Book Week 2012

My kids adore dressing up, in fact my son has spent more days embodying a fictitious character than being Eli. Although I find his ability to get through life with an Omnitrix full of characters he can call upon as the need arises fascinating, I am relived to note that the days of hearing over the loud speaker “Would the mother of Mr Sonic X please come to the information desk” are finally behind us. But the odd loss of identity aside, dress ups are a welcomed thrill around here so when Book Week turns up every year, home schoolers or not, we are going to that character parade.

This year Sabrina Bean went as Puss in Boots, Lilly Pilly as Lucy Pevensie from The Lion The Witch and The Wardrobe, Eli as Peter Pan and Alanah Pea as Tiffany Aching from The Wee Free Men.

The mandatory, before the guests arrive, photo shoot.

Lani holding her absolute favourite book. Her daddy read it to her first and the moment he read the feegles out in a hilarious Scottish accent her heart opened up a spare room just for them. She is now reading back through the book by herself and as she goes along every feegle talks to her in her Daddy’s voice and I think that’s sweet.

Oh and please excuse Pirate Puss, I accidently asked her to smile while taking the photo.

The kids decided Lucy needed an Aslan and thought Jonas would be perfect for the job. He wasn’t so sure.

Oh the the things a loving dog does for his furless litter mates. Oh and if you like lions and small children check this out.

The group photo, woo hoo! don’t they all look amazing. In the back row (now I didn’t actually remember to ask, so these titles are from Eli and I get the feeling some may not be entirely accurate.) left to right: Some sort of Princess, Legolas from Lord of the Rings, Tiffany, Some Bible Person (I’m guessing Moses???) A Girl of Some Sort (I’m thinking from the cute little prairie bonnet she might be Laura Ingals Wilder), Tin Tin. Front row: Another Bible Person (David with his harp???), A Ring Wraith from LOTR, Aslan, Peter Pan, Puss and Lucy. missing from the photo is Fern from Charlottes web and her two brothers because they couldn’t find our house, but they got here in the end, well just after the beginning to be more accurate.

The first book we read from the nominated book list was Flood by Jackie French the illustrations in these book are dripping with emotion, literally. To convey a sense of the enormity of the Queensland disaster the illustrator Bruce Whatley drew with his wrong hand, the left producing raw emotive images which he then drenched in a paint wash of earthen tones. The paint was allowed to flow over the drawings leaving water marks and drip lines running down the page. Honestly the book feels like you are holding a river in your hands and many of the children felt very moved after we read it, the littler ones calling it “The sad book.”

After reading the account of the flood we had a try at producing our own water filled paintings.

The next book we read called For All Creatures was the complete opposite to Flood. This book is a carnival of celebration, the pages bursting with vibrant, joyful almost childlike representations of all things deserving of thanks in God’s creation. Illustrator Rebecca Cool has used a combination of acrylic paint and fabric collage to represent the array of life on this planet. I played the hymn All Things Bright and Beautiful to the kids while they made their own thankful collage, sparkling them up with a good dose of gold glitter to add to the happiness.

The final book for the day was That’s Not a Daffodil, which is a gorgeous little book that not only explores the science behind the growth of a flower from a onion-like bulb but also presents the reader with a beautiful friendship between a young boy and his elderly neighbour, encouraging the young to seek the knowledge of their elders.

what better way to explore this book further than to dive into the dirt and plant our own blubs.

I bought a heap of colourful permanent markers and asked the kids to gather together in their family groups to decorate a pot to take home.

The boys, who hadn’t been to keen on the painting and glittering, really got into this activity. They chose to work together on their friends pot, writing secret messages, codes and their own super hero names inside to be hidden forever by the dirt, it was good to see them so enthused and they were still going long after the girls had gone off to play.

My little Puss loved going back to her pot and adding more stickers as they day went on, stickers are just the best.

Everyone stayed for lunch, boy is it crazy feeding fifteen hungry kiddos very much how you’d picture a flock of seagulls devouring an abandoned box of chips. There is something very special about sharing a meal together, even with multiple mouths in confined spaces, it is as if the joining together to add nourishment to our bodies encourages a friendship to grow and cements an experience in our minds. Both the kids and I had such a great time, thank you to everyone who came I’m sure we will relive the memories of this day many times and each time we will be thankful that you are in them.