Three Trees

I’m not even sure how this book showed up on my library search for Christmas books, but I’m glad it did, anyway.

Angela Elwell Hunt has retold a traditional folktale called The Tale of Three Trees. It’s a wonderful, little story about 3 trees who had wishes to be great things and ended up each serving Jesus in different ways.

One little tree wished to hold treasure, but instead was made into a feed trough for animals.

The second tree wanted to be the strongest ship to carry kings but instead was made into a small dinghy.

The third tree just wanted people to see itself and think of God, but instead was made into rough logs.

As you can probably guess, each one was disappointed with its lot in life and wondered what had gone wrong.  But each one was used for important parts of Jesus life. The feed trough was used to cradle the baby Jesus.  The dinghy carried the king Jesus and his disciples when he calmed the storm.  The third tree, as a log, held Jesus on the cross and helped people to think of God.

This was a great story to spark some discussion about vocation, and how God transforms us to do great things.

This legend is told simply and beautifully.  The illustrations (by Tim Jonke) are definitely unique.  I don’t believe I’ve ever seen trees drawn like that in books.

What I like about it is when each tree is given it’s job, it’s not explicitly said, this is Jesus.  The kids have to figure that part out.  For instance, it simply says:

…a young woman placed her newborn baby in the feed box….and suddently the first tree knew he was holding the greatest treasure in the world.

Highly recommend this story.  It’s short enough for younger children, and meaningful enough for olders.  Appropriate for Christmas time, Easter, or really throughout the year.

Hee Haw!

We watched the season’s obligatory It’s a Wonderful Life on tv the other night.  At the friends’ every mention of “hee-haw” I was reminded that I had gotten a Christmas book out of the library and hadn’t yet read it to the kids.  We remedied that yesterday and even made a school lesson out of it.

St. Francis and the Christmas Donkey is by Robert Byrd. The story tells of St. Francis walking in the woods when he started a conversation with a very grumpy donkey who was tired of being pushed around by the other animals.  St. Francis then tells donkey the story of how he became a beast of burden and ultimately how that prepared him for his most special job of carrying Mary and her unborn baby Jesus.

Overall we all enjoyed this story.  It reads wonderfully, smoothly and tells the story simply yet dramatically.  It reminds me a little bit of a gentler, better version of Rudyard Kipling’s Just So Stories, because it talks about how the donkey got his long floppy ears and scraggly tail.  It’s a longer story, better for 4 and up, most likely.  The illustrations are lovely and vibrant.

The story talks about the story of Creation, but takes great liberty in recounting the events, so that may be a concern to some people.  But it is in typical legend form and reads as such, not meant to be taken as a literal account of the creation of the world.

We used this book as our daily advent reading, then transitioned to a science lesson about donkeys and their characteristics, and how they have been used in different cultures.  This could also be a great book to read for St. Francis’ feast day.

Sorry Ludwig

We are currently in the middle of a Beethoven unit in our homeschool.  There are quite a few books that I found that have enhanced our studies.  But one in particular was a flop. I don’t even have a picture.

The Value of Giving:  The Story of Beethoven is just such a bizarre story I’m not sure where to begin.  It’s from a series of “ValueTales” by Ann Donegan Johnson. The illustrations are on the creepy side, very comical faces, which can be fine, these just seem more like the Sunday Comics.  The story is about Beethoven’s childhood and growing up with a drunk, sometimes abusive father.  Ludwig makes up an imaginary cat as a friend and stumbles through life being teased by others and just trying to write the music he heard in his head.

It could be a decent story.  But somehow he became the go-to person in history to teach kids about giving????  I’m at a loss.

Here’s the quote from the last page of the book:

“Of course not everyone can give the world great music, as Beethoven did.  But sooner or later, everyone has the opportunity to give something to make someone else happier.  Your gifts may be very simple, but if they make someone else happy, you will probably be happier too.”

Oh, I get it now.

Up next:  books about Beethoven that are worth reading.

A new spin on the nativity story

This nativity story focuses on a legend about the gift of a particular spider.  The Cobweb Curtain:  A Christmas Story by Jenny Koralek, is not the typical nativity story.  It begins with the birth of the baby Jesus, and tells how the holy family fled out of the city to escape Herod’s wickedness.  A shepherd helps them leave and finds a cave for them to hide in for the night.  During the cold night, a spider spins large web that spans the opening of the cave.  As a result, the next morning, Herod’s guards don’t bother to look in the cave.  They assume that no one had been there recently if a spider had time to make such a large web.

