April is National Poetry Month!

April is my favorite themed month - National Poetry Month! My fellow bookseller Shara and I have huge, squishy soft spots for poetry, to the point of reading and reciting poems to each other, and fawning over each new poetry anthology that comes in. We hope you come in this month, especially on Poem in Your Pocket Day (the 14th!) and swap poems with us. For some inspiration, here are some of our newest and most favored poetry books.


Spinster Goose: Twisted Rhymes for Naughty Children by Lisa Wheeler, illustrated by Sophie Blackall. Spinster Goose, Mother Goose's sister, reforms wayward, bad-mannered children. This tongue-in-cheek collection parodies well-known nursery rhymes with such poems as "Peter, Peter, was a cheater" and "The Fibber," which begins, "Mary had a little lamb./She said it was a horse." This collection blends manners mores a la Hilaire Belloc's Cautionary Tales and Bad Child's Book of Beasts with Jon Scieszka's darkly goofy humor style in The Stinky Cheese Man.


For even more hilarious nonsense, one need go no further than Edward Lear. Even though these poems are from the Victorian era, like Lewis Carroll's stories and poems, their unexpected rhymes and pure ridiculousness are still popular. A new collection, His Shoes Were Far Too Tight, edited by Daniel Pinkwater, illustrated by Calef Brown (who has many wonderful poetry books of his own), has just been published this month.

Do you know what April 14th is? (Other than "I did mail my taxes, didn't I?" day)? It's Poem in Your Pocket Day - a day to carry about your favorite poem, share it with friends, co-workers, or your neighborhood's barista, and swap it for the poem in their pocket. To fill your pockets with odes and sestinas, there is Poem in Your Pocket for Young Poets, edited by Bruno Navasky with the Academy of American Poets, which has 100 poems on tear away pages. Poets in the collections run from Grace Paley and Naomi Shihab Nye to e.e. cummings, Langston Hughes, and Edna St. Vincent Millay.

Great Poems for Grand Children, edited by Celestine Frost with illustrations by Brian Cronin, is the kind of collection that belongs on every nursery and teenager's bookshelf. Divided into topical sections including "nonsense verse," "animal friends," "fairies, witches, goblins & company," and "seasons of life," this collection features a range of poets from Shakespeare and Walt Whitman to Jack Kerouac and Galway Kinnell. I especially enjoy the inclusion of traditional standards, hobo ballads, and Native American songs.


One of our new books just in this week is a picture book biography of a famous Chilean poet: Pablo Neruda: Poet of the People written by Monica Brown and illustrated by Julie Paschkis. His life story and the inspiration for his poems are supplemented by Paschkis's rich paintings with English and Spanish words woven into the scenery.



After lyrical picture books and gorgeous anthologies of poetry, why not explore novels in verse? One of our book buyer's very favorite books is Sharon Creech's Love That Dog. Jack's new teacher, Miss Stretchberry, is teaching his class about poetry - which Jack resists fiercely until he discovers Walter Dean Myers and the power of a poem to confront and release powerful emotions. In the back of the book you can find the original poems that Jack is responding to.






And one last line to leave on: this September, HarperCollins will release a posthumous collection of previously unpublished poems and drawings from Shel Silverstein, called Everything On It.

New picture books: from moon dazed piggies to family farms' tractors

Is there anything more fun than getting a brace of new picture books, with staff members all crowding around book crates exclaiming over long-awaited titles, and customers peering into the pile to get a jump ahead on exciting books? This week has brought in some real crowd-pleasers.

Deborah Underwood had a fabulous spring last year with the popular Quiet Book, illustrated by Renata Liwska (Who wrote and illustrated a title I blogged about a few weeks ago, Red Wagon), and the graduation book, A Balloon for Isabel, illustrated by Laura Rankin. This season, Underwood and Liwska are back together for The LOUD Book, another endearing romp through the various sounds and reactions both kids and adults can relate to: "fireworks loud", "dropping your lunch tray loud," and the last page's heart-squeezing homage to summer, a lone bunny lying in a moonlit field to "crickets loud."

