It’s the Easter season, which mean lots of little girls are wearing fancy dresses.
So it seems like the perfect time for Allyssa to review Bonnie Ashburn’s picture book I Had a Favorite Dress (Abrams Books for Young Readers, 2011).
This book tells the story of a girl who wears her favorite dress. Every week on the same day. For a lot of weeks.
But then, she grows, and the dress is too short. What to do? Thanks to some creative thinking and sewing skills from her mom, the dress gets transformed into another piece of clothing. That she wears once a week on a different day.
And then, it becomes another kind of clothing for another day.
And then … well, let’s hear the rest from Allyssa.
Our reviewer: Allyssa.
Age: 7
Things I like to do: Draw, color and read.
This book was about: A girl who had a favorite dress.
The best part was when: She had the hairbow in her hair.
I smiled when: When she was wearing the skirt.
I was worried when: When I told my mom that I didn’t have pants to wear to school. But on Monday, my pants were in my drawer. (Note: This example comes from Allyssa’s own life, not from the book!)
I was surprised when: The puppy got ahold of the hairbow.
This book taught me: “You can’t wear the same clothes every day.”
Three words that best describe this book are: “Funny.” “Creative.” “Good.”
My favorite line or phrase in the book was: “Snip, snip, sew, sew… New shirt, hello!”
You should read this book because: Because girls might have a favorite dress too. And it’s a funny book. You can see all the dresses on the front cover and choose which is the one you like.
Thank you, Allyssa! For the record, Allyssa’s favorite piece of clothing is a short-sleeved shirt that is purple and pink and sparkly with buttons. And her favorite day of the week is Saturday, because sometimes she and her family do fun things together.
Another cool thing about this book is that it was a finalist for the Cybils Award, which is given to outstanding children’s book in several categories based on nominees and judging by children’s book bloggers. And if you’d like to see the memories it inspired in several grown women, read this blog post from Abrams.
Author Boni Ashburn has several great books out. To learn more, you can:
Illustrator Julia Denos loves fashion and books, so she was the perfect choice to illustrate this book. You can learn more about her by:
We are indeed overdue for Dress Day #2, ladies and gents!
A little afternoon dress for a lazy day out:
"Picnic"
With accompanying tune
All the Wine by some of my favorite Brooklyn-based musicians, Clare and the Reasons.
Is it really REALLY TRULY Spring? Here in the Northeast, it's hard to let your heart be convinced lest it be quickly broken (by April snow), but I'm believing in Spring today. It's gorgeous and sunny and the perfect time to wear your favorite dress. Speaking of dresses...I heard from a bird (named Chad Beckerman) that the advances of my next book are IN:
Deciding what THE dress of dresses would be for the little girl in this book was a dizzying task, and you can imagine how many tiny dress drawings were made (a tiny closet full). So I'm going to open up the closet for random
Dress Days throughout the months leading up to the release of the book. Some dresses you will be able to spy throughout the book! I had to name them all to keep them straight so on
Dress Day #1 we have:
"Lemonade Gala"
I loved Tara’s post from Day 22 because I get a lot of my ideas in the opposite way. Re-read your favorites and examine what you love about them? I like doing this too, but it completely freezes my creativity. I end up thinking I could NEVER write anything THAT wonderful and I go eat a pint of chocolate ice cream instead.
I would LOVE to be inspired by good books, but (sadly) I’m not. My biggest-ever writing epiphany (next to understanding rhyme) was learning this about myself: good books are bad for me.
No, what I need to feed my creativity is bad books. Nothing gets me more fired up than a book/story/idea that I think could be improved. Books that I read which annoy me in some way that I recognize instantly, or the ones that gnaw at me weeks later, asking me, “Why…? Why…? Why…?”
