Kids love it when you change the words to songs and that is what this book is all about. Songs such as “Our Friendly Mailman” set to the tune of “Frosty the Snowman”, “Toy Catalogs” set to the tune of “O Tannenbaum” and “Something in My Brother’s Underpants” set to the tune of “Winter Wonderland”. Liam thought most of the songs were hilarious. Two thumbs up! I got this one at the library. Ages 3-8.
What to do, what to do…I have a friend whose oldest son is the same age as Liam and they have been “friends” since they were born. We have had playdates fairly consistently for the past almost five years. The problem lately has been that they have opposite schedules…Liam has preschool in the morning and the other kiddo has preschool in the afternoon, so they haven’t seen each other in a while and they are getting to the age now where they have their own thoughts, ideas and interests and they want friends who have the same interests they do. In the middle of their playdate today Liam said, “This is the worst playdate ever!” Okay, maybe we need to work on our manners, but honesty is the best policy, right? We had a talk after the playdate today about how you might not like to play with everyone, but it is still important to be nice to everyone. He’s growing up…
Liam has been playing with his Nativity set during naptime and I noticed that Mary and the angel were kind of off to one side with Baby Jesus. I asked him why they were over there and he said that Mary and the angel had to talk before Mary could decide when everyone else could come and see the baby. I guess Mary’s a little possesive.
It took me to almost the end of the book to figure out why the author gave the book this title, but I think it is pretty fitting. This was a good book. It was not a page turner that you can’t put down and you must keep reading it to find out what happens in the end kind of book. It was just a good story about a young woman living in Manitoba and learning what it means to be a mother, a daughter and a friend.
Chloe came over and made cookies with Liam today. Liam has been looking forward to doing this for quite some time, so he was very excited. It was a sticky mess…they kept spilling sprinkles everywhere and licking icing off of everything, Chloe had icing in her hair, Liam had icing all over his shirt…but they had a good time.
Look at how much he is concentrating.
I made one of these, can you guess which one?
I usually only write about books that I am reading for myself, but decided to add to the list of books I review. I thought I would add children’s books that I think are quality books. I may review them because they have a great theme, they use rhyme and repetition, or what have you. I will try to chose books that are new as well as oldies, but goodies. I figured I would make myself useful since I am getting an entire degree dedicated to teaching children how to read and since I don’t have any students I thought I would share my thoughts concerning children’s literature with you. So, my first book is Are You Grumpy, Santa? This is a great book not only because it is cute and is a twist on the normal Santa delivering presents story, but it also uses rhyme which is important in teaching children how language works. When children start to understand rhyme, they can be read a story like this that uses rhyme and based on what they know about rhyming words put together with what they know about the plot of the story, they can start to fill in the blanks of the story if the reader stops and allows the child to finish the rhyming phrase. I found this book at Barnes and Noble. Ages 3-7
…it just looks that way. This is what our basement looks like right now. Notice that the shelves (which are meant for storing the toys) are almost completely bare. How am I ever going to be able to keep this house clean enough to sell it? 
Liam has been busy cutting pictures from magazines so that he can use them as visual aides when writing his letter to Santa. He said he wanted to make sure that Santa knew what the toys looked like. He was also sure to include the descriptions of the toys so that Santa would know what else came with the toy. Someone is going to be very disappointed on Christmas morning. Hopefully he will forget about some of the things he cut out and perhaps he will get some of them for his birthday which is what Santa had to do last year because Liam sent his letter too late.
These are the pictures he has cut out. He has started glueing them to paper. He has quite a little operation going here.
Last night in the car we were listening to a beautiful rendition of O, Holy Night when Liam said, “Mom, doesn’t this song make you want to just sway your head from side to side?” So, we were driving around listening to Christmas music swaying our heads from side to side and probably getting a few stares from other drivers. Oh well, I guess they just aren’t in the groove of the holiday season yet.
This is the diary of a girl who grew up in the 70’s. The diary is from when she is 13 until she is 18. It is easy to relate to the angst she goes through while dealing with her family, friends, boys, and her faith. I think it reflects the troubles, worries, ups and downs, joys and sorrows that every teenage girl experiences.