There are many truck and tractor books out there, as many a toddler-toting parent can affirm, but not all vehicles books have the soul and love that Grandpa's Tractor by Michael Garland contains. Grandpa Joe takes Timmy back to his childhood's farm, and while they walk by the abandoned barn to see the rusting tractor, Grandpa Joe tells him about planting alfalfa seeds, picking apples, and hauling firewood for their wood stove.


This next title, Ten Moonstruck Piglets by Lindsay Lee Johnson, I am going to beg Jess to read during story-time, it has such engaging rhymes. Just imagine the sounds you can make to this page: "They squeal! They snort!/On legs so short,/rollicking piglets/gaily cavort." I love the illustrations just as much, the black-on-blue scenery and piglet characters are so detailed that they deserve the kind of poring over that Richard Scarry and Don and Audrey Wood require.


We are a very animal friendly store - pets are very welcome (and welcome to the treats at the front door!) and our book buyer has been known to come upstairs to see any particularly adorable puppies. Which is why when such an adorable picture book as Say Hello to Zorro! by Carter Goodrich came in, we all pretty much melted. Mister Bud (with an hilarious large snout to stick over bedspreads and couches) is very set in his canine schedule, until a wee grumpy bull dog joins the family. Fans of Emily Gravett's Dogs will rejoice at another pup picture book that captures dog characters so very well.

My last pick of new picture books is the lush, lyrical and socially aware Migrant, written by Maxine Trottier and illustrated by Isabelle Arsenault (who happened to illustrate the Emily Dickinson installment of the Visions in Poetry series. Delicious.). Every year, Anna and her large family move with the seasons following the work from Mexico to Canada and back. The beauty in this potentially heavy story is the lightness and sweetness of the language: Anna's family is continually compared to geese flying, bees working, kittens sleeping, and the families that stay in one place are like trees rooted deeply: "But fall is here, and the geese are flying away. /And with them goes Anna, like a monarch, like a robin, like a feather in the wind."

Zut alors, it's Zutano!

We are so excited to announce that we now carry Zutano baby clothes! These adorable clothes come in a variety of styles, sizes, and designs.
We carry wrap dresses, body wraps, T shirts, pants, coveralls, bodice jackets, and leggings, with designs ranging from gumballs, zoo animals, sputnik, and a variety of stripes.


The sizes are primarily infant sizes at 6, 12, 18, and 24 months, with select styles in toddler sizes.

New picture books: what's in a name?

I will admit that even after years of bookselling, and of course calling myself a discerning reader, I still make occasional snap judgments of books based on covers and titles. Even while I am trying to train myself not to, there are still those glorious moments when I read a title like The Boy Who Cried Ninja, and I am immediately, irrevocably in love with it, no matter how terrible it may be. Fortunately, these new picture books live up to their great titles, and then some.


If the title - complete with speech bubble! - alone hadn't grabbed me, the illustrations of Alex Latimer's The Boy Who Cried Ninja would have held me tight. Reminiscent of Oliver Jeffers style, these characters have such funny, endearing qualities as tiny stick legs and gaping mouths indicating speech. Don't let the title fool you into thinking this is a heavy handed morality tale, simply placing ninjas, sunburned crocodiles and time-traveling monkeys in lieu of wolves; it is more capricious than cautionary.

Just a few days ago a customer had been looking for books about stuffed animals and I wish we had had I Must Have Bobo! by Eileen and Marc Rosenthal in then! Not only am I apparently weak-kneed for It-Wasn't-Me kitty stares, I also have a soft spot for appropriately exclamatory titles. (Don't even tell me you too don't want to exclaim LET ME DRIVE THE BUS!, with various emphases)
Willy and his stuffed, beshirted monkey Bobo do everything together, from coloring to investigating potentially mean bitey-bigs. Unfortunately, Willy's conniving cat Earl also likes Bobo. The gentle humor and comforting sweetness of this story reminds me of A Sick Day for Amos McGee, with the added humor of a plush-filching cat named Earl, of all things.

This next book has a tongue-twister of a title: Where's Walrus? written and illustrated by Stephen Savage. This cheeky walrus escapes from the zoo, a la Good Night Gorilla and A Sick Day for Amos McGee, with a bumbling, mustachioed zookeeper hot on his tail, so to speak. With vibrant colors and a modern art feel, both children and adults will be amused by the walrus's plain sight hiding places and visual gags. I am particularly fond of the mermaid fountain scene and the cover's nod to Edward Hopper. Maybe there will even be a sequel with a certain red and white tourist hat for the walrus to try on...

