Category: children

children, figure skating, goals, Life Talk

Lessons

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WARNING: This post has nothing to do with writing. It is, in fact, mostly bragging on my kid. Because along with being a writer, I’m a MOM, and occasional bragging on my kid goes with the territory.

These two pictures were taken the first time Joy was on the ice. She made either me or my sister carry her the ENTIRE time. Granted, she was a tiny three-year-old at the time, but still, we were SORE the next morning. She has loved watching ice skating with me ever since she was a little baby, but the reality of stepping on the ice scared her to death.
This was her third time on the ice. She didn’t even want to hold my hand by then! She also insisted I show her how to bunny hop. No fear at all, and even the few times she fell, she laughed.
photo by lis hurlbut
First time on single-bladed skates, showing her sister how it’s done.
And THIS is from her first day of Snowplow Sam (that’s the lowest level of skating classes from the United States Figure Skating Association, by the way) in January.

And THIS is last Sunday, when she brought home a certificate stating that she’d passed all of Snowplow Sam, and is ready to start Basic 1 in the fall!
Not bad, for a little over a year. Her first-ever skating show is this Sunday, and my parents, Carl’s mom, my sister and brother-in-law, and possibly Carl’s sister are all coming out to watch and cheer her on. It’s not just about the skating, it’s about finding something she loves, overcoming her fears about it, and excelling at it.
Hmm, maybe there really IS something in here applicable to writing after all …
Hey, have you entered the giveaway yet? If not, go, enter! What are you waiting for?
Books, children, fantasy, reading list

The Year of The Author

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I have a hard time keeping track of what books I read in a year. I start out well enough, in January and February, but by March, I’ve completely forgotten about writing down what books I’ve read. Probably because so many of them are re-reads, and it seems silly sometimes to write down that I’ve read Anne of Green Gables for the 500th time.

However, I did realize, recently, that I tend to have a year of an author. For the last few years, there’s been one author that I’ve discovered, either new to me or newly-loved, and I’ve spent the year reading everything I can get my hands on by that author.

First it was Dorothy L Sayers, and spending the year borrowing one Lord Peter book after another from the library. I even read all the Monty Egg stories I could find. Sayers’ writing still enthralls me – I find something new about it to cherish each time I re-read. And Lord Peter himself … I have mentioned before how bitterly I resented Harriet Vane because he fell in love with her, yes? All right then. Nothing more about that really need be said. He is as human and real and swoon-worthy a hero as was ever written.

Then it was Tamora Pierce – first Kel, then Aly, then Beka. Though Pierce’s tendency (as I see it) to sometimes subvert the story in favor of her point irritated me (and still does, though the more I write the more I understand that temptation, and also how easy that is to do without realizing it), I did so appreciate her strong heroines – especially Kel and Beka, who were both quieter and more sensible than many female fantasy protagonists and were not blessed with special gifts that made them stand out; it was their character and determination. I truly do love that.

This past year, it was Diana Wynne Jones. I’d read one or two of her books before last year, but 2011 was the year I fully fell in love. Also, it happened to be the year she died, which left me feeling outraged – I’d finally found out how much I loved her writing, and then she was gone, before I even had a chance to say or think “thank you.” The woman who created Sophie and Howl, Chrestomanci, Cat, and so many others, and wait, what, they just barely sprang to life for me and their creator was gone? Bad timing, Louise and world!

I think I already know what author will dominate 2012 for me – another one who died shortly after I’d finally read one of her books*, though that was a few years ago.

2012 seems a fitting year to immerse myself in this author’s writings, seeing as how it is the 50th anniversary of her most famous work. That work? A Wrinkle in Time, and the author is Madeleine L’Engle.

