Just in from the Pasture

Yesterday I spent the day with my daughter and her classmates at Mrs. C’s farm.  Instead of the “usual” class trip, each year, Mrs. C. invites her class and the class next door (it’s a K/1 Team teach) to spend the day at her house.

Every Friday afternoon during the year, one of Mrs. C’s students brings home Mac, a little stuffed cow. Mac comes in his own backpack, with a journal and pencil. Each weekend the cow-tender fills the journal with all of the adventures and fun they had with Mac. This is Mac one memorable weekend at our house! Yesterday, everyone got to meet the real Mac. Needless to say, everyone wanted to spend time with him. They also got to meet Fyreflii (horse), Daisy and her goat family, and three chickens.  It’s hard to say what the favorite part of the day was: talking to (and feeding) the animals or enjoying a popsicle after your team found its color of eggs in the egg  hunt.

Somehow, I ended up at the swings, helping kids blast off to any number of places, real and imagined:  Want to go to the moon? Well, we let’s count down by ten. Want to go to McDonalds? Well, we need 5 words that begin with the letter “M”? Pluto? Well, I’m not sure Plutonians speak English, what are the Spanish words for hello and goodbye.  Bubbleland? Oh, well, can we name 4 other shapes? They  laughed, they giggled, they helped each other, and then came back for more.

It was a glorious day, filled with wonderful memories. I spent the rest of the afternoon and evening savoring the day, and listening to Catherine recount all of the fun. Now, with my arms a little more rested, I can get back to the things I meant to do yesterday afternoon …

Fans and friends of Kelly Herold and Big A little A are so excited to have her blogging about children’s literature again.  Although she has been away, you’d never know it. She has always had her finger on the pulse of kidlit, and her new blog, Crossover is another fine example of that. At Crossover, Kelly will

focus on a rare breed of book–the adult book teens love, the teen book adults appreciate, and (very, very occasionally) that Middle Grade book adults read. I’m interested in reviewing books that transcend these age boundaries and understanding why these books are different.

Thanks to Denise Johnson (The Joy of Children’s Literature) for the head’s up (via School Library Journal) about Facebook’s Book Clubs. It’s a fan page, and Facebook members can instantly create or join a reading group devoted to any category, region, interest, or author. As Denise explains in this post, it is not only getting kids excited about reading, but also talking about what they read.

From the late but not forgotten portion of our program:  Susan Taylor Brown has the Poetry Friday roundup at Susan Writes.

Have a great weekend. Here in the States it is Memorial Day weekend. It’s a time for remembering – and thanking – the citizens who have served our country and sacrificed the conveniences we enjoy and sometimes their lives in preserving the freedoms we often take for granted.  Here’s to the soldiers, sailors, marines, and airmen who protect us every day.