THE AUTHOR

We had quite a week here. First a stomach virus laid most of us low, and then yesterday when I was finally feeling more like myself, I managed to wrench my back during a cough. So stupid.

But a lot of nice Decemberish things happened in between the grim bits. Before I got sick, I led a craft workshop for a group of teen girls—we made little Midori-style booklets out of envelopes and washi tape, a favorite project of mine. I got the tree up yesterday—no ornaments yet, just the lights—and even a strand of outdoor lights. And we had a double birthday this week, celebrated with marshmallow krispie treats instead of cake.

Last December I was reading novels nonstop for the CYBIL Awards. This year, I’ve hardly read a thing. This month, I mean. Between work and kids and illness, my brain just hasn’t been there. Except for reading Christmas books to the kids, of course. Jingle the Christmas Clown, Christmas Trolls, The Baker’s Dozen, Hanna’s Christmas (Huck’s pick, I swear).

I did a Periscope yesterday (about five minutes before I messed up my back) about how we use Memrise and Duolingo for foreign language and other things—a topic I’ve addressed here on the blog many a time. Earlier in the week when I was too sick to read, I found it soothing to review Memrise topics I’ve completed in the past…U.S. Presidents, British Monarchs. Rilla is loving Duolingo French and is now at a great age to use that program. As I said in the ’scope, it’s a bit too advanced for Huck—too much English spelling, let alone German—but there are aspects of the platform that he really loves, and if I sit with him to help with the spelling he gets along pretty well.

No plans this weekend except rest, answering some letters, and maybe cracking a book that has a spine thicker than a quarter-inch. You?

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As I pack away my Christmas tree for another year, I took stock today of my Christmas haul of books. I’m planning on reading more classics in 2015 and was fortunate enough to receive a few beautiful clothbound editions for Christmas. I hope you too were lucky enough to receive a book or two at Christmas time, […]

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Every year at this time, my blog stats show dozens of searches for the Christmas picture book I wrote long ago. It’s been out of print for ages and tends to be pricey on the resale market, especially this time of year. Last year I decided to read it aloud on video so folks who can’t find it can watch it with their kids.

And here’s my video introduction to the book.

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Santa Lucia Day is December 13. Coming up fast!

If you’re already thinking how to fill the sleigh this Christmas, climb on in and assume the brace position because it’s only 44 more days until Christmas. Yes! As terrifying as that may sound, here are three fantastic new reads to lessen the impact. They are cheerfully Christmassy, are already, or destined to be classics […]

Okay, so let's talk about the important stuff we got and gave for Christmas. Books.

I received a subscription to Bookmarks Magazine, which I'm very excited about. Also a Barnes & Noble gift card and an Amazon gift card, with which I hope to buy masses of things for my Kindle. And 500 Pizzas & Flatbreads, which was unexpected but very me.

I gave:

Fairest  Vol. 1 by Bill Willingham

Witches Abroad by Terry Pratchett. The family member who received this and I were making our way through the Discworld books back in 2011 and got sidetracked. I'm hoping to get this as a loaner from him later this year.

When Rain Falls by Melissa Stewart

We take Christmas as we find it.
Big or little. Rich or poor.
 
Our December began with a broken car.
Growing kids bursting out of their coats and socks and shoes.
And a skinnier piggy bank.

So we're doing homemade this Christmas.
And humble, homemade gifts won't hurt us a bit.

In light of so much sorrow around us this year,
all we have is gratitude.

The messes don't matter.
I am unspeakably thankful for these eight small hands,
alive and healthy,
for the joyful chaos that surrounds them,
for my imperfect, half-finished jumble,
the light, the squeals, the squabbles.

The egg carton bells.
Popsicle stick snowflakes.

Trying on wreaths as hats.

What matters is already surrounding us.

Love encircles us,
wraps us in glowing strands,
and though it doesn't magically take away the sorrows
of our broken world,
Love is the thing that will mend us.

It anchors us when winds and sorrows come.
Smooths out the wrinkles in our weary, bleary furrows.
Makes us small candles to give courage in the dark. 

Simple, homespun gifts may not be sophisticated,
fancy, or exactly on everyone's wish list,
but they are offerings of love.
and I'm okay with that.

Because love goes deeper than wish lists.


Christmas began with a gift
wrapped in old clothes and straw.
A humble gift.
A love gift.




Love to you, my friends.
Love.
Connecticut. Haiti. Japan.
Rwanda. Middle East. 
Love to you.