I’ve mentioned on here recently just how moving I found A Ring of Endless Light. 2011 (well, and 2010) was a year of a lot of personal darkness for me, and the message of hope and encouragement to persevere that rang through Vicky’s experiences was just exactly what I needed, when I needed it. I sobbed my way through the last few pages – and I am not a big crier (I mean, sure I get choked up Every Single Time I read OR watch Sam’s “I can’t carry the Ring, but I can carry you,” bit to Frodo in Return of the King, but who doesn’t? I’m not made of stone, after all).

While we were visiting my MIL for Christmas, I started reading A Circle of Quiet, one of L’Engle’s memoir-ish works. By the time I was a few pages in, I know this was going to be one of those books that picked me up, shook me out, and set me back down again dazed, refreshed, and seeing the world with new eyes – or old eyes that simple had too many scales on them now shaken off.

And I was right. My thinking hasn’t necessarily radically changed on anything, but the book both affirmed and challenged me right where I needed it, helped me shake loose some ideas that have been weighting me down, and filled up the spaces with fresh ones. It also made me laugh, which is grand.

So now I am certain that 2012? Is going to be the year I read everything I can find by L’Engle.

(*So, the story about why it took me so long to read anything by L’Engle – when I was very young, I picked up a book from the library called The Door in the Wall, which I thought was going to be exciting, and WAS NOT. I hated it. After that, I always got that book confused with A Wind in the Door, and so transferred my loathing of that darn non-exciting children’s book to anything by L’Engle. Kind of like how I never read anything by Jones for so long because I always saw cats on the covers of her books, and unless Lloyd Alexander is writing it, I have no interest in feline fantasy. It took me until I was an adult to finally brave picking up Wrinkle, at which point I realized it had nothing whatsoever to do with EVIL BORING DOOR BOOK, but it was so very different from what I had been anticipating that I wasn’t sure what to make of it. Same when I finally read Wind, and it really did take me until Vicky and Ring before I could start to better appreciate L’Engle’s beautiful, strange writing. The End.)

Books, children

Favorite Children’s Books

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My girls are 4 and 2 1/2, and I thought I’d share some of their current favorite books, in case there are any parents/grandparents/aunts/uncles/close friends who are interested in good books for very small people.

Anything by Beatrix Potter. Their current favorites are the nursery rhyme books: Cecily Parsley and Appley Dapply. They also like The Tale of Timmy Tiptoes, Jemima Puddleduck, and Mrs Tittlemouse (Grace goes around all the time saying “Sank ‘oo, ‘sank ‘oo, mouse*,” in a very credible imitation of pompous Mr Jackson).

White Rabbit’s Color Book. This is one of Grandpa’s stories that he keeps for the littles. Grace asks about it the entire car ride whenever we go and visit (that’s four hours straight, by the way). They love learning about the mixing of colors, and I think they both (especially Grace) identify with the inquisitive White Rabbit.

Along those same lines, The Color Kittens is another favorite. I’ve been slowly increasing our collection of Little Golden Books; this one they like the best so far. We can’t get through a day without one or both of them asking me what color comes from mixing _____ (insert any two colors of choice here), and then correcting me if I get it wrong.

Joy more than Grace loves this Classic Fairy Tales book, another one that Grandpa picked up at the used bookstore and gave us to take home. Carl reads this to them often, and Joy knows most of the stories well enough by now that she can go through it by herself and recite the stories.

Footprints and Shadows is lovely. I found it at a used bookstore and couldn’t believe someone had sold it. The littles love the quiet rhythm of the words, and I get enchanted by the illustrations. It has actually inspired me to attempt more picture books, and I even have a plot simmering in the back of my brain for the next one!

Any of the books in the Stranger in the Woods series are perennial favorites, adored ever since the littles were babies. They are especially fun in the wintertime.

They are both just starting to appreciate the wacky humor of Dr Seuss. Grace loves her ABC book, and I bought Joy One Fish, Two Fish for Christmas, and this is ONE present I’m fairly certain (rap wood) she won’t reject after opening.

