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This year is the 15th anniversary for El día de los niños/El día de los libros! Happy birthday to this wonderful celebration of children and books from all linguistic and cultural backgrounds!

There are lots of celebrations going on and one I’m particularly excited about is the Pura Belpré Celebración at the ALA Annual Conference in New Orleans this June.  Organizers tell us that they’re going to celebrate it as a Quinceañera with a traditional promenade.  It’s going to be fabulous – we only hope we can sneak away from our booth long enough to participate!

For your collections, here are some Spanish and bilingual books to consider for your Día celebrations:

• Ada, Alma Flor and F. Isabel Campoy  ¡MUU, MOO!: Rimas de animales/Animal Nursery Rhymes. Illus. Vivi Escriva. 2010
• Ada, Alma Flor and F. Isabel Campoy TEN LITTLE PUPPIES/Diez Perritos.  Illus. Ulises Wensell. 2011
• Brown, Monica SIDE BY SIDE/Lado a lado.  Illus. Joe Cepeda. 2010
• Dorros, Arthur  MAMA AND ME.  Illus. Rudy Gutierrez. 2011
• Dorros, Arthur  RADIO MAN/Don radio. 1997 (paperback)
• Guy, Ginger Foglesong  BRAVO! Illus. Rene King Moreno. 2010
• Guy, Ginger Foglesong  MY GRANDMA/Mi abuelita.  Illus. Vivi Escriva. 2007
• Lacamara, Laura  FLOATING ON MAMA’S SONG/Flotando en la canción de mamá. Illus. Yuyi Morales. 2010
• Martinez, Rueben  ONCE UPON A TIME/Habia una vez: Traditional Latin American Tales/Cuentos tradicionales latinoamericanos.  Illus. Raul Colon. 2010
• Mora, Pat  BOOK FIESTA! Illus. Rafael Lopez.  2009
• Mora, Pat WIGGLING POCKETS/Los bolsillos saltarines.  Illus. Maribel Suarez. 2009
• Reiser, Lynn  Tortillas and Lullabies/Tortillas y cancioncitas. Illus. Corazones Valientes. 2008

This list is by no means exhaustive (many of these authors and illustrators are prolific with rich and beautiful books in their backlist), but hopefully it’ll help get you started.

And make sure to check out the Día website – there’s a wealth of information about hosting your own Día event, events going

We’ve just had a seventh birthday celebration in our household. Little Brother was lucky: it was the week-end and he spent the whole day with his family. Not so poor little Graciela in Papi’s Gift (written by Karen Stanton and illustrated by Rene King Moreno) whose father is working in the United States to support his family back home. We don’t know the exact location but the gentle illustrations in soft pastels place the book in a Latino setting with many visual cultural references.

Graciela can’t have her father at home for her seventh birthday but she can at least have the parcel he sends to her… or so she thinks. But she waits and waits and the parcel never arrives. Papi cries at the other end of the phone – a very daring notion to include in a picture book, which really brings home the stress of separation for all involved. Graciela goes through many emotions – expectation turns to upset and then anger but, with her mother’s help, she emerges from the experience not unscathed but with hope in her heart.

In the same way that we feel Graciela will grow from the experience, young readers/ listeners (and this really is a book for sharing at a first reading), will find the story sobering and thought-provoking. They will empathise with the universality of her responses to what she has no control over; and they will question and learn about the reality of what life is like for some families, where separation is the only answer in order for them to survive.

There’s a great review of Papi’s Gift over at BookBuds and Picture Book of the Day recommends it as a springboard for a classroom writing activity.

In this show A multimedia text set focusing on gender issues and definitions of success. Texts Mentioned: Shrek The Pink Party Boy Can He Dance Thanks To: Diana Rodriguez for the multi-media audio Chris Kretz from the Dowling College Library Omnibus Podcast