making space for creativity
William Pène du Bois’s 1948 Newbery winning book The Twenty-One Balloons tells the story of a math teacher – turned amateur balloonist who ends up stranded on the supposedly uninhabited Pacific island of Krakatoa right before its fated (and real-life) volcanic eruption in 1883. The majority of the book takes place on (and the…
Somehow, miraculously, I have arrived halfway through this pregnancy. It has been both slow, especially those first exhausted weeks, and at the same time so fast, particularly the second trimester with its summer trips back to DC and up north to the shore of Lake Superior. Overall, I would highly recommend the…
The 26th Newbery, Carolyn Sherwin Bailey’s 1947 Miss Hickory, is a quirky, but fairly charming, tale of a wooden doll’s extraordinary year when her little girl moves away, a chipmunk takes over her home, and she’s forced to fend for herself in the great New England woods. Similarity to other…
Amazingly, spring is nearly over here in Wisconsin. The tulips and daffodils are long gone and even oak trees have leaves out now. I am climbing out of the hibernation of first trimester—today I’m fifteen weeks pregnant, and I am slowly feeling better. This week was also the last week of my sister-in-law’s fulltime job,…
The Joy. After seven months of trying, the end of the month was drawing once again to a close. I was that guarded hopeful that I had come to know, counting the days until it would be “reasonable” to take a pregnancy test. That month (March) it was Evan’s birthday, five days after…
At the end of January, my friend, and recommender of fabulous books, Loren, went to the American Library Association mid-winter conference. I too was invited to trek down to Chicago and drool over the hundreds of 2015 upcoming releases in the exhibit hall, but for various boring reasons, mostly having to do with grading…
Twenty-Five Newberies in, I thought I’d pause and reflect on a quarter century’s worth of award winning children books from 1922 to 1946. I started this project with pretty high hopes about the delight of reading so many wonderful children’s books. However, it became apparent only a few books in that this was going to…
We’ve been trying to conceive for six months. Six months is a funny amount of time. It’s both short: only half a year. Yet it’s also long: 26 weeks, 182 days. And every one of those days I’ve thought about it. Some days in tears, a few days in calm acceptance, most days…
Strawberry Girl by Lois Lenski tells the story of Biddie Boyer and her family as they move south to a new town in northern Florida in the early years of the 1900s. This lovely historical fiction Newbery captures the rural poverty and toughness of the Florida “Crackers” as the Boyers begin to farm (strawberries)…
When I was tiny, vacation felt like leaving for the airport before dawn. It was exciting to feel the bumps of an empty highway as we rushed with our bags full of swimsuits and books to make an early flight. And once we were there, Florida or California, vacation was full. It was full…
The 1945 Newbery, Robert Lawson’s Rabbit Hill, tells the tale of a community of wild animals that live near a vacant farm house. They receive news that a new family is moving in that spring. Rumors are that the new family are farmers, and times of plenty may be around the corner for the…
Today, I am highly honored to be a part of celebrating the upcoming release of Caroline Starr Rose’s newest verse novel: Blue Birds. It’s a tale of going to a strange land and being brave. At the end of high school I went to France for a few weeks with about 8 girls…
This year has been filled with good books. In addition to reading the first 23 Newberies, here are some of the other books I’ve enjoyed this year in no particular order. 30 books in honor of turning 30 last Saturday. May 2015 be filled with even more! Memoirs 1. A Good…
Dear Friends & Family, What a great, wonderful, difficult, beautiful year! We moved from Maryland to Wisconsin, became an aunt and uncle to the beautiful Anika Eve, and started a new job at Hope Christian High School teaching US History. Well, technically, only Evan has that new job, but I have been doing so…
The 1944 Newbery winner Johnny Tremain by Esther Hoskins Forbes came at the exact time that I’ve been helping Evan’s 10th graders study the American Revolution. I wanted to get 65 copies of the book and make them all read about this Boston silver smith who at their age got wrapped up in…