My last latest picture book love has an understated title with an enticing cover: Renata Liwska's Red Wagon not only depicts one of my favorite animals (a hedgie! In the eponymous wagon!), but these animals look comfortingly familiar because Liwska was the illustrator of the much-talked-of adorable The Quiet Book. This tale of imagination and friendship is the definition of a picture book, with a perfect tension between the text and illustrations. My favorite spread is from the line "She was almost down [the hill] again when the wagon hit a rock!", where the wagon turns into a rocket ship with the fox and bunny friends as astronauts and the raccoon pal becomes a three-eyed alien raccoon in a UFO! Three eyed raccoons get me every time.

New (and returning!) arrivals

The announcements and aftermath of the ALA awards is always exciting - I love the rush of folks calling or stopping in to look at the winners and the thrill of reading books I would have otherwise accidentally overlooked. The only downside is when the publisher goes out of stock!


Happily, we have a few award winning titles returning to our shelves. Moon Over Manifest, the Newbery Medal winner, never quite left, but now it has a shiny medal sticker to entice you even more, if spies, fortune-tellers, and rail-hopping wasn't enough!


We also have back in Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi (say that three times fast, wee!), the Printz Medal and National Book Award finalist. I'm looking forward to reading this dystopian adventure. This is Bacigalupi's first venture into young adult literature from general adult science fiction, and with such encomiums, let's hope he returns to it.

Two of my favorite books from last year are now out in paperback: Fire by Kristin Cashore and The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate by Jacqueline Kelly. Fire is a companion to novel to Cashore's debut Graceling. These two novels are incredible fantasy adventures for fans of Robin McKinley and Tamora Pierce: with fierce female protagonists, palace intrigue, journeys through wild lands, passionate romance, and solid, enthralling writing, what more can you ask for? (Maybe a Po or Brigan of your very own...).

The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate is for a younger audience (ages 9 up), but is no less gripping for that. This Newbery Honor takes place in the hottest Texan summer eleven-year-old Callie can remember, 1899. Callie is that lovable tomboy we all adore reading about, a la Jo March or Caddie Woodlawn, who chafes against learning needlepoint and pie-making. This summer, she befriends her grumpy, reclusive naturalist grandfather and learns how to look at and think about her world more closely, making a few surprising discoveries along the way. With American Girl's budding scientist Lanie, and the numerous accessible non-fiction about Charles Darwin, this is an encouraging trend for girls' middle grade reading.

We are still waiting for the Caldecott Honor and Coretta Scott King Illustrator winner Dave the Potter and Caldecott Honor Interrupting Chicken to be reprinted, but hopefully they will be also be back on shelves soon!

Where else would you find...

On this blog I bandy about various well-known brands that we carry, from Melissa & Doug's classic wooden toys to Hasbro's board games, but do you know some of the funkier things we carry? As a small independent shop, we pride ourselves on stocking toys, books, and the doodads/chotskies/knick-knacks you won't see in the big box stores. Here are some items that I get a particular kick out of us selling.

Oh Jellycat, let me count the ways I love your plush: they flop, they dangle, their bean butts and bright colors beg to be piled on bed comforters and stuffed into backpacks to calm first school day jitters. I readily admit to owning a Jellycat hedgehog and coveting the especially adorable Truffles Mammoth Pillow. For starters, it's a giant (28"!) WOOLLY MAMMOTH. Add in its squishy sprawling limbs, wild shaggy fur, and tusks, and you have yourself (or, err, your loved one) the best cuddle pal around.

Not everyone likes prehistoric plush, and that's OK. We turn now to what many kids and adults do love: Legos! And Lego accessories! Last year Lego's keychain figurine lights were a big hit for stocking stuffers, and this year gives us another promising excitement: a Lego Figurine Head Lamp. Our headlamps from Schylling are ever-popular, I can hardly imagine how quickly these headlamps with a miniature, light-up Lego man strapped to the headband will sell. We just got these in yesterday and I've already thought of four acquaintances of mine who would love these.

