pirates, promises more small adventures for the BraveMice (and Bumper).  Watch out for the Roof Rats!

[N.b. Review copy provided by the publisher; thank you!]

The Blue Bird of Happiness Project

I read The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin (Harper, 2009) during my blog break and immediately set about starting my own Happiness Project.  (Me and everyone else who reads the book, I imagine.)  I'll spare you the details, although it does involve more blogging--which brings me to this post.

At one point during Gretchen's project, she decides to collect bluebirds, because bluebirds are a symbol of happiness.  The connection arises from Maurice Maeterlinck's play The Blue Bird (1908; link is to Project Gutenberg), in which two children--Tytyl and Mytyl--search everywhere for the Blue Bird of Happiness only to find that it was at home all along.

And of course, The Blue Bird is the matinee performed by the students of Madame Fidolia's Academy of Dancing and Stage Training in Noel Streatfeild's Ballet Shoes (1937).  Two scenes from the play are quoted at length in the book; I loved reading these as a child and imagining myself in the roles of Pauline-as-Tytyl and Petrova-as-Mytyl.  I collect books, not bluebirds, but they bring me happiness all the same.

[N.b.  I love the costume notes for The Blue Bird:

TYLTYL wears the dress of Hop o' my Thumb in Perrault's Tales. Scarlet
knickerbockers, pale-blue jacket, white stockings, tan shoes.
MYTYL is dressed like Gretel or Little Red Riding-hood.
LIGHT.--The "moon-coloured" dress in Perrault's _Peau d'âne;_ that is
to say, pale gold shot with silver, shimmering gauzes, forming a sort of
rays, etc. Neo-Grecian or Anglo-Grecian (à la Walter Crane) or even
more or less Empire style: a high waist, bare arms, etc. Head-dress: a sort
of diadem or even a light crown.
THE FAIRY BÉRYLUNE and NEIGHBOUR BERLINGOT.--The traditional dress of the
poor women in fairy-tales. If desired, the transformation of the Fairy into
a princess in Act I may be omitted.
DADDY TYL, MUMMY TYL, GAFFER TYL and GRANNY TYL.--The traditional costume
of the German wood-cutters and peasants in Grimm's Tales.

And many more, all of which I want to make.  Puppet show, anyone?]

Elizabeti and Fanny

An article in today's KidsPost about children making their own toys ("Creating Toys with Their Own Two Hands," 11/11/09) reminded me of two otherwise very different books about girls making their own dolls.  I'm very fond of Elizabeti's Doll by Stephanie Stuve-Bodeen (illustrated by Christy Hale; Lee and Low, 1998) -- of all the Elizabeti books, really.  In this one, Elizabeti has a new baby brother and wants to take care of her own baby, so she picks up a rock that's just the right size, kisses it, and names it Eva.  Stuve-Bodeen's text and Hale's illustrations evoke the Tanzanian setting beautifully, but the focus of the book is squarely on Elizabeti's relationship with Eva.

Holly Hobbie's Fanny (Little, Brown 2009) is a very different book, and despite its more familiar setting and concerns--Fanny's mother doesn't want her to have the Bratz-like Connie doll Fanny has her heart set on, so Fanny makes her own doll--I haven't warmed up to it (we own it).  I wonder if it has something to do with why Elizabeti and Fanny are motivated to make their own dolls?  Or could it be the mere presence of the Connies?  If you've read Fanny, I would love to know what you make of it.  And if you haven't read Elizabeti, I highly recommend it!  The two make an interesting comparison.

Madeline's Birthday

We celebrated Milly's fifth birthday with a Madeline party at home.  I think even Ludwig Bemelmans (who never actually wrote a book about Madeline's birthday) would have been pleased.  Milly was!  Miss Clavel (that would be me) made twelve little girls-worth of Madeline coats and hats for Milly and the party guests; we did a dramatic reading of Madeline's Rescue featuring a special guest appearance by Lord Cucuface (Milly's dad); and we hunted high and low for Madeline's dog Genevieve, who turned out to be a dog pinata (retrofitted with pullstrings to avoid the appearance of animal cruelty).  Then we ate cake.

All of this was surprisingly simple to put together, I swear.  It did take some thought and time (and the writing of a bit of / bad Bemelmans-esque rhyme); but if your child has a birthday coming up, I would definitely encourage you to plan the party around the book.  And if your child's favorite book is Madeline, call me.

Joyeux anniversaire, Milly!

Easter eggs

We decorated eggs today. 84 of them! It's a big Anderson family tradition.  I always pull out our copy of An Egg is Quiet for inspiration (Dianna Aston, illustrated in ink and watercolor by Sylvia Long; Chronicle, 2006).  Its endpapers look like the blue speckled scarlet tanager egg pictured here; for a variety of eggs, see the first double page spread and the one for "An egg is colorful."