Picture Books We're Enjoying this Week:

 
 
The Christmas Tapestry- Patricia Polacco
Christmas in the Barn- Margaret Wise Brown, Barbara Cooney
A Child is Born - Elizabeth Winthrop, Charles Mikolaycak
Gleam and Glow - Eve Bunting, Peter Sylvada
Christmas with the Mousekins - Maggie Smith
The Little House Christmas - Laura Ingalls Wilder, Garth Williams
One Wintry Night - Ruth Bell Graham, Richard Jesse Watson
The Joy of A Peanuts Christmas - Charles Schultz

Following yesterday’s recipe for roast goose by Mrs Beeton, here’s that classic Christmas dinner portrayed by Charles Dickens in the famous scene from A Christmas Carol. Here Ebeneezer Scrooge watches with the Ghost of Christmas Present as the Cratchit family sits down to roast goose and Christmas pudding.

‘And how did little Tim behave?’ asked Mrs Cratchit, when she had rallied Bob on his credulity, and Bob had hugged his daughter to his heart’s content.

‘As good as gold,’ said Bob, ‘and better. Somehow he gets thoughtful, sitting by himself so much, and thinks the strangest things you ever heard. He told me, coming home, that he hoped the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk, and blind men see.’

Bob’s voice was tremulous when he told them this, and trembled more when he said that Tiny Tim was growing strong and hearty.

His active little crutch was heard upon the floor, and back came Tiny Tim before another word was spoken, escorted by his brother and sister to his stool before the fire; and while Bob, turning up his cuffs — as if, poor fellow, they were capable of being made more shabby — compounded some hot mixture in a jug with gin and lemons, and stirred it round and round and put it on the hob to simmer; Master Peter, and the two ubiquitous young Cratchits went to fetch the goose, with which they soon returned in high procession.

Such a bustle ensued that you might have thought a goose the rarest of all birds; a feathered phenomenon, to which a black swan was a matter of course — and in truth it was something very like it in that house. Mrs Cratchit made the gravy (ready beforehand in a little saucepan) hissing hot; Master Peter mashed the potatoes with incredible vigour; Miss Belinda sweetened up the apple-sauce; Martha dusted the hot plates; Bob took Tiny Tim beside him in a tiny corner at the table; the two young Cratchits set chairs for everybody, not forgetting themselves, and mounting guard upon their posts, crammed spoons into their mouths, lest they should shriek for goose before their turn came to be helped. At last the dishes were set on, and grace was said. It was succeeded by a breathless pause, as Mrs Cratchit, looking slowly all along the carving knife, prepared to plunge it in the breast; but when she did, and when the long expected gush of stuffing issued forth, one murmur of delight arose all round the board and even Tiny Tim, excited by the two young Cratchits, beat on the table with the handle of his knife, and feebly cried Hurrah!

There never was such a goose. Bob said he didn’t believe there ever was such a goose cooked. Its tenderness and flavour, size and cheapness, were the themes of universal admiration. Eked out by apple-sauce and mashed potatoes, it was a sufficient dinner for the whole family; indeed, as Mrs Cratchit said with great delight (surveying one small atom of bone upon the dish), they hadn’t ate it all particular, were steeped in sage and onion to the eyebrows! But now, the plates being changed by Miss Belinda, Mrs Cratchit left the room alone — too nervous to bear witness — to take the pudding up and bring it in.

Suppose it should not be done enough! Suppose it should break in turning out! Suppose somebody should have got over the wall of the back-yard, and stolen it, while they were merry with the goose — and supposition at which the two young Cratchits became livid! All sorts of horrors were supposed.

Hallo! A great deal of steam! The pudding was out of the copper. A smell like a washing-day! That was the cloth. A smell like an eating-house and a pastrycook’s next door to each other, with a laundress’s next door to that! That was the pudding! In half a minute Mrs Cratchit entered — flushed by smiling proudly — with the pudding, like a speckled cannon-ball, so hard and firm, blazing in half of half-a-quartern of ignited brandy, and bedight with Christmas holly stuck into the top.

Oh, a wonderful pudding! Bob Cratchit said, and calmly too, that he regarded it as the greatest success achieved by Mrs Cratchit since their marriage. Mrs Cratchit said that now the weight was off her mind, she would confess she had her doubts about the quantity of flour. Everybody had something to say about it, but nobody said or thought it was at all a small pudding for a large family. It would have been flat heresy to do so. Any Cratchit would have blushed to hint at such a thing.

At last the dinner was all done, the cloth was cleared, the hearth swept, and the fire made up. The compound in the jug being tasted, and considered perfect, apples and oranges were put upon the table, and a shovel-full of chestnuts on the fire. Then all the Cratchit family drew round the hearth, in what Bob Cratchit called a circle, meaning half a one; and at Bob Cratchit’s elbow stood the family display of glass. Two tumblers, and a custard-cup without a handle.

These held the hot stuff from the jug, however, as well as golden goblets would have done; and Bob served it out with beaming looks, while the chestnuts on the fire sputtered and cracked noisily. Then Bob proposed:

‘A Merry Christmas to us all, my dears. God bless us!’ Which all the family re-echoed.