Piggy banks have long been a staple of birthday presents and baby showers, and we're pretty excited to expand our repertoire of banks to include porcelain Fire Trucks, Pick Up Trucks, and Birthday Cake banks from Andrea by Sadek. These banks are delicate and richly painted - the heart cupcake bank gives me a serious case of cupcake envy. We also carry Sadek's darling miniature 10 piece tea rose set.

My love for the New York Times Book Review collection continues to grow exponentially. I've recently discovered Three Ladies Beside the Sea, written by Rhoda Levine and illustrated by Edward Gorey. With Gorey's whimsically creepy drawings and such rhymes as "Then, there was Alice of Hazard,/A dangerous life led she:/When not indoors, involved with chores,/Alice was up a tree!", this reissue is a surreal treat.

Another New York Times Book Review reissue is Lizard Music by Daniel Pinkwater. I've heard many requests for this book in my years here, and I am ecstatic to see it on the shelf...mostly so I can read it myself! I hear from our book buyer (who generally prefers realistic fiction and brooding, epic tales of generations of families) that this is fantastically wacky, despite its tame black and white cover of lizard silhouettes. Maybe such an innocuous cover would draw the Pinkwater radio fan into his children's writing universe?



Second to Alice's Adventure in Wonderland, J.M. Barrie's Peter Pan is one of my all time favorite children's classics. Sterling's centenary edition of Peter Pan and Wendy is illustrated by the incredible Australian artist Robert Ingpen. The wide trim size is perfect for reading together and poring over the lush watercolor and pencil drawings.


I also have exciting news for two popular books!

Gareth Hinds's graphic adaptation of Homer's Odyssey is back in stock and in pride of place in our newly relocated graphic novels section above the chapter books.

The latest copies of Moon Over Manifest have the shiny new Newbery Medal affixed to their cover! If you move fast, you can still get one from the pre-Medal shipment, but that gold shine sure does dazzle. Most of our staff is in the middle of reading it and can't stop talking about it - share your opinion next time you're visiting!

A few festive fall favorites (...too alliterative? No?)

Last week we hutters switched over the last of our going-to-school display to Halloween. I was barely coping with it being fall (and needing rain boots!), and it's time for face paint, guides to cutting a unique jack-0-lantern, bean bag gourds, and ghost stories! At least the new merchandise and books are supremely adorable. Here are some of my favorites.

I really know it's getting along in the year when we start decorating the Melissa & Doug giant plush with cozy clothing. (Hey, I know you love my construction worker giraffe ensemble in our Brattle window.) Two's Company Animal Knit Scarves are the perfect accessory for the lovable penguin, panda, or preschooler in your life.

Gund is known for its cuddly plush, and every fall I look forward to its new autumnal plush. This year, they have wee Harvest Beanbags, in the shape of smiling gourds and acorns. My mother loves making little holiday displays, so her fall care package is definitely going to have some of these critters.

For those days it's really too blustery to stay outside but you need something to do, try the Tie Dye Kit by Jacquard. This set includes three dyes plus an empty color mixing bottle, enough to make ten to fifteen t-shirts. It also has rubber bands, gloves, and a DVD with ideas for folding techniques and different items you can dye. You may want to try this kind of activity in your garage or with newspapers covering the table, but the minor mess potential just makes it that much more fun!


When it comes to books, there are so many gorgeous new titles and brilliant new issues. A favorite standby of mine is a board book edition of Leaves by David Ezra Stein, about a baby bear's first encounter with falling leaves: "'Are you okay?' he wondered." Stein's pen and watercolor illustrations and spare text make for a winsome, whimsical tale.


Another modern classic I love is Mouse's First Halloween by Lauren Thompson and illustrator Buket Erdogan. This endearing title in the Mouse series is Mouse's adventure on Halloween evening, where he discovers that some mysterious bumps and rustles (tumbling leaves, apples dropping from trees) in the dark are "not so scary after all." This picture book is perfect for the timid trick-or-treater.

One new title we're really excited about is Hallowilloween: Nefarious Silliness, a book of poems from Calef Brown. One staffer, a solid Brown fan, was cackling in the hut, reading these poems aloud to us all. Her favorite is "The Portrait of Gory Rene," about a man whose hideous portrait strangely becomes more and more handsome, until he has to hide it in the attic. (Hmm...remind you of someone?).