Jan Brett is another one whose books the girls love – any and all of them. On Noah’s Ark and The Owl and the Pussycat are their favorites, but now that Christmas is coming, I suspect they will want to read The Gingerbread Baby over and over (and over and over) again.

Grace is still a little young for them, but Joy enjoys Madeline and Babar, and they both like Curious George (although the first time I re-read the first book since I was a kid, last year, I was horrified at it – the Man in the Yellow Hat kidnaps George, and then George gets arrested for accidentally dialing a wrong number because the Man in the Yellow Hat just goes off and leaves him alone and loose in the apartment (AFTER KIDNAPPING HIM IN THE FIRST PLACE) … the whole thing is dreadful. Give me Babar’s communism any day).

Finally, they also both like listening to the CD of the Jesus Storybook Bible (GREAT for long car rides), and even though I find myself choking up at various stories when I try to read it aloud (Abraham and Isaac? BAWL), they also like to have it read to them by Mamma or Papa.

So there you have it! Any books little people in your life adore that I ought to look into adding to our collection?

*that translates to “Thank you, thank you, Mrs Tittlemouse.”

Carl reading Winnie-the-Pooh to Joy when she was about a week old, starting what we hope is a lifetime habit of loving good stories.


1920s, Books, children, families, heroines, Life Talk

Libraries and Death Traps

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Thank you all, again, for your kind words on my last post. You brought a lump to my throat more than once.

We’re still at my parents’ until Tuesday morning; Grandma’s memorial service is Monday. We’re looking forward to having much of the clan gathered together for it. Even though funerals are sad, we always manage to have something of a good time just because we’re together. Some of the aunts and uncles have only met my littles once or twice, so I’m happy (and slightly nervous) to introduce my small people to the larger family.

We also had Joy’s fourth birthday party today; I can’t wait to put pictures up on here from it. It was a woodland butterfly fairy tea party (originally, it was going to be a bird and flower and butterfly theme, but it evolved. These things happen), and even the three men involved (my husband, father, and brother-in-law) wore butterfly wings. O yes, they did. They all love Joy very much. They are also all very secure in their masculinity.

And my sister and I made sure to get them blue wings. Pink might have been carrying things a little too far.

And for a first, Joy only got one book for her birthday (and that from Carl and me). Usually books make up the bulk of her gifts. I’m sure she will get more once she receives her package from Carl’s aunt, a librarian in Maine. She always sends lots of book for birthdays and holidays. We are always very happy to see presents from G-Auntie.

This is the book we got for Joy:

No, wait. Wrong one. This one:

thanks to a recommendation from Rockin Librarian (thank you!). I’m excited to see what stories Joy concocts from the illustrations.

Meanwhile, my mom, sister and I are all sick (watching the two of them trying to tack up sheets and white lights while simultaneously hacking and blowing their noses would have been funny if I weren’t trying to slice vegetables without sneezing into them), and I am starting to go a little bit crazy from not writing at all in the last week plus – not since coming up here last Thursday. Family is more important, hands down, no questions asked and no regrets … but writing is such a part of me that I’m starting to feel starved for it.

And my characters are starting to haunt my dreams. Plus last night I dreamed that I had to scale a rickety ladder and swing from a rope to get into a library’s second story, not to mention crawling along the outside of the roof and breaking through a window (and was I ever pissed when I got inside and saw an escalator that led to main lobby, and I realized the librarian at the desk had sent me up the death trap way for, apparently, a lark, and then the escalators shut down because the library closed and I had to come down the same way and I DIDN’T EVEN GET TO CHECK OUT MY BOOKS), which I think is indication that my subconscious is telling me to not neglect books so much.

Or, you know, it could have been the rum in the tea last night. Whatever.

(Almost worse than the horrific ladder (I have a good head for heights, but I have always always hated ladders, and swinging from a frail rope to try to reach a roof window is not my idea of fun) was that I had found a brand-new, just-discovered Lloyd Alexander book in the children section (downstairs) and when I didn’t get to check my books out, I had to leave it behind. LLOYD ALEXANDER, newly-discovered book!)

