The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies

Beatrix Potter. 1909. Frederick Warne

We love this book. It's perfect for children without being too simple. There is drama, adventure and proper characters. The illustrations are beautiful and the size is just right for little hands to hold. 

What a great start to the story:

It is said that the effect of eating too much lettuce is "soporific".

I have never felt sleepy after eating lettuces; but then I am not a rabbit.

p7

The Man Whose Mother was a Pirate

Margaret Mahy, Illustrated by Margaret Chamberlain. 1985 Puffin Books.

There are a lot of saintly mothers in children's books and every now and again it makes a lovely change to read about a mother who is a pirate, as in this book. A fulsome, jolly, gold wearing colourful pirate who glows in the city setting. Her son is a brown suited accountant, of course. The mother tells him that they must go to the sea, even though they must travel with just a wheelbarrow and a kite. The image is when they have arrived and are frolicking in the sounds, smells and taste of the sea. Great for planning a beach holiday and for your own inner pirate. Aye aye!

Nail Soup

Eric Maddern illustrated by Paul Hess

Frances Lincoln Children's Books 2007

This is a traditional fairy tale - I knew it as 'Axe soup'. A traveller (wearing a beautiful vest ) stops at a house in a forest and softens the heart of the grumpy lady of the house by showing her how to make a soup from a nail. Of course the soup would be even better with: oats, some herbs, perhaps some milk, a little potato, barley and some salted beef. All these additions are prefaced with the traveller saying:

"But...what one has to do without

It's no use thinking more about"

Gradually the soup becomes the soup fit for a queen and king. The lady is tricked into offering much more hospitality than she wanted to at first, or is she. The drawings are magical, perspectives from strange angles and glorious colours. The timeframe is tricky: when the story starts it is autumn, then we see snow and by the time the traveller is ready to leave after one night it is spring.

Joy loves this book, so do I, as I am not immune from magic. 

The Potato People

Pamela Allen. 2002 Puffin books (Australia)

We have been planting  vegetables, watering and watching them (a lot of watching, three days into it there is little above ground progress...) Today we put away some potatoes to grow sprouts and remembered this much loved book. We made some potato people of our own.

The potato is a tuber close to my heart, well the stomach is close to the heart isn't it? We've been celebrating the year of the potato with potatoes fried, and gnocchi.

Rain or Shine

A Book of the Weather by Leonard Matthews and Peter Woolcock, Hodder and Stoughton, 1983

This is Joy's favourite book. She chose it herself in a second hand bookshop in Fish Creek. Comic book style drawings, multiple illustrations per page. I suspect it may be a geography book as it's semi-scientific; explains where wind comes from. 

We read this at least once a week, but usually once a day. The writing is a little stilted in my view, but then I'm not the target audience.

Pippi Longstocking

Astrid Lindgren, Puffin Audiobooks, 2000

Pippi is a great character; strong, independent, funny, adventurous and irrepressible. She obeys no conventions. Well, what could be expected after a life at sea with a father who is a pirate king and a mother who is an angel. Both parents are absent. Pippi lives with Mr Nelson, a monkey, and a horse in a large house with no rules, no school, no manners. Such fruitful freedom. The neighbour's two children act as the straight guys to Pippi's zaniness. Her adventures make me laugh out loud and Joy is captivated eventhough I'm not sure she fully understands.

Sharon, keep your hair on

Gillian Rubinstein (words) and David Mackintosh (pictures), A Mark Macleod Book,Random House, Australia. first published 1996, reprint 2004.

So Sharon said,

'Jase, we need more space,

We'll have to move to a bigger place.'

Jase said, 'Sharon,

Keep your hair on,

I'll just build a little bit more on.

I can put another floor on.'

Jason is a builder whose family grows and grows; children, ponies, unicycles, sobbing sister in law and unruly family, safari-going parents and a pining gorilla (the full wonder of family life). He just keeps taking out the saw and adding on another floor. Zany rhyming fun. Great ending. I can read this over and over (and do).

'Very sorry to trouble you, lad.

We're coming home. We've sold the villa.

Can we stay, just me and Priscilla?

and the gorilla?

Called K.K..'

The Night Eater

Ana Juan, 2004, Arthur A. Levine Books, Scholastic, New York

How magical is the pink marshmallow-y night eater? He travels with the moon and eats up the sky before the day comes. The drawings are so very beautiful, painterly and whimsical. 

The plot goes something like this: one day the moon tells the night eater that he has been eating too much night and is getting to be rather large; the night eater is upset and refuses to eat any more; the world is covered in darkness and it gets rather cold. The resolution comes when the night eater starts to speak and a little piece of star slips into his mouth, he forgets why he stopped eating and everyone is happy.

Miss Lily's Fabulous Pink Feather Boa

Margaret Wild and Kerry Argent, 2000, Penguin Books

Baby chicken and I have read this so many times that she can now 'read'/recite the beginning almost word perfect. 

Up north , where the hibiscus flowers were as big as dinner plates and the trees blossomed with white cockatoos...

I love the illustrations, gorgeous mix of tropical colours and the zany mix of Aussie animals. Miss Lily is, of course, a crocodile.

Beautiful holiday quilt. I have been admiring Baby chicken's book without her.

Gorilla - Anthony Brown

2002 Walker Books

First published in 1983 and the illustrations are delightfully lost in the 80s.  A subtle dreamscape about a girl who loves gorillas. A gorilla toy comes to life and takes her to the zoo; getting there by swinging through the trees. The zoo animals are beautiful but sad. Then they go to the movies to see a gorilla superman. There's also a gorilla mona lisa and a gorilla statue of liberty; and best of all a happy ending.

I've been admiring the quilt in this book.