Reading & Books

Best Bookshops Seattle: Foodie Favorite

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If you are a foodie, bibliophile or cookbook collector you simply must go to The Book Larder: a community cookbook store in the Fremont neighborhood of Seattle (4252 Fremont Ave N, Seattle, Wa 98103).  This is an entire store dedicated to cookbooks!

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I personally love cookbooks, when I was a child I would sit and pour over the pictures in my moms cookbooks.  I love them, everything about them.  If you love cookbooks even a little bit, you will love this store.

What is even better is the staff are so knowledgable about the cookbooks, they can recommend books and have a huge array of cookbooks from around the country and globe as well as vintage cookbooks.  What is so special about this store is the laid back feel when you walk in, you could spend hours in there and still not see all of the books they have to offer.

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Another aspect that makes this shop so inviting is the kitchen table in the middle of the store.  Not only do they sell amazing cookbooks, but they have classes and demos on a regular basis too!  The cooking classes range from $30-$85 and the book talks are free.  You may have to stop me before I completely start to swoon.

This is the perfect shop for people who love to cook or who want to buy a unique or special cookbook for the foodie in their life.  With exceptionally unique cards, tea towels, totes and recipe cards.

photo

Make the most of your visit:

Leave the petites at home so you can fully immerse yourself in this awesome shop.  This is not really a kids bookshop and will be more enjoyable without petites in tow.  With that said, I brought my five year old and it was fine, I just didn’t get to browse as leisurely as I would have liked.  The shop owner graciously offered to bring out crayons, thankfully on our visit their were food samples which kept her occupied.

Store Hours
Monday–Friday: 11am–6pm
Saturday: 11am–5pm
Sunday: 12pm–4pm
Parking: lots of street parking that is free, you may have to walk a little bit.
Check their website for classes or book signings – https://www.booklarder.com/events
I can’t wait to hear what you think about this amazing shop and better yet what cookbook you leave with.
Bon Appetit!
Erin

 

Petite Foodies: Alice Waters and the Trip to Delicious

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Alice Waters is a true revolutionary in the culinary world.  She in essence started the farm to table movement more than 30 years ago.  In her Berkeley California restaurant, Chez Panisse, she sourced all of her food locally from farmers and foragers.  In 2014, Time Magazine listed her as one of the 100 most influential people for her work in promoting good food for all.  If you want to know more about Alice Waters and her amazing legacy listen to this story on NPR about her.  She is amazing in more ways than one, a project she currently works on is called Edible Schoolyards where public school students learn to grow food that is then used in their school lunches.  Amazing, right?

“We’re trying to bring children into a new relationship with food where they have an opportunity to work in a garden,” she says. “They know what it is to plant the seeds and pick the weeds and they’re learning about what it takes to cook the food. … We’ve been separated from this experience through a kind of fast-food indoctrination that’s been going on for the last 50 years. So we need to really come back to our senses and really understand, like most every other country in the world, that food is something precious.” – Alice Waters

What an important skill for our children to be learning.  Alice Waters is culinary hero to me and I was thrilled to see this book showcasing her in the children’s section of our public library.

book-alice-cover

Source: ReaderstoEaters.com

Alice Waters and the Trip to Delicious written by Jacqueline Briggs Martin and illustrated by Hayelin Choi (2014), published by Readers to Eaters is not only pleasing to the eye, but filled with a fantastic story and really fun little factoids about Waters life.

To me this book hits on so many different levels of inspiration.  Food and eating well, along with growing your own foods and sourcing local foods.  Trying new things, which is something we strive to promote in our house.  Travel and enjoying destinations and cultures through food.  A sense of adventure and how food can take you to new places literally and figuratively.

I love this book and think you will too.  Please tell me in the comments what you think or if you have other petite foodie recommendations.

Erin

Illustrator Love: Kit Chase

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The petites and I picked up a bunch of books at the library and oh my goodness do I have a super cute book to share with you today. Oliver’s Tree by Kit Chase (G.P. Putnam’s Son Books for Young Readers, 2014) this sweet book was published in March and is so cute, you need to get your hands on it.  I am sure you will fall head over heals for the illustrations and message, just like we did.

This book is just the book I needed to read with my girls.  Sometimes in kindergarten playing with friends can be a challenge, and this book highlights teamwork, friends finding solutions so everyone can play and be included and what it means to be friends.

To my delight, Kit Chase has an Etsy shop: Trafalgar’s Square that is simply adorable.  I am in love and thinking that when I makeover the petites book nook this shop will be my first stop.  I love these prints and the love of literacy that they showcase.