I am working on the MG rewrite, but of today, Maia of the 1920s fantasy-adventure has been chatting to me, reminding me, impatiently, that I left her in Grave Danger and she needs a chance to Prove Her Worth. She is most definitely not a helpless heroine, and she doesn’t like being left a victim without a chance to take on the villain herself. So I think I need to get back to her soon. She gets very crabby when left alone for too long.

And now if you’ll excuse me, I have some rum-and-tea and a box of tissues calling my name.

And some pictures of three men in butterfly wings to upload onto my computer.

Books, children, critiquing, Life Talk, publishing, writing

Finding My Ark

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This has been an up-and-down week for me.

I wrote a children’s picture book. WHEEE!

I got the typical “oh that’s nice” response or, worse, no response at all from family and friends when I tried to share my excitement. WAHHH.

One friend immediately asked about illustrations, and we started collaborating that night. WHEEE!

Trying to figure out the best way to self-publish that offered me electronic options AND the freedom to offer print books to indie bookstores and local galleries on my own AND didn’t cost the sky completely and totally freaked me out. WAHHH.

I had a beautifully positive response from the few friends who did get excited for me, and my first critique partner. WHEEE!

My husband and I had one of those conversations where no one is mad at the other, but everyone ends up feeling lousy afterward (nothing to do with writing). WAHHH.

And then I got sick.

And it’s been raining for what feels like 40 days and 40 nights.

So, I’m finding an ark.

Today I’m going to wear nice clothes, bake cookies, play loud and fun music, laugh with my girls, work on sewing their skirts I cut out last week, and throw encouragement at everyone I can find, even if it is just online. I will hide myself from discouragement in joy. And hopefully when I emerge, the waters will have receded.

Just as soon as the two-year-old stops her wailing for no reason in the background.

What is your “ark” – where do you go, what do you do to rest and recover from discouragement or disappointment, or just plain blah-ness? Are you living in an area that’s been getting drowned, like me, or are you one of the ones suffering from drought? If you are, I so wish I could send you some of our wet!

characters, children

Names and Naming

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This can’t be long, because I’m on my way out the door with husband, littles, and mother-in-law, on our way to a children’s museum, hurrah!

But, something Joy said the other day planted a seed for a children’s picture book in my brain, and it has been growing ever since, and seems about ready to burst into full blossom.

So I need your help, friends: What would a good name be for an imaginative little boy (about six years old) with a kind heart and a mischievous grin, who calls his mother Mummy and likes to ride his bicycle?

(Peter, Jamie, George, and Johnny have all been discarded already. Just about any other name is up for grabs.)


Have at it in the comments!


Edited to Add: I’ve had a bit more time to think about it and look up names, so I can now offer you a list of names that stood out to me. Feel free, please, to still come up with your own, but if you prefer to pick from a list, here are, in alphabetical order,

Abel
Arthur
Clayton
Colin
David
Ellis
Felix
Finn
Gilbert
Jack
Jeffery
Julian
Lewis
Malcolm
Milo
Nicholas
Oliver
Parker
Silas
Timothy

Books, characters, children, families, favorites, fiction, influences

Influences: Elizabeth Enright

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Another one of the few non-fantasy authors who have been an enormous influence on my writing and my life, Elizabeth Enright doesn’t get anywhere near the appreciation she deserves, in my opinion. Which sounds odd, considering she won a Newbery Medal for Thimble Summer. It’s been my experience, however, that most people get a blank look on their faces when you mention Enright’s name, and then only vague recognition comes with the mention of Thimble Summer.

