A young tree digs his roots into forest soil, never imagining that he'd ever grow anywhere else, in this beautiful, tender story about a little Christmas tree.
The tree, an evergreen with fine, stubby needles, is the littlest one in the forest, at first no taller than a sparrow. Every day, he pushes his way further up through the grass to find the sun.
Though all the other trees on the hillside are much taller, the Littlest Evergreen doesn't mind because he's happy just where he is and he feels a part of something grand.
Every spring, the Littlest Evergreen inches a little more skyward, stretching the tip of his crown to try to catch up to other trees. And each day into summer, he soaks in the smells and sounds around him.
He marvels at the heat pulling the scent out of his needles and the crackle of lightning in the air. He delights in the downpour that follows, the feeling of rain washing away dust from his bows.
And when fall comes and his sap slows, he sleeps, with his roots tucked under a blanket of snow until titmice and chickadees herald spring once more.
Living there, in a carpet of trees, is serene -- and for a time, safe. But then one day, a terrible sound rips through the air and his companions begin to fall to the ground around him.
The Littlest Evergreen wonders if he'll be cut down too, never to know what it's like to be big. But then something incredible happens.
The cutters dig him up instead. They wrap burlap around his roots, then send him to a Christmas tree lot to be used fo
Written by Linda Sue Park
Illustrated by Bagram Ibatoulline
A father and son walk a desert collecting tears of sap for market, not yet knowing that the largest of those pearls will become a gift for a baby named Jesus.
In this evocative, masterfully painted story, Newbery Medalist Linda Sue Park joins with renowned illustrator Bagram Ibatoulline to weave a captivating tale about myrrh, the third gift given by the wise men to the Christ child.
Imagining a father teaching his son how to gather the treasured resin, Park describes the two walking with a basket, water-gourd and an ax across a landscape almost entirely of sandy rock to a grove of stunted and spiny trees.
The boy's father kneels by one of the gnarled trees "to see inside." Gently, he feels the bark with his hands, and plucks off a leaf and sniffs, to determine whether its myrrh is ready to be harvested.
Finding a tree that is aged just right, he carefully selects a spot to wound, to cut a shallow X, so that the tree will weep. Then, making the cut, he watches as the sap bubbles up into a big tear.
After waiting for the tear's surface to dry into a shell, the father twists the resin off with his fingers and places it in their basket.
On this day, as the two are finishing their harvest, they see the biggest tear yet. It's the size of a hen's egg and the boy's father gives his son the honor of teasing it off.
This tear and the others will bring good money at the spice market. Some people will buy them for medicine or to flavor wine, but most will purchase them for embalming loved ones.
Two weeks pass and soon it's time for the spice market. As they arrive to sell their tears, they're ushered into a tent where three wise
Written & illustrated by Brock Cole
In this rollicking read-aloud, a cozy family of six attempts to room with a turkey while they plump him up for Christmas dinner.
But as feathers begin to fly, it's not clear who's getting the better of whom.
One afternoon Pa returns home from market with a brilliant way to save pennies for Christmas dinner.
He'll fatten up a turkey poult and keep it in a wooden box by the stove of their tenement apartment.
But with five children, himself and his wife packed inside, the family's flat is already feeling crowded.
And much to Ma's chagrin, the turkey doesn't like to keep to one spot, and soon, he's also much too big for his box.
Suddenly Alfred, their turkey, must be shifted somewhere else, but where do you put a boisterous young fowl?
It's up to Pa to find that somewhere else, but locating an empty spot in the tenement will require a bit of creativity.
The problem is, being clever isn't always enough -- every place Pa moves Alfred proves disastrous.
On the fire escape, neighbors up and down get a waft of him, and when he's strung out on the clothesline inside a crate, they get showered by droppings as they walk outside.
Poor widow Schumacher from upstairs can barely stand the clucking and smell, or so she says. She comes down to their flat three times a day just to complain.
And now with Christmas almost here, it's getting harder to think of Alfred as the centerpiece of Christmas dinner.
Do they really want to butcher their friend? And if they don't, will dinner still be just as special?
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By: Jenny Miller,
on 12/8/2011
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Written & illustrated by Tomi Ungerer
Phaidon Press, 2011
$12.95, ages 4-8, 32 pages
Four little pigs brighten the rooms of a cold, dilapidated house with the spirit of Christmas, in this charming reissue of a German classic.
When each of the Mellops brothers surprises their papa with a Christmas tree, they find they've all had the same idea and they burst into tears. Oh no, "what a to-do."
Four trees are just too many. And it wouldn't be fair to pick one brother's tree over another, so Mr. Mellops suggests that the boys look for people in need to give them to.
The problem is everyone they ask already has a tree -- at the orphanage, hospital, prison and military barracks.
Poor Casimir, Isidor, Felix and Ferdinand, they really want to help someone and as the lug their trees back home, their ears wilt with disappointment.
But just as these well-meaning fellows resign to throw away their trees, they see a girl pig quietly sobbing on the sidewalk. Could this be the person they've been looking for?
The girl pig explains that she lives with her ailing grandma, then leads them back to her rickety house.
The mood inside is forlorn. Her grandma lays in bed: her eyes, dark scribbles, her hooves, dangling over the edge of the bed frame. Plaster has peeled off walls exposing brick and a mouse scrambles across a chipped floor board.
In other rooms of the same house, the brothers find an old soldier shivering in a wheelchair next to an empty wood stove, two scared children huddled in a corner, and an old pig grimacing by a photograph of a woman who's no longer with him.
All at once, the boys' heads flood with ideas to cheer up the lodgers in the house. Every room will have a tree, they shout. Then they dash home to gather things sorely needed in each of the four rooms.
Isidor pulls clothes and blankets out of their armoir, Felix hammers open their "people" banks to buy gifts and medicine, Casimir chops wood to heat the rooms and Ferdinand fills a wheelbarrow with food.
Soon the house is happy and warm, and every tree is just where it's needed, cheering at a bedside and brightening rooms. And the Mellops boys? Well they're hear
By: Jenny Miller,
on 12/8/2011
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Text based on the King James Bible
Illustrations by Pamela Dalton
$17.99, all ages, 32 pages
In this reverent retelling of the nativity story, illustrations look as if they were pulled from the walls of a church.
Using a technique rooted in 16th Century folk art, Pamela Dalton scissor-cuts designs from a single piece of paper, then watercolors in details and mounts the scenes on a black backdrop.
Each design is a fragile tapestry of paper and has a mural-like quality. Ornate and naturalistic, it conveys a feeling of antiquity that works beautifully with the story, retold here from the King James Bible.
In one spread, readers see the angel Gabriel alighting before Mary, an Easter lily being offered in his hand, and later, three shepherds arrive at the manager to see baby Jesus, each of their gowns elaborately cut in repeating patterns.
At times, Dalton frames scenes with trees, their bows weighted by apples as flowers vigorously climb up around their trunks. Other times, carved stone fences, bridges or rolling paths define the background, as birds and butterflies angle here and there, or stars shimmer in the sky.
Each scene feels like a fresco commissioned for the wall (or ceiling) of a chapel, and is painted in delicate, earthy hues that evoke feelings of profound respect and peacefulness.
The most exquisite cuts resemble intricate carvings and look as if they might tear if they were touched.
On one page, baby Jesus is swaddled on an oval bed of wheat, its stalks as fine as feathers. On other pages, angel wings in tan tones look like thin wood filigree that's been cut with a laser.
Once again, the result is astounding: images that suggest the look of aged materials, parchment or plaster or wood, as if the pictures themselves were as old as the story.
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