Copyright @ Kit Chase from Etsy

Copyright @ Kit Chase from Etsy

You have to get your hands on Oliver’s Tree and visit Ms. Chase’s Etsy shop.  Also, up to midnight tonight there is a discount code, so act fast.

Happy Reading and Shopping!

Erin

Bucket List Bookshops & Book Events: Scotland

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Recently I was looking around the internet at possible future travel locations and ended up reading all about Scotland.  What I found to be so fascinating about Scotland is not only that rugged beauty, but that the Scots have a deep love and appreciation of books and literacy.  So much so, that they have a week long celebration of books every year in November.  So I did a little more digging and it turns out that it was just last week.  What is so remarkable, okay there are quite a few things that are remarkable, but the first is that its book week for all genres, here in the states we have Children’s Book Week and Banned Book Week.  Still cool, but not exactly the same thing.  What I loved most about Scotland’s Book Week is that it is about all aspects of books – early literacy programs and book gifting, writing of books, inspiring readers and writers, funding literacy events, outreach for needy families, online lists and resources for all book lovers.  The Scottish Book Trust website is complete with lots of resources, fun articles and my personal favorite – book lists.  Check it out here.

Another fun aspect is that I’m currently obsessed with is a mystery book sculptor,  who hides (her, people believe it may be a woman) amazing sculptures all around Edinburgh.  These mysterious sculptures have been hidden around the city since 2011. What is so neat is that the citizens of Edinburgh have been on a scavenger hunt, if you will, to find these sculptures.  They are usually left at a Scottish historical site or points of literary interest.  The sculptures come with a message about literacy and the importance of books and literacy.  They are amazing.

Mystery Book Sculptor Scotland

Scottish Book Week, Scotland.org

I’m rather obsessed with how fun this is, in 2012 the sculptor created five sculptures and hid them around the city for Book Week.  They released online clues as to where they would be hidden, when they were found the “winners” received a smaller sculpture and the honor of being awesome and finding the sculpture.  So much fun.

WigtownWigtown Town Center

Next Wigtown, this is where I want to go, it is a town that was named Scotland’s National Book Town in 1998, this charming little town has everything a book lover could ask for, 20 businesses dedicated to books.  Its own book festival.  This is where I get super excited, I found this on their website:

The Open Book is a six-month project run by Wigtown Festival Company. The project will invite members of the public to apply to help run a real bookshop in Scotland’s National Book Town in Wigtown for a period of between 2 and 6 weeks and to blog about their experience. Training will be given in bookselling, and help will be provided by Wigtown’s community of booksellers, who will also offer practical and moral support. 

WHAT?!  Amazing, right?  If you want to check this out go to their website.

Finally, and I think I may have saved the best for last here, Leakey’s Bookshop and Café which is Scotland’s largest secondhand bookshop.  It is in Inverness and just looks cool, it looks like it smells amazing…all you will need to be in complete bliss is a cup of tea, a drizzly afternoon and a wallet full of pounds….oh yeah and a cute tote bag to carry all of your finds home.

Leakey's

 

A Bookish Christmas Tradition for the Petites

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Bookish Tradition 1

A couple of years ago I saw a pin on Pinterest about different types of advent calendars and one of them was all about books.  Of course I immediately wanted more information.  Basically it is incredibly simple and a great way to promote literacy in a fun and festive way.  What you need are 25 Christmas or winter books one for each day until Christmas.

Initially, I thought that this would be really hard to get my hands on 25 books, but when I dug through our books I already had 10.  Getting the rest can be as simple or detailed as you would like it to be.  I picked up a bunch of board books at the Target dollar bins.  Another great place to get holiday books are used bookstores.  If you don’t want to buy a bunch of books right now you can always hit up your local public library for some great titles to fill in the gaps.

Another idea would be to start with the 12 days of Christmas, that way you wouldn’t have to stress yourself out trying to find 25 books the first year and then you could build your collection over time.  I’ve realized that I am missing some very classic holiday books (How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Bear Stays Up for Christmas, and The Mitten) that I need to get my hands on when I replace some of the board books next year.  Part of the fun  is finding out which books will become new family favorites.  Another aspect that is so fun is that the books are put away after the holidays and only brought out for this, so there is a huge excitement when the wrapped books appear on the first of December.

It’s in the details: How it works, get your books and wrap them up, then each night your petites open a new book for story time.  Lots of amazing bloggers out there have special wrapping paper and lovely cut tags, I went the low-key route this year and wrapped in paper I had (it doesn’t match) and am going to just write the number on the book with a silver marker.

There are lots of options for the 25th book, some families choose to use the Bible or The Night Before Christmas.  There are so many options of fabulous Christmas books that you might be surprised at how fun it is to collect books for this bookish tradition.  Enjoy!