I thoroughly enjoy Thimble Summer, but it can’t hold a candle to my favorites of hers – the Gone-Away books. Whether it is the close relationship between a boy cousin and a girl cousin, reminding me so happily of the friendship between my cousin Zach and me, or the idea of a hidden, old-fashioned community, or (in the second book) all the fun of renovating an old house (which, having lived through, is Not Really Fun At All, but Enright made it seem fun), and moving to the country after having lived in the city … whatever it was, the books were a delight. I especially like that, unlike so many YA and MG books, the adults are present and involved, while the children still have freedom to explore and be brave and get themselves in and out of trouble. We need to see more of that in books for young people!

Then there’s the Melendy Quartet. I’ve written in my favorites posts about this family – Randy and Rush and the family overall. I love them. I want them to be my next-door neighbors. I want to have had Randy and Rush to adventure with as a kid, and I want them all to be my kids’ friends. They are real, and delightful, and funny, and brave (and occasionally not), and ambitious, and loyal and loving.

I think what I like best about Enright’s books, and her characters, is that perfect blend of realism and idealism. While the Melendy gang have marvelous adventures and impossible luck, they also feel like real people, people you could meet any day walking down the road. Same with Portia and Julian and the rest of the Gone-Away crew. As for Garnet of the wheat-colored braids, despite living in the hardest of times in American recollection, the Great Depression (a farmer’s daughter, no less), there is no grimness in her; she still exudes the natural joy of childhood, mixed with a very real worry for her parents’ livelihood.

Another factor that has always personally influenced my delight in Enright is the friendship that exists between boys and girls, without any romance or foolishness, just very easy and natural. Garnet and Jay and Rush and Randy are, true, brother and sister, and Portia and Julian cousins, so romance would be quite ick in their cases, but so many writers only seem to capture the squabbling side of boy-girl family relationships, or the exasperation each feels for the other. There is some of that in Enright’s books, as there is in life, but there is also the deep and meaningful friendship that only comes when boys and girls are friends with each other, instead of boys only being friends with boys, and girls only being friends with girls. I love that Enright shows those sorts of friendships are possible, instead of assuming there must always be this unfathomable chasm between the two. Ugh! No wonder we have such problems with gender discrimination; it is so ubiquitous, even in children’s literature!

Whenever I want to capture some of the sense of my childhood, I re-read an Enright book. And in my writing, I try to keep in mind how natural and fun her characters all are, regardless of the book’s setting. When children who were created sixty, seventy, eighty years ago feel more real than children written about today, you know something has been done right!

Are you familiar with Elizabeth Enright? If so, which is your favorite book? What are some books you can think of that feature really excellent boy-girl friendships, without any hints of romance?

children, Life Talk, school

Obligatory Start of School Year Post

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“So Louise,” you say, “What have you been up to lately?”

Funny you should ask!

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned here before our plan to teach our littles at home. Our main reason for this is that both Carl and I feel that a classical education, or some form thereof, is going to give them the best tools for learning and growing their entire life. And that is not something that one can find in any public schools, or even most private. I love the holistic way classical education works, showing how everything is interconnected, I love that it teaches how to learn, instead of just imparting facts, I love, love, love that it gives them Latin at a young age so that they have a good solid base for almost any other language they want to learn in later years.

So. Yesterday I started preschool with Joy. It wasn’t in our original plan to do preschool at all – I have a rather Montessori approach to schooling for really little kids, in theory at least, that they learn best through unstructured play and exploring their world.

But Joy? She gets bored with unstructured play. And she really loves doing projects, or sitting down and practicing letters, or anything of that sort. So last year I bought a few workbooks just to see if she would like them, and she ate them up. So this year I firmly put my child’s individual preference ahead of my ideals and theories, and we are doing preschool. I ordered more workbooks from the same company (Kumon, in case anyone is curious – I know they don’t work for everyone, but they seem practically made for Joy), bought some flashcards (which she likes almost as much as the workbooks), and typed up a weekly schedule for her. We haven’t dived right into the new schedule yet, still using some of our other books (Hooked on Phonics, which she likes but doesn’t find anywhere near as challenging and satisfying as the Kumon books) because I’m still missing one workbook which I thought I had but ended up having to order …

But this isn’t about my absent-mindedness, although I suspect we’ll possibly have an episode like that every year. Joy is so happy to be “doing school” every day, and although I am emphatically not a natural teacher, I love seeing her blossom almost overnight with this new schedule.