Other family favorite Easter books (mostly picture books, and one middle grade novel) listed here.  Which are your favorites?

Poetry Friday: Father's Fox's Christmas Rhymes

Here am I, old Father Fox
With sweets in my pocket and holes in my socks
Bringing a basket brimful of cheer
A toy for each day until Christmas is here

We're fond of foxes here at bookstogether.  Our favorite foxes are sisters Clyde and Wendy Watsons's; their Father Fox's Pennyrhymes was a National Book Award finalist in 1971.  This collection of 18 original Christmas rhymes was published over thirty years later (FSG, 2003); we like it even better.  The rhymes (by Clyde) are both crisp and cozy; the illustrations (by Wendy) reward lots of looking.

The Christmas rhymes can stand alone, although taken together (as we read them), they tell a story.  I chose this one to share because it describes so well the atmosphere in our house (and the foxes') during the days before Christmas.

Secret things in
Secret places
Whispered words
And knowing faces

Red glass beads
In the cracks of the floor
A whiff of paint
From behind a door

Paper rustles
Scissors snip
A telltale wink
And a finger to the lip

[Ssh!  This year I'm making the kids stuffed foxes of rust-colored wool felt, wearing patched white linen nightclothes like the ones the Fox family wears.  What are you making?]

[Poetry Friday Roundup is at poet Elaine Magliaro's blog Wild Rose Reader.  Thanks, Elaine!]

The Magic Rabbit

Milly was fascinated by Annette LeBlanc Cole's The Magic Rabbit (Candlewick, 2007) earlier this fall.  It's a story about a street magician (Ray) and his white rabbit (Bunny), who are separated during a performance; that night, Bunny follows a trail of gold stars (and popcorn) that leads to a reunion with Ray.  A perfectly nice book; but I wasn't sure right away what it was about it that fascinated Milly.

We borrowed it from her preschool teacher and read it countless times over a long weekend.  It held up to repeated readings well, thankfully; but it was the artwork, I think, that did it:  elegant pen-and-ink illustrations, most of them of the city (Cambrige, MA?) at night--lit up by many magic yellow stars.  There don't seem to be many picture books illustrated in black-and-white, but it works wonderfully well here.

The Magic Rabbit inspired a lot of art projects at home, too:  Milly made her own magicians with silver crayon on black construction paper, and rabbits with gold on white.  We cut out a handful of yellow stars and scattered them around the house.  I even made a black magician's cape with a high stand-up collar just like Ray's, and a magic wand (I didn't get to the hat, though).  We gave the cape, wand, and stars to the preschool when we returned the book, so everyone could pretend to be a magician.

[See also The House in the Night by Susan Marie Swanson; illustrated in black-and-white scratchboard with touches of "marigold" by Beth Krommes (Houghton Mifflin, 2008) and one of PW's Best Children's Picture Books of the Year.  It's a beautiful bedtime book, based on a cumulative poem found in The Oxford Nursery Rhyme Book.  I love the way the marigold highlights objects that are familiar yet fascinating to a preschooler--a key, a book, a bird, the moon.  And I've always loved Krommes's work; this post on Grandmother Winter is from this time last year.]

Nonfiction Monday: We Spy Colors in Art

We've been enjoying the latest in the series of "I Spy" art books by Lucy Mickelthwait, I Spy Colors in Art (Greenwillow, 2007).  The concept is simple and elegant:  pair an "I Spy" statement ("I spy with my little eye an orange orange") with a painting (John Frederick Peto, The Poor Man's Store) on the facing page.  You can extend it all sorts of ways, too:  after she finds what I'm spying, Milly asks me to look for something else in each painting; or we'll make up a story about what might happen next.  All the while, the kids (Leo likes to play, too) are familiarizing themselves with fine art and figuring out how to join the conversation about it.

Milly had a lot to say on Saturday at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.  We were just trying to escape from the heat at the Arts on Foot festival, but her interest in looking at and talking about particular paintings reminded me that we haven't visited the National Gallery with her, either.  At least not since she could talk.  We're already planning to visit later this month.

Of course, a visit to the art museum should always end at the museum gift shop, where you can purchase for small change a postcard of the painting (or whatever) you liked best.  I have a small collection of museum postcards that tends toward paintings of mothers and daughters; women reading, writing, or doing needlework; 15th c. portraits and Dutch interiors.  As Milly starts her own collection of art cards, I'm considering mounting them in a series of simple staple-bound books so we can play "I spy" with paintings that mean something special to her.

[I spy the Nonfiction Monday roundup at Picture Book of the Day!]