It’s Children’s Book Week!

Today is the start of Children’s Book Week.

Let’s go in the Way Back Time Machine and look at a fellow named Aesop, who lived in Ancient Greece, and was the source of over 600 fables!

http://www.aesopfables.com/

Here is an early illustration for The Donkey and the Lion….

Great Month for the Library

April is a great month to get to your local library.

April 13 is National Library Workers’ Day, and April 30 is Children’s Day/Book Day, a day to celebrate children’s books!

This day is known simply as Dia in Mexico, where it is a very popular day.

So get yourself and your kids to your library!

The fine ladies above are at the Tottenville (Staten Island) branch of the New York Public Library.

Asterix from France

When I visited relatives in France in my early teens, the newspapers ran a comic strip called Asterix, about the exploits of the title character/hero and his village of ancient Gauls as they resist Roman occupation.

The Asterix series is the most popular of French comics in the world. To date, the comic strip has ran over 50 years, and 325 million copies of 34 Asterix books have been sold worldwide.

The illustration above is the cover of Asterix Conquers Rome. Just another Roman orgy!Vive Asterix!

Edgar Allan Pie

INGREDIENTS
Split two raven breasts down the middle
1 cup of curdled milk
1 cup of flour
1/2 cup of sugar
1/2 cup of palpable fear
1 tell-tale heart
1 gold bug
1 tablespoon of macabre
1 tablespoon of foreboding
1 teaspoon blood

Mix milk, flour, sugar and fear. Chill overnite (preferably in a cemetery).

Vlad the Vulture from “Horton Hears a Who!”

If there can be a “scene-stealer” in animated films, then Vlad Vladikoff the Vulture is it.

The movie’s been out for a while, and my two kids love watching the DVD, especially my 4-year old.

Voiced by Will Arnett (in a Romanian-type accent), there are some really funny lines by Vlad (and about Vlad).

When we first meet Vlad, the jungle-ruling Kangaroo enlists the vulture to destroy the clover that Horton constantly carries with him. (This scene spooks my son a little bit.)

Vlad excitedly tells the Kangaroo what he will do the clover. “I will crush it, then devour it. Then I will regurgitate it, and devour it second time. Two times devoured.”

He then has a rip-roaring chase with Horton over the clover. He’s quite an over-the-top character. The animators and writers did great work with him.

The Illustrations of Gustaf Tenggren (1896-1970)

Gustaf Tenggren once worked for Walt Disney, but got fed up and left Disney in the 1920s to produce his own works. Check out these very nice illustrations

Aliens, Pirates, Robots, etc.

Having two boys, 4 and 8, I get to witness much of their playtime, which often involves pretending. Just this morning, the younger one stood in the middle of the bedroom and wrapped one end of a blanket around himself.

The older one said it was an octopus tentacle and that his little brother was going to be eaten. Funny stuff!

Often, the floor of the bedroom is “water” that can only be crossed by throwing pillows on the floor. The same goes with the outside walkway to the front porch. The walkway is water, and can be crossed by jumping over it, from one side of the walkway to the other.

I could be wrong, but I don’t think that girls pretend in this way.

Over the past couple weeks, the younger one has really been excited by UPS trucks driving along our street. He’s always been fascinated with trash & recycling trucks stopping outside, but now it’s UPS trucks too.

It got me thinking about the various things that really strike a chord in boys’ play and imagination. The list could be endless, so here’s just a few:

Airplanes
Aliens
Animals
Cars & trucks
Digging, in dirt or sand
Dinosaurs
Monsters
Pirates
Robots
Spaceships
Trains

Mehoomash Update

Recently, my son Pierre (who turns 8 in March) came up with the name Mehoomash, based on Shel Silverstein’s poem that reads:

“Knock knock! Who’s there? Me! Me who? That’s right! What’s right? Meehoo! That’s what I want to know!”

When I asked Pierre who Mr. Mehoomash was, he said he didn’t have a family….or a job…but he had a house…somewhere! When I asked him what Mr. Mehoomash did all day, he said: He knocks on people’s doors. And when they answer their doors, he does a dance! We’ll have to find out more later!

In the meantime, I have added the following:

The Mehoomashes are a family of 9 boys and 1 girl.
Mr. Majestic Mehoomash (dad) is the son of the founder of Mehoomash Opportunity Savings & Trust (MOST) of New York City. Perhaps the largest bank in all of Gotham.
Slogan: “You get the MOST at Mehoomash”

Mrs. M. (Matilda) is one of the city’s most renowned socialites and philanthropists.

The kids and ages are:
1. Marlowe, MOST investment banker, 29
2. Matisse, head of Mehoomash Museum of Art, 27
3/4. twins Marco & Magellan, aviator/ballonist; deap-sea explorer, 25
5. Merlin, “Metal Man” performer in Central Park, 23
6. Memphis, Oxford student, 20
7. Montana, snowboarder, 18
8/9. Miles/Max; whizzes at chess and doubles tennis, 16
10. Miracle (that’s what Mrs. M. said when she found out it was a girl), a muralist, 14

Nannies: Millie & Mollie (twins)
Butler: Middleton
Cook: Mee Shim
Cat, Mischief; Dog, Mayhem

When Mr. M. heard from a friend that there was a Chinese cook named Mee Shim who could cook just about ANYthing, he hired him sight unseen, just on his name alone!

What’s curious about them is that the Meehoomashes have not ALL been together at home for dinner…in years! Until, with Thanksgiving approaching, Mrs. Mehoomash is planning a grand affair for her guest: none other than Queen Angoritha of Bruxelbourgia, who is touring the U.S. to learn all about America.

Can they all finally be together at one time?!

“Dreamy Pies in the Sky” Picture Book

Many thanks to Argentine artist Adriana Mufarrege for creating this beautiful cover! ©2009

In an older part of the city — between brownstones and tall apartments — a large flat building glows warmly through its skylight and glass block windows.

The Dreamy Pies Works makes thousands of pies by day and by night.

Pie fillings are made in very large vats using fresh fruits and berries.

The soft dough passes through a set of rollers.

Then ingredients are added and the pies are crimped by machines.

Conveyor belts and wheeled tracks go clickety-clack and load the pies into two giant ovens the size of fire trucks.

Much of the baking is done at night, so people can enjoy the freshest pies in the morning.

Each pie box gets a sticker with a quarter moon and stars: the sign of a genuine Dreamy Pie.

Apple, cherry, lemon meringue, chocolate silk, even peanut butter pies!

People can’t buy pies at the factory, but some are very lucky.

[THE COMPLETE STORY IS AVAILABLE AS AN E-BOOK]

Who Is Mr. Mehoomash?

My seven-year-old son Pierre made up this name last week. Doesn’t it sound great?

The stress is on the first syllable, Me. I told him Mehoomash would be a wonderful character to create for his class writing. He said NO, MISTER Mehoomash! Oops, my bad…I’ll keep you posted about who the mysterious MISTER Mehoomash really is!