I even wrote out a goal list of things I want to see Joy accomplish this year – both academic and personal, because for me, school is about so much more than just training the mind, but about developing healthy lifestyle habits as well. Which is why “explore new ideas” is one item on the list, as well as “learn to write name,” “learn to count to 100,” and “learn to control temper” (I suspect that one will go on the goal list Every Single Year); and “skate forward and backward” (figure skating is our PE!) is right next to “learn music” (yes, that one is vague, but I’m still not sure what we’ll be doing for music. Joy insists she wants to learn banjo, but I’m thinking we might need to start with something more basic, first). Education! It’s so much more than readin’, writin’, and ‘rithmetic.

Grace, I suspect, will be my Montessori kid, which also ought to be fun, especially once I’ve gotten used to Joy’s learning style and have to retrain myself all over again to figure out what works best for Gracie, but I am adapting as I need, and the reward of my kid’s beaming face as she finishes up the last of last year’s workbooks before starting the new is enough for me.

Hope this wasn’t too boring for you all to read! I promise, I will do a writing-related post soon. How many of you sent your kids off to school this week, or started school at home? Were your kids excited or dreading the school year? If you do homeschool, do you follow a particular method, and if so, why? Are you super-impressed by my not-quite four-year-old’s ability to mostly color within the lines?

children, heroines, quotes

True Princesses

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My nearly-four-year-old and I share a fascination with Princess Kate – I beg her pardon, Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge. We just call her Princess Kate, though.

Joy and I (and my father) happily watched as much of the Royal Wedding as we got up in time to see. Granted, most of Joy’s thrills came from the horses that pulled the carriages, and with the bride’s beautiful white dress. Mine came because I had adored Princess Diana as a little girl, and it felt like coming full circle to watch my daughter sit in absorbed fascination at her son’s wedding.

We don’t do Disney princesses around here. This hasn’t been so much of a conscious decision against those sorts of princesses; we just don’t do much for television or movies at all. As my girls get older, though, I am devoutly thankful that their ideas of princesses come from the likes of Princess Kate and Audrey Hepburn’s Princess Anne in “Roman Holiday” (we watched that on Hepburn’s birthday), rather than pale, insipid versions of fairy tales princesses.

I’m not sure whether Disney is the root or the result of the problem with how we in this culture instinctively view princesses. I do know it is a more modern way of looking at things – that “princess” is synonymous with privilege and luxury, instead of responsibility and sacrifice. A perfect example of the difference, and how much things have changed in the last hundred years, is looking at the difference between the book A Little Princess, written by Frances Hodgson Burnett in 1905 (revised from a serial written in 1888), and the popular movie version that came out in 1995.

In the book, Sara’s “pretend” that she is a princess starts while she is living in pampered luxury, but where it really takes effect is when everything is stripped away from her. She says, in effect (my copy of the book is in a box at the other house right now, so I can’t give exact quotes), “Anyone can be a princess when she has lots of pretty things and everyone likes her. A true princess shows her worth when all that is taken away.” Sara shows her true “princess-ness” by always being courteous and kind to those who constantly belittle and abuse her, by giving generously of what she still has left – namely, her imagination and story-telling abilities – to those around her, and by sacrificing her own needs to those who are less fortunate even than she (“this is one of the populace, and I’m not truly starving,” she says, as she gives away her buns to the little beggar girl, in one of the most poignant and beautiful scenes in the entire book). Because of the era in which the book was written, she of course receives her reward in the end, but still, the idea is that because she was a princess when everything was dark and bad, she was raised up again to luxury and comfort.

