Sturdy for Common Things

Falling Leaves Storytime

“Falling Leaves” was the theme for Sunday’s Storytime. I believe I’ve mentioned before that this is my favorite time of the year, so I will do every fall-time theme imaginable before the kids start to tire of it. “Squirrels”, “Apple Pie”, “Falling Leaves”, and this coming Sunday I’m 98% certain I’ll be reading about “Pumpkins”. Mmmm… I think I see a pumpkin treat in this storytime’s future. Oh the fun to be had!

The line-up included:

Mouse’s First Fall by Lauren Thompson and Illustrated by Bucket Erdogan

Song: “The Leaves on the Trees Are Falling Down”by Irmagard Guertges

(To the tune of “The Wheels on the Bus”)

The leaves of the trees turn orange and red

orange and red, orange and red.

The leaves of the trees turn orange and red

All through the town.

The leaves of the trees come tumbling down,

tumbling down, tumbling down.

The leaves of the trees come tumbling down,

All through the town.

The leaves on the ground go swish, swish, swish

Swish, swish, swish, swish, swish, swish

The leaves on the ground go swish, swish, swish

All through the town.

Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert

Poem: “All The Bright Colors” from the book Under the Sun and the Moon by Margaret Wise Brown

Leaves by David Ezra Stein

By the Light of the Harvest Moon by Harriet Ziefert and Illustrated by Mark Jones

The craft:

The autumn tree craft for Sunday’s Storytime was inspired by Full Circle, with one alteration; I didn’t use ink simply because we didn’t have any, AND it has the potential to make a huge mess in the library.

Instead, pre-storytime I painted a tree with washable black paint and photocopied it into multiple copies once dry.

Once I had a nice tree silhouette for the kiddos to work with,  I crinkled leaves I had found outside into smallish pieces and placed the “miniature leaves” into bowls.

Then when storytime came around, I set out the tree silhouettes, crumpled leaves, and liquid school glue. I instructed the kids to dab glue where they would like leaves to be on their tree, sprinkle the crumbled leaves as if you would sprinkle glitter over glue, and then press the leaves down. After a minute, we would give our trees a light shake and the leaves that were not attached by glue would fall from the tree, while the attached would remain.

Image Sources: Mouse’s First Fall, Leaf Man, Leaves, Harvest Moon

Apple Pie Storytime

Nothing tastes more like fall than apple pie.

I’m pretty sure apple season in Kansas starts in September, but even so apples are autumn-ish and festive for an October afternoon storytime.  My pie-wizard-of-a-husband even baked an apple pie for the show, because naturally I believe in tempting children with treats to attend storytime.

We had a good turnout to show for it.

The line-up included:

Apple Farmer Annie by Monica Wellington

Ten Red Apples: A Bartholomew Bear Book by Virgina Miller

Apple Pie ABC by Alison Murray

The Apple Pie Tree by Zoe Hall and Illustrated by Shari Halpern

“Apple Treats”, a poem, from In Fall by Rochelle Nielsen-Barsum (Sorry, no picture. Pretty sure it’s out of print but it’s available at the library!)

The Apple Pie that Papa Baked by Lauren Thompson and Illustrated by Jonathan Bean

Our “homemade apple pie” craft after reading (and eating the real deal):

The idea for the apple pie craft came from mash up of a co-worker’s storytime project for pumpkin pie and an apple pie project from this website.

Before Sunday’s storytime, I hole-punched 6-7 holes in two paper plates at once, tied them together with a long piece of yarn, and cut out pie holes in one of each paper plate pairs.

To make it easier for the kids to string together, I wrapped a small piece of scotch tape on the end. I also cut out apple slices from creme colored card stock beforehand.

After we read our apple pie books at storytime, I invited the kids to “bake” their own apple pie.

First we colored the crust with crayons.

Then glued apple slices inside the pie crust.

Sprinkled cinnamon on the glued apples.

Closed the cover on the pie and “baked” it by sewing it together.

Once sewn together, the adults helped the kids fasten a loop at the top.

Smells like freshly baked apple pie.

Image Sources: Apple Farmer Annie, Ten Red Apples, Apple Pie ABC, The Apple Pie Tree, The Apple Pie that Papa Baked

Storytime Sunday

I realize it’s Tuesday and not Sunday, but this week I started reading for the library’s Sunday family storytime and was a thinkin’ it might (just might) be fun to start a regular post about Sunday storytime. The books I read and the craft we made… Could be a good time, right?

Back when I was fresh out of college, I worked in the children’s department of a bookstore. And when I wasn’t dreaming about getting a big city break, I would organize and read for the bi-weekly storytimes.

That was about a millions of years ago, so I’m a little rusty. Ease will come with time.

Anywho, this is what we did last Sunday.

The theme: SQUIRRELS

The line-up:

Nuts To You! by Lois Ehlert

The Busy Little Squirrel by Nancy Tafuri

A Whiff of Pine, A Hit of Skunk: A forest of poems by Deborah Ruddel and Joan Rankin. We read the poem “October Surprise Party”.

The Squirrelly Craft:

Using this template, I printed off Squirrel’s parts on brown construction paper, cut out the individual pieces, and put each set in their own baggie. Using fall-like-colored construction paper (yellow, orange, green…), gluesticks, and crayons, the plan was to have the kids glue Squirrel together on their autumn themed construction paper.

That was the original idea.

But then on my way to work Sunday, I improvised, collecting fallen leaves for the kids to use in lieu of Squirrel’s paper tail (see above). OR to use as a tree for Squirrel to climb or as a branch from him to sit on (see below).

I thought it turned out nicely.

Then again, you can’t go wrong with squirrels.

Image Sources: Nuts To You!, Busy Squirrel, Whiff of Pine

And the award goes to…. ?

Last week, I was asked what children book awards I’m currently aware of. Excited by the question immediately blurted out, “The Caldecott Medal, The Newbery Awards, and…well… um…..that’s it.” Embarrassing. I worked in a children’s book department for almost two years and that’s all I’ve got? It was some time ago, but even so my answer bugged me.

For my own information and redemption, I did a little research and put together a list of popular children and teen book awards supported by the American Library Association. Click the seal or the link below each award you’ll be directed to a current list the winners and honorees. Read More

The Benevolent Library

Don’t be fooled… this picture of our town library is from September. (Oh, glorious blue skies!) The Ludington Library is a teeny, tiny library, BUT they order books that will travel from all over western Michigan to visit me AND I love that they have these nifty Reader Review slips in each book…

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