In the chapter book room, our book buyer extraordinaire is very happy that it's time again to put out the beginning chapter book Squirrel's World by Lisa Moser. Squirrel is very helpful and a very good friend: when he almost forgets to say good night to Mouse one evening, he dashes back out to Mouse's tree stump and wakes him up to tell him good night.

Who could get through Halloween without the modern classic The Witches, by Roald Dahl? I reread this comic horror chapter book every autumn to get a head start on the creepy chills...and a refresher on how to discover a child-loathing witch. Roald Dahl has books for grown-ups too: Skin and Other Stories as well as The Umbrella Man and Other Stories are perfect for those blustery nights when the wind howls between your apartment buildings (you hear me, Cantabrigians).

In new books, our staffer Shara raves about a new fantasy collection Zombies Vs. Unicorns, edited by Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier. This collection features such fantasy greats as Garth Nix and Cassandra Clare (meanwhile, are you reading Clockwork Angel, the first book of Infernal Devices?) with Margo Lanagan and Diane Peterfreund (also with a new killer unicorn book out, Ascendant). Some say the world will end in zombies, some say in unicorns...which do you choose?

Bookish Moving Pictures

It's so hot today, it's even difficult to focus on a page and read! You KNOW it's bad when it comes to that. On hot days when it's difficult to read, sitting in an air-conditioned theater is an appealing idea. And what better sort of movie to see, than one made from a book? What follows is a round-up of upcoming adaptations of books coming to the silver screen.

Mr. Popper's Penguins, starring Jim Carrey. The release date is not yet announced, it sounds like the script is just nearing completion. But, the script is certainly taking its liberties with the much beloved middle-grade novel and 1939 Newberry Honor. The IGN reports that the "movie version takes the book into an upscale direction: a high-powered businessman suddenly inherits six penguins. As he gets acquainted with – and increasingly attached to – his winged roommates, Popper's life quickly unravels: his swanky New York apartment is turned into a snowy winter wonderland, the deal he's long been working on is derailed, and he almost lands in jail."

Expect to see it in theaters in a year or so. It's pretty clear what kind of movie this will be, and nothing could ever beat Robert Lawson's understated and playful monochromatic illustrations. But, alas, there's always a silver lining: a mediocre movie always helps readers find amazing books.

Up next is the VERY anticipated and VERY probably awesome forthcoming movie based on The Hunger Games. Suzanne Collins has been on a tour of all the Districts of (Ancient) Panem, and when I caught up with her at Brookline Public Library, she said that she was at work on the script herself, with some help from scriptwriting gentleman. No director has been selected, but she thinks the selection will be made soon. Then it will be a couple of years till we see the movie, I bet. I think I should play Katniss, and Clive Owen can play Gale and Edward Norton can play Peeta. Le sigh. Where's that air conditioning knob?

The Smurfs. This is perhaps the strangest forthcoming adaptation...the beloved comic book characters of old are coming to the big screen...albeit in CG form. And the Smurfs will be placed in a modern-day NYC frame story, akin to the "Mr. Popper" plot.

Here's a pic, from Wikipedia:







As weird as the CG may be, there are some great voice talents recruited; Hank Azaria as Gargamel, Neil Patrick Harris and John Oliver! Since they've just released a picture of the CG, I imagine it will be another year until theatrical release.

But, if you prefer to keep your Smurfs preserved in the nostalgic glow of un-CG'd childhood, the movie is reinvigorating interest. The original comic books are being reprinted into graphic novels with three stories in each volume.

The Purple Smurfs (Vol. 1)
Downstairs in the Chapter Book Room
$5.99







The Smurfs and the Magic Flute (Vol. 2)
Downstairs in the Chapter Book Room
$5.99

...with more volumes forthcoming!

And more Schleich Smurfs to come to the hut SOON!

What books would you want made into a movie? Which ones should be left alone for forever?

So you've already finished Mockingjay?

I haven't yet, but as I'm meeting Suzanne Collins tomorrow (neener neener!), I'm going to read it tonight. From what I hear from fellow Georgians and the kidslitosphere at large, I won't have any trouble reading it in one fell swoop. :)

Scholastic has posted a run-down of Mockingjay's media coverage here -- if you're already done you needn't avoid spoilers, right? Bookshelves of Doom has a fabulous suggested reading list for those of you who have finished. On it you'll find George staff favorites Incarceron, Graceling, The Knife of Never Letting Go, and The Forest of Hands and Teeth, along with lots of other great fantasy, dystopian, and adventure books to explore. Check our thematic reading round-ups for even more recommendations... or just come in and chat with a friendly Chapter Book Room staffer!

