Thursday, October 2

This morning, I came across an article in Slate featuring the top 25 picture books over the past 25 years. The article was partly in response to an old article in the NYT about how picture books were no longer a vital part of children's lives, how children's books were dead, etc etc. Articles like that always surprise me, because picture books were such a crucial part of my kids' childhood that I can honestly say the books I selected and read to them made them who they are. We read together for hours each day. We had books for each season and holiday, and a new selection of books every summer that we read only on the porch. A couple of the books from this Slate list are in our own library; but our favorites are generally not the type of book that would make an appearance on a list like this. (For example: the incredibly odd and somewhat disturbing Three Little Horses.)

Recently, Greta and I dug through all of our picture books, pulling out our very favorites. This task was spurred by a project she's doing at school--creating an artwork based on a picture book and then reading the book to her "kindergarten buddy" (eighth graders are paired with kindergartners for the year, a WT tradition). 

Of course, Greta took the book-selection process very seriously. "Everyone else is bringing in The Very Hungry Caterpillar," she said with disdain and condescension. "Well," I replied, "not everyone is lucky enough to have a mom who believed that selecting the most outstanding and often obscure reading material is the entire point of parenting." I didn't actually say this, but obviously I was thinking it. 

We had a huge stack of favorites, and even pulled out the box of Halloween books--an exceptionally strong collection. And as we exclaimed over the books--it's been quite a while since we've read them (sob)--it struck me how interesting and sometimes odd most of our favorites are. Of course we have and loved the classics; but our collection goes far beyond those. Among the Halloween favorites:

(Side note: The Little Ghost Who Was a Quilt is currently listed online with Anthropologie's seasonal wares!)

Greta ultimately chose The Cloud Spinner, because she felt the artwork would work for her project. It's about a little boy who weaves impossibly soft clothes from beautiful clouds, and a greedy king who wants too much. She was very nervous about bringing the book to school, fearing loss/damage/theft, even though I pointed out that the copy we have is actually an unbound review copy I got through the book review I wrote for back in California--Dad put a few stitches in to hold the whole thing together. Of course, this fact just made the book all the more precious to Greta. (Have I given her too much of my personality?...) She finally agreed to bring it but said she'd tell the teacher she'd keep it in her locker.