‘God bless us every one!’ said Tiny Tim, the last of all.

A Christmas Carol has gripped the public imagination since it was first published in 1843, and it is now as much a part of Christmas as mistletoe or plum pudding. The Oxford World’s Classics edition, edited by Robert Douglas-Fairhurst, reprints the story alongside Dickens’s four other Christmas Books: The Chimes, The Cricket on the Hearth, The Battle of Life, and The Haunted Man.

For over 100 years Oxford World’s Classics has made available the broadest spectrum of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford’s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, voluminous notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

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Image credit: Reproduced from a c.1870s photographer frontispiece to Charles Dicken’s A Christmas Carol. By Frederick Barnard (1846-1896). Digital image from LIFE. Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

The post Christmas dinner with the Cratchits appeared first on OUPblog.

Holiday High Notes 2011

Holiday High Notes 2009

SCHOOL LIBRARY JOURNAL

December Holiday Books 2011

Holiday Booksfor Ages 8-10

Kids’ Christmas Books, 2010: Forthe Naughty & Nice

THE LOOKING GLASS CHILDREN’S BOOK REVIEWS

Christmas Picture Books

We made ornaments this week...for the birds.

Because they ate all our cherries this year?

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

I couldn’t resist taking a break from my Christmas duties to squeeze this post in. At this time of year, there’s a veritable sleigh-load of children’s Christmas books on offer; exciting new titles and plenty of old chestnuts too. Applesauce and the Christmas Miracle is one of the latter, which if not already part of your Christmas hamper, is destined to become so.

Brimming with rural Aussie flavour, this CBCA short-listed picture book is a sensitive juxtaposition of a pig, ironically named Applesauce, who feels hopelessly bereft after a bushfire sweeps away life as she knew it in her valley. Unable to come to terms with the loss, she succumbs to abject depression, certain there will be no Christmas this year for her and her beloved Joe and Marigold; the people she shares her life with.

Sage Owl consoles Applesauce, advising her that ‘Christmas comes from the heart’ not from what you have or have not got. But surrounded by such a bleak, scarred world, Applesauce is unable to feel anything but glum.

Meanwhile, others from the neighbouring bush are making their way through the empty landscape to see Joe and Marigold. We are still not sure why, although a glimpse at the book’s cover gives us a clue. The arrivals of the Shepard family and Marigold’s three slightly eccentric looking, elderly aunties all go unnoticed by Applesauce, that is until, she is finally introduced to Joe and Marigold’s new baby.

Suddenly, all that was miserable and desolate becomes cheery and meaningful. Cockatoos swirl like snowflakes. New red leaves blaze like fairy lights in the fierce sunlight, and it is amongst these simple and symbolic celebrations of new life that Applesauce lets ‘Christmas fill her heart again’.

Author Glenda Millard

From the first line, award-winning author, Glenda Millard, draws us almost imperceptibly into Applesauce’s pining for better days; days before drought and bushfire desecrated her world. Even without the exquisite illustrations of Stephen Michael King, Millard’s descriptions are deliciously seasoned with enough sensory detail to enable the reader to smell and feel the arid emptiness of the land; ‘night fell as dark as burnt toast’ is one image that lingers on long after being read and is thoughtfully followed by a text-less spread of night, star flecked sky.

King’s illustrations compliment the poignant text perfectly; never impinging on the tale, always filling each page with delicate, imaginative colour. I adore King’s quirky illustrative style and sense of fancy.  Both work well to retell a tale as old as Christmas itself. Adults sharing this picture book with young children will recognise the clever parallels to the nativity story. Young readers will enjoy the gorgeous imagery, magically told tale and simple yet strong Christmas message. Applesauce and the Christmas Miracle is guaranteed to fill your heart with the spirit of Christmas.

Recommended for pre-school age (3) and above.

Books we read today:

Caps For Sale
The Baker’s Dozen: A Saint Nicholas Tale
The Donkey’s Dream

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Last piano class before Bean & Rose’s Christmas recital. Lot of Deck the Halls and Carol of the Bells going on around here.

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• Loved this Mother Bird post on making oak gall ink.

• What happens to your data (and your domains) when you die?

• I mentioned this on Facebook and at GeekMom, but in case you missed it: Amazon’s got some good stuff for $1.99 on Kindle this month. Howl’s Moving Castle, the first Series of Unfortunate Events book, and Dava Sobel’s excellent Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time, among others. We already own all of those in print, but—two bucks!

4 Stars Seymour's Christmas Wish Jane Matyger Javier Duarte Mirror Publishing 28 Pages    Ages: 3 + ..................... ...................... Back Cover: Seymour, a tiny, tiny mouse, lives at the North Pole. Each Christmas Eve, he shines Rudolph’s red nose before Santa’s big trip. This year Seymour has a special wish . . . a wish that [...]