Books with ill-conceived plots that obviously should have gone This Way instead of That Way (obviously to ME, anyway–ha!) Books with poor structure. Books with over-worn themes that bring nothing new to the world. Characters that should be funnier. Characters who do things I don’t understand. Settings that don’t matter, but could–or should! Why did the author set it there when here would have been so much better?
Wasted opportunity–that’s what basically gets my creative juices flowing. It plays into re-tellings and re-interpretations and parodies very nicely (and I write a lot of those), but you can also use the ideas you come up with in original stories.
When I grew tired of singing Hush, Little Baby to my twins several times every night, wondering at the wisdom of giving breakable (a mirror), small (a diamond ring) or potentially stampeding (a bull and cart) items to a baby who’s screaming, wondering at the lack of funny lullabyes to entertain the parent AND send the child off to Sleepyland with a laugh in their heart, those cogs in my brain just started grinding away.
Most versions I could find at the time were built around a human baby (although several others have proliferated in the last five years), but what if it was a baby… dragon? What would his mother bring him that both made more sense AND was funny? When I thought of a princess to eat, I laughed and started writing.
Most versions of the song Over In The Meadow center on animal communities. And there are so many different versions, every ecosystem on earth! Geesh- nothing new there. But wait. What about all the people at a busy place… like a castle! I did some research, and Bingo! Book #2.
I wrote a twin manuscript because I was tired of picture books that only showed the twice-as-nice, double-the-love side of twins. If you have twins, you KNOW this is only half of the story. Where are the twins who love each other but ALSO shove each other because they’re tired of 24/7 sharing? Mine DO that! So I wrote it.
Hush little baby, don’t say a word.
Mama’s found a book that beats the herd.
It’s got a little dragon and his mum.
She’s finding food for him, and not just crumbs.
A knight, a queen and a magician.
Yes, those folks are good nutrition.
Set to the tune of a sweet lullaby,
That author Boni Ashburn is really sly.
Please excuse my forced rhyme here,
Boni’s verse is better, don’t you fear.
In fact, that couplet with “nutrition”
Is the author’s, not my addition.
My three year-old just loves this book,
Hush Little Dragon boasts quite the hook.
So rush right out and grab this title,
Sorry I have nothing to rhyme with title.
Let me repeat just one more time,
Boni’s verses are better than mine.
Hush little baby, don’t say a word.
There’s a Hush sequel and maybe a third?
If Boni keeps writing books like this,
Kids everywhere will have reading bliss.
Hush, Little Dragon
Story by Boni Ashburn
Illustrations by Kelly Murphy
Abrams Books for Young Readers, March 2008
Want it? Sure you do!
I had a conversation with Holly Black recently where we both admitted that every time we’re told that we can’t do some particular writing thing we are compelled to do it.
“Vampires are played out. There is no new take on vampires left!” someone will tells us.
“Right then,” we’ll think to ourselves. “Challenge! We’ll be writing a vampire story.”
“Avoid adverbs and adjectives,” someone will say.
We will immediately have an attack of the Angela Carters.
David Moles admitted to a similar reaction to definitions of genres. They make him want to write something entirely outside the limits of the genre being defined.1 Holly and me are the same,2 whenever we see a YA definition we find ourselves thinking of the exceptions and thinking of ways we can stretch those boundaries. How can we get away with writing books where the protags aren’t teens? Or have the kind of content everyone is so sure you can’t have in a YA? Or where the story does not have the immediacy everyone associates with the genre?
It’s probably very childish but there’s a level at which all writing rules (never head hop! avoid passive voice!)3 and genre definitions make my back straighten, my nostrils inflate, and leave me with an overwhelming urge to shout, “You are not the boss of me! I’ll write what I bloody well want to write!”
When I was chatting about it with Holly we decided it was a good thing. Definitions be damned!
It’s the Easter season, which mean lots of little girls are wearing fancy dresses..jpeg?picon=1784)
This little dress shouts, "SUMMER!"
Great!
Thanks, Elizabeth...Crossing fingers that the warm weather stays!