The movie sends a different message. It’s been several years since I watched it, but I remember the general idea as well as specific scenes quite plainly. From what I remember, and reviews I’ve read, what sets Sara apart from the other girls as a “princess” isn’t so much how she behaves as her imagination. She doesn’t always treat everyone with respect, as is shown in one scene where she pretends to place a curse on the school’s “mean girl.” In the book, Sara does have a fierce temper, but part of being a princess means she has to control it, even when she wants to box the bully’s ears.

In the movie, Sara’s salvation comes when all the girls put their differences aside and band together to help her. And in the end, they realize that they are all princesses at heart, if they just tap into their potential. At surface, that seems like an “awww” idea. But looking at it more deeply, it is directly opposite to the idea proposed in the book, which is that one has to work and sacrifice and love deeply to be a true princess – you are a princess if you behave the same regardless of your circumstances, instead of needing the circumstances to be just so to show you your worth.

The difference is subtle, but like I said before: I want my girls to grow up with the idea that it is how you behave to others that sets you apart, not how others treat you. Yes, dear girls, by all means grow up with princesses as examples, but let them be princesses like Sara Crewe of the book, not of the movie.

Or, as King Lune puts it in The Horse and His Boy,

“For this is what it means to be king: to be first in every desperate attack and last in every desperate retreat, and when there’s hunger in the land (as there must be now and then in bad years) to wear finer clothes and laugh louder over a scantier meal than any man in your kingdom.”

It’s not about privilege. It’s about sacrificing for your people, for those you love. And that, my friends, is the noblest goal of all.

ETA: Re-reading this, I realized this could really be the companion piece to my Hero and Everyman post. Connections without even realizing it!

What are your thoughts on princesses? Are you a fan of Disney? Do you agree that it is good to have fictional role models, even princesses, so long as those role models show praiseworthy traits?

Books, children, families

Reading at Breakfast

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As I got up from the table this morning to carry my plate into the kitchen, I glanced back over my shoulder. Both of the littles are sitting at the table, their breakfasts half-eaten, absorbed in Little Golden Books. I’m not thrilled that they keep forgetting to eat, but I love, love, love the fact that my almost-four-year-old and two-year-old find books so delightful that they lose track of everything else.

(Apologies for the blurriness. The lighting in my dining room isn’t the best, and if I use the flash they both squinch up their eyes.)

These books I picked up at the Borders liquidation sale on Saturday. The girls had been so good about staying close to us through the crowds, and waiting for us to go through the rows of books in which there was little or no order, and besides, if Mamma and Papa are coming out with armfuls of books, shouldn’t they, too?
(Admittedly, most of the books I bought were preschool workbooks to use with Joy this fall, but I did pick up a couple for myself.)
Joy helped me pick the books out, because Grace was assisting Carl with all his philosophy books. Joy chose “Baby Farm Animals” and “The Jolly Barnyard,” and I snagged “The Color Kittens” because I remember reading that at my grandparents’ house and I want them to delight in it, too (Hush and Brush!).
My parents used to buy my sister and me Little Golden Books at the grocery store. Not every time, but frequently as a “just because” purchase. Our grandparents and aunts and uncles helped fill our shelves with more. So far, my littles have only gotten board book versions or some of my smaller ones that I’ve passed to them, so these were their first picked-off-the-shelf, carry-to-the-register, read-in-the-car-on-the-way-home Little Golden Books.
And I thrill to see them, even though they can’t read the words yet, already finding such happiness in these classic tales. I hope, in five to ten years, to have shelves full of Little Golden Books, just as I did when I was a girl. And maybe someday, they’ll have the delight of putting one of these very same books in the hands of their child and saying,
“I loved this one when I was little.”
Did you grow up on Little Golden Books? Which one was your favorite? I always love anything with illustrations by Eloise Wilkins. Does it give you a thrill to pass books that you loved as a child down to children now? Have you gone to Borders recently, and if so, did you find it as sad as I did?