Words can't describe...

I've long loved wordless picture books. There's something special about the joint act of storytelling between the reader and the illustrator/creator without the barrier of actual words. Within a wordless picture book, any child, no matter her reading abilities, can read: and even more satisfying, can tell the story to her grownups.


Wordless picture books can be as straightforward and humorous as Tomie DePaola's Pancakes for Breakfast, wherein a woman lacking the ingredients for this tasty morning staple finds a way to have pancakes one morning. They can be a simple day in a boy's adventures, as in Mercer Mayer's A Boy, A Dog, A Frog, and A Friend. Or they can be imaginative, even abstract, like the flying frogs of Tuesday by David Wiesner or the mind-bending perspective changes Zoom by Istvan Banyai.

The newest wordless picture book I've fallen in love with is a seemingly simple tale of friendship and love. But on second, third, twentieth reading, Beatrice Rodriguez's The Chicken Thief is so much more. Every time I see a George alum or customer particularly fond of excellent picture books, I show them this book and pose a question after the reading. (I'll give you the question after I summarize. SPOILER ALERT!). One day, a fox sneaks up on a group of various animal friends at their home in the woods, and makes off with their friend chicken. The animal friends chase the fox and chicken through the woods, over mountains and under tunnels, while the chicken and fox remain always a step ahead. Each night, the fox and chicken seem friendlier than a kidnapper and dinner might seem to be; one night they even play chess. When the friends finally catch up with the pair, the chicken gestures (because, as I have pointed out to a co-worker, in this make-believe land, the animals are still animals and don't, you know, talk) that it wants to stay with the fox, and the other animals go back over the mountains and through the woods back home. (END SPOILER!). Now I ask - is this a love story, or an example of Stockholm Syndrome? I've had a good discussion with the entire staff on this, and while most people swing toward "Love story, obviously!", a few (including our book buyer) do consider the second possibility. (Maybe they also consider that I'm a little loopy, but this is everyday knowledge here).

I hope this makes at least one person look twice at wordless picture books. Without someone explicitly telling you what is certainly happening, and therefore excluding what possibly may be happening, the act of reading becomes that much more interactive and open-ended. Sure, we know that the chicken stays with the fox, but do we know how they remain together, as friends, partners, kidnapper and sympathetic kidnappee, diner and dinner? How we choose to interpret these relationships can speak volumes about us readers, and as people.

So come in and tell me what you think! I'll be waiting.

New goodies: CuddleFest edition

Two recent additions to our picture books have such squeezable characters that they're just begging to be read in a blanket fort on a sleepy Sunday morning. Gather up all your blankies, pillows, and lovies, and get ready to invest in some serious snuggle time.

The Quiet Book by Deborah Underwood is something I've been waiting impatiently for since last summer, when I got a sneak peek at NECBA's "Pub Crawl" of publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. The text is deceptively simple and brilliantly subtle, naming different kinds of quiet beginning first thing in the morning and continuing through the day. There are a lot more than you might think! The young animals acting as surrogates for kids during good ("first one awake," "bedtime kiss") and not-so-great ("jelly-side down") moments of quiet have great expressiveness in face and gesture. The Quiet Book is charming at first glance, but only grows in warmth and wit the more time you spend with it being quiet.

Natalie Russell's Brown Rabbit in the City is another long-awaited new book. This companion to Moon Rabbit follows Brown Rabbit as he visits Little Rabbit in an NYC-esque metropolis. Being a country bunny, he's in for a shock (I remember feeling similarly when I first visited New York!), and Little Rabbit's not helping with her jam-packed agenda of things to do and see. I love Moon Rabbit, and I'm so glad that its sweet friendship story continues In the City.

A new shipment of Jellycat plush came in yesterday (huzzah!). We actually had just gotten more Jellycat recently, but they go so fast -- apparently customers love this brand as much as we do! There are quite a few new faces in the bunch; Teresa immediately glommed onto this giant, pillowy Truffle Dog:


Having similar plans myself, I thought it might come to fisticuffs until I saw the Chaucer Truffle Dog:


Luckily, we can still be friends, since each of us can have a Truffle Dog of our very own. Whew! Crisis averted!

