I couldn’t help but overhear as I straightened up during my volunteer time in the children’s book area at the Oak Grove Public Library’s big sale yesterday. The mother said to her son, who was happily browsing the books, something to the effect that he needed to stop looking at the ones with pictures and find some that had a lot of words to read.
Oh, my! Oh, my! I could scarcely restrain myself. Such sacrilege – and in Children’s Picture Book Month! But, as Mama would say, “She didn’t know me from Adam’s house cat and hadn’t asked my advice.”
You haven’t asked either, but you are reading my blog so here goes. One is never too old for picture books! I’m very grateful that I still get them sometimes for Christmas, Mother’s Day, or my birthday.
My difficulty is choosing which to read as I honor Picture Book Month:
- Do I read Jerry Pinckney’s beautifully illustrated Aesop’s fable The Lion and The Mouse, which technically can’t be read since it only has a few animal sounds for words.
- Do I read The Nutcracker, illustrated by Susan Jeffers – one of my favorites, that I got for my birthday (along with tickets to see local production)?
- Do I read Judith Viorst’s Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day since I still get those now and then?
- Maybe I’ll take time to peruse A Child of Books from another birthday that has far more intricate things to see than any kid has the knowledge or attention span to appreciate.
- And let’s not forget that Thanksgiving is coming which calls for Pat Zietlow Miller’s Sharing the Bread: An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving Story.
The list could go on. Fortunately, November has thirty days, and who knows, I may cheat and read some in December or even July.
I wish I had thought faster this morning. I would love to have reminded the mother, who had the best of intentions, that before her son had teeth she only let him eat soft foods like mashed potatoes. But when he became capable of chowing down on steak, she didn’t take the wonderful buttery mashed potatoes away - just encouraged him to enjoy them together.