The story goes that later the shepherd takes the web home to his family to put on their tree.  Every year after his children find a frosty web to hang on the little tree to remind them of the Christ Child’s birthday.  The connection at the end is drawn to modern day garland and tinsel on our trees.

My kids enjoyed this story.  It was fairly short, and took a familiar story and made it interesting.  The illustrations are unique.   Overall the quality of the story and illustrations make up for the possible inaccuracies of the story itself.

Our Lady of Guadalupe

Today is the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe.  Tomie DePaola has written a beautiful children’s book to educate them about the events that this feast commemorates.  The Lady of Guadalupe is quite a detailed re-telling of Juan Diego and how Mary visited him to increase his faith.  The illustrations are very Tomie-like, but he does a stunning job with Our Lady’s image.

This is a great book to have in your own home library, but you can likely find it at your local library.  It’s a nice one to have on hand for any study about Mary and her apparitions, or names.

Let my people go!

I just finished a unit with my 6 yo about Moses and the Exodus of the Israelites.  We were rather combining our History studies of ancient Egypt and our religion units of the Ten Commandments.  I wanted to share some of the books we used to enhance our studies.

The one thing to keep in mind with this Bible story is that it can be quite graphic.  From the Pharaoh setting out to kill all the firstborn baby boys to the plagues and Moses’ murder of the Egyptian, these can be violent stories so of course you have to preview these books before reading them to your child, or allowing your child to read them.

I’ll start with the lighter versions first:

Mary Auld has retold the story in two different books:  Exodus from Egypt and Moses in the Bulrushes.

This one starts with a brief telling of how the Israelites became slaves of the Egyptians and ends with Moses being called by God back to free his people.

It’s well done, not too simple nice illustrations.

This one goes into fairly great detail of the plagues and follows the Israelites until after they pass through the Red Sea.  It makes a nice follow up to the above book.  I appreciate the pictures in here, not too gory and there is just something about the style that draws you in.

The next one is by Jean Marzollo (she also wrote the I Spy books).

Miriam and her Brother Moses is definitely more cutesy and lighthearted, focusing on the sibling relationship between Miriam and Moses.  On each page it shows Miriam and the song she would sing to Moses, and how eventually it is that song that helps him remember who he really is, an Israelite.  A tough story is given some reprieve with the images of this little girl dancing and singing, and ducks quacking.

Of these books, this one was one of my son’s favorite to read over and over.  It’s a fun reprieve from a tragic story.

The next two are quite accurate re-tellings of the story.  They are longer versions, with very detailed and sometimes graphic artwork.  They should be used for older children or read-alouds.

Ann Keay Beneduce’s Moses:  The Long Road to Freedom. Is well done.  My complaints are possibly inconsequential.  I hate the font chosen for the text.  It’s very light, quite small and a lot of space between lines.

I struggle with falling asleep while reading to the kids.  I don’t want to have to squint!

The illustrations by Gennady Spirin are unique.  They remind me of a particular painter but can’t put my finger on who it is.  They are very detailed, with soft colors and kind of grainy.  There is a very detailed picture of the Red Sea engulfing the Egyptians so be sure to preview this one for your kids.

Lastly, Exodus retold by Miriam Chaikin is the most detailed and long version of the story.  It uses many names for the secondary characters.  Starts with Moses as a baby and ends with the Ten Commandments and the Ark of the Covenant.  The drawings are detailed and there is a lot of text on each page.  The storytelling is engaging and it was a good read overall.

So go out and read about Moses and the Exodus.  Advent is a good time to read about one of the Old Testament Promises that lead to the ultimate promise of a Savior.

Waiting for Noel

When I saw this book show up on a library search for “Advent books” I was truly excited.  Frankly there aren’t many books that even talk about the season of Advent.  It’s usually just lumped in with Christmas as the same thing.  But our family truly tries to observe Advent and Christmas as different seasons with different traditions.

Anyway, I was excited to read Waiting for Noel:  An Advent Story, by Ann Dixon.