One newbie from Jellycat is really an old friend. Please allow me to re-introduce you:

Here is Edward Bear, coming downstairs now, bump, bump, bump, on the back of his head, behind Christopher Robin. It is, as far as he knows, the only way of coming downstairs, but sometimes he feels that there really is another way, if only he could stop bumping for a moment and think of it. And then he feels that perhaps there isn't. Anyhow, here he is at the bottom, and ready to be introduced to you. Winnie-the-Pooh.

When I first heard his name, I said, just as you are going to say, "But I thought he was a boy?"

"So did I," said Christopher Robin.

"Then you can't call him Winnie?"

"I don't."

"But you said--"

"He's Winnie-ther-Pooh. Don't you know what 'ther' means?"

"Ah, yes, now I do," I said quickly; and I hope you do too, because that is all the explanation you are going to get.
-- A.A. Milne, from Winnie-the-Pooh (1926)

Winnie-the-Pooh, The House at Pooh Corner, and Milne's poetry are quintessential blanket-fort fare... and any serious Pooh read-aloud session requires a "silly old bear" to be present! This one from Jellycat will naturally need a little wearing in to be the ultimate companion -- may I recommend some bumping down the stairs on his head? -- but he's an awfully good start. For a great baby gift, pair him with Dutton's new full-color editions, which have watercolors accentuating Ernest Shepard's lovely illustrations.

The other George staffers know I'm hooked on the art of Susie Ghahremani, introduced to me by CG alumna, lover of all things adorable, and illustrator of squishable animals Jess Golden. Luckily for me, if not for my bank account, we recently received a bunch more items featuring Ghahremani illustrations!

The Land + Air + Water Triptych Journal Collection are tiny blank books, complementary in color and composition. On the "Land" journal, a trio of teddy-esque bears peek from behind evergreen trees. "Water" shows three octopuses -- octopi? octopods? actually, these guys only have four -pods, so make of that what you will! -- in their seaweed forest with a seahorse friend. My favorite of the triptych is "Air," on which three owls stargaze from their perches on bare tree branches. An "extremely interesting measurement table" gives collective animal nouns, which I'd rather have than metric conversions any day. (A group of owls is apparently a parliament, but I'm unfortunately still in doubt about the collective noun for octopus.)

What better way to let someone know you're thinking of them than with a short but sweet sentiment relayed by cavorting animals? The tri-fold Mini Notes set holds ten each of three card designs: "Thanks for..." (birdies carrying thank-you banners), "Hi There!" (a kitty opening a present with a puppy inside), and "Call Me!" (a kitty wrapped up in a phone cord). The cards measure about 3.5 inches by 2 inches, and come with coordinating teeny-tiny envelopes. The mini size makes these great to tuck into a friend's purse, pocket, locker, or lunch bag. Everybody I've given one to has actually squeed!

My Family, My Journey: A Baby Book for Adoptive Families is unlike any other baby journal I've seen -- it helps families record memories leading up to and after an adoption. Adoption-specific journaling prompts like "The Match!," "Our Journey to You," "Our Very First Meeting," and "What We Know About Your Birth Family" are tucked in with more standard baby journal fare ("All About Your Birthday," "All About Your Name," Our Hopes and Dreams for You"). There's also a pocket to store mementos and stickers to create a family tree. I wish this had been out there when a (now pre-teen) young friend of mine was adopted!

Let's Go Outside! Outdoor Activities and Projects to Get You and Your Kids Closer to Nature by Jennifer Ward features art by Susie Ghahremani alongside more than 50 great ideas for outdoor fun. Make sun prints, press flowers, make daisy chains, blow giant bubbles, start a cloud-watching journal, or make a field guide to your own backyard. I especially can't wait to try #19 ("Paper Makers") and #22 ("Playground for Poets"). This is a great pick for summer vacation.

For more over-the-top adorableness, check out connoisseur-of-cute Natasha's recent posts about all things tiny and the awesome new Animal Journal. Come to think of it, that Natasha's pretty cute herself. :)