Overall I think it’s an interesting book.  It wasn’t a huge hit with my children, but I think there are kids who would get more from it.  The story is about a family who is preparing for the birth of Jesus, and tells how they light one more candle on the Advent wreath each week.  At the same time, they are waiting for the birth of a new sibling.  The baby, name “Noel” arrives on Christmas day.  The story is written very poetically and is more of a reflection comparing the family’s waiting and preparations to the waiting for the birth of Jesus.

Today, when the sun skims the rim of a smooth blue sky and night rises soft with monlight, four Advent candles are lit, a promise we know won’t be broken.  With faith in the power of light, we welcome the Christmas babe.

The illustrations are unique, I think oil paints.  Personnally I’m not a fan of the style, kind of a blurry look to everything.  But the colors are beautiful and I can’t say anything wrong with it, just not my style.

The story idea is unique and this would be a great gift to a family who is expecting a sibling during the Christmas season, or for a child born around Christmas.

It is nice to see the Advent wreath in a regular book.  It is one of those traditions that our family celebrates but  is not commonly seen in regular society.

Silent Night

Last night we read another of Margaret Hodges great legend books.  Silent Night:  The Song and its Story is about how the much-loved Christmas carol was written and how its popularity spread.

We read about a little church in Austria whose organ bellows breaks just before Christmas Eve Mass.  The priest sets about writing a homily and instead comes up with the words to the carol.  The church musician sets them to music and before the Mass starts they sing it together with a simple guitar accompaniment.

The story goes on to tell how the song was popularized by a family of singers later on, but no one knew the source, until a connection with the musician was later discovered and the mystery solved.  The song was eventually taken to America and translated into English.

Then Hodges goes on to give a few examples of how the song was used amidst war time to give snippets of peace to soldiers.

I have no proof for the authenticity of this story or the events Hodges tells about in war time.  But this isn’t the only source I’ve heard some of those stories, so there is probably some basis of truth in them.  The Classical Kids Christmas cd also recalls similar events.

Silent Night is not a short story as far as children’s books go.  It’s fairly long and some pages are only text.  It is definitely a good read aloud for older children.  My 6 yo was interested in it but it was a bit drawn out for the 4 yo.

Overall it’s another top notch book done by Hodges.

A different kind of Christmas reading

If you are searching for some Christmas or December reading that isn’t necessarily about the holiday, you might try this one:

Regardless of how much you liked the politics of the former administration, former VP’s wife, Lynne Cheney is a great author of history story books for young children.  When Washington Crossed the Delaware:  A Wintertime Story for Young Patriots.  Our drive through a cold Valley Forge Park today reminded me of this story.  It chronicles the battles of Trenton and Princeton in the Revolutionary War.  The noteworthy part about the story is that they made a rather perilous crossing of the Delaware River from Pennsylvania into New Jersey on Christmas Day.  The troops had a rough winter stationed at Valley Forge.

Cheney definitely succeeded in taking a historical story and making it engaging and interesting for young children.  As far as I can tell the story is accurate, although simplified.  I appreciate the portrayal of General Washington in this story, someone who bore the weight of his decisions to send men into battle in perilous conditions. The illustrations are stunning as well, in part because of the larger size of the book.

Here are some other books by Lynne Cheney.  Although I have read a few of the other ones and at the time thought the quality was somewhat lessened in comparison to this one.

Homer

Don’t worry I’m not getting too sophisticated yet…I’m just referring to our current read-aloud, Robert McCloskey’s Homer Price. I loved McCloskey’s One Morning in Maine and Blueberries for Sal when I was younger, so I was happy to learn as an adult that he had written longer chapter books.

Part of the charm of Homer Price is the fact that it is written in a time and about a time so far removed from my children.  The book was first published in 1943.  There are certainly cars in the book, but at the same time, being set in a small town, there are still times when the characters use horse and wagon to get around.  Homer is a typical young boy in small town America during that time.  He’s free to roam around town getting into all sorts of adventures.  He puts together radios in his bedroom and is fascinated by comic book heroes and gadgets.

My 6 year old is thoroughly enjoying this book.  Homer is certainly a fun adventurous character who always has interesting experiences going on.  What I like about the book is that it isn’t necessarily one that you have to read cover to cover.  Each chapter is a new adventure and not really connected to the other.  There are also the typical McClosky pencil illustrations throughout which truly capture the nostalgic feel of the book.

While we are reading this aloud, my 6yo is also reading it independently.  I have also seen it in audio format which I’m sure would be fun to listen to in the car.