Petite Stag Picks:

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The Night before Christmas

Santa’s Little Helper

Where Snowflakes Fall

The Snowy Day

William’s Winter Wish

Mickey’s Night Before Christmas

holiday 3

Bear’s Christmas Star

Llama Llama Holiday Drama

Mooseltoe

Ten on a Sled 

Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer

Santa is Coming to Washington

holiday 4

The Twelve Days of Christmas in Washington

Thomas’ Christmas Delivery

The Polar Express

An Irish Night Before Christmas

Tallulah’s Nutcracker 

Board Book

Board Books

Merry Christmas Ollie

A Christmas Carol

Frosty the Snowman

Welcome Winter

Why I love Christmas

The Snowman

 

Thankfulness and Kids

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I think it is pretty important to have children who have manners.  As a teacher and a parent it happens all to often that you have rude little petites, who don’t say please and thank you and becomes terribly refreshing when they do – which I think is sad.  Teaching little ones through modeling has worked for our five year old – she is pretty polite, in fact it is usually what people remark about her when we are out and about.

Recently we found a book that I think is less about Thanksgiving and more about just saying thanks, and being appreciative of what you have.

Karma Wilson has put out these amazing Bear Books and Bear Says Thanks is our new favorite.  We are trying to teach our almost 18 month old to say thank you and she loves bears and animals so this book was a hit!

Source: Amazon

Source: Amazon

It is an incredibly cute story with a big lesson.  Bear has company and they keep bringing food for a feast, he doesn’t feel he has anything to contribute, but in the end he learns that saying thanks is what it is really all about. He enjoys a fabulous feast with all of his woodland friends and is so thankful.

The illustrations by Jane Chapman are fabulous.  This is a story about being thankful and grateful for your friends and time spent together.  A perfect book to share with your petite on Thanksgiving or any other day.

Happy Thanksgiving from the Petite Stags

Perfect Presents for Petites

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I have loved learning about Jane Goodall my entire life.  She is a remarkable woman who is an incredible role model to  little girls everywhere.  She had a dream and she stuck with it and made it her reality.  There are a number of books out there about her and her life’s work.

Me...Jane

Source Amazon

“There are so many people who have dreamed seemingly unattainable dreams and, because they never gave up, achieved their goals against all the odds, or blazed a path along which others could follow…They inspire me.  They inspire those around them.” – Jane Goodall

Me…Jane by Patrick McDonnell is a Caldecott Honor Book for a reason.  This book has lovely illustrations of Jane as a child and how her dream of growing up to help animals became her reality.  This book highlights Jane’s curiosity, desire for adventure and her imagination.  All things that are so important to foster in young children.  At the end of this book there is a message from Jane where she encourages everyone to make the world a different place. I love this book.  I believe that this book should be in the hands of all small girls.

Jane

Source: Amazon

 

Jane 2

Source: Amazon

 

 

 

Jellycat Monkey

The story highlights Jane with her stuffed monkey Jubilee here is a fantastic little monkey that would pair nicely with this book.  Jellycat stuffed animals are a favorite of my girls, they are so soft and well made.  Another important fact about them is that they are made with quality materials that aren’t toxic to petites.

I love this gift idea, I can imagine any petite would love to have a fantastic story read to them while snuggling their own Jubilee.

Erin

Buzzy Tales & Toys for Petites

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This summer my petite family spent some time in Savannah and it was amazing.  We loved Savannah, more specifically I feel deeply in love with the Savannah Bee Company, their honey, products and mission.  This sparked a huge interest in bees from my daughter.  Ah Honey Honey

If you’re new to my blog check out my post about our favorite shop The Savannah Bee Company.  After going there my petite had a renewed interest in bees.  Since we spend a lot of time in the summer gardening we had previously had a lot of conversations about bees.  In Savannah we got to sample tons of honey which was awesome.

When we returned I wanted to keep the interest in bees buzzing.  So we pulled out some of our favorite bee books and toys.  I figure it can’t hurt to start placing emphasis on the importance of bees when it comes to our food.

Bee & Me

Bee & Me – by Elle J. Mcguinnes is a huge favorite of my 16 month old, she loves watching the bee move and squeals with delight when she turns the pages on her own.  However, there is a message that is important for older petites as well, that even if we are scared of getting stung that bees do really important work.

These Bees Count!

These Bees Count! by Allison Formento with illustrations by Sarah Snow is a great book part of a series of counting books.  This particular book has petites going on a field trip to a farm, not just any farm, but the Busy Bee Farm.  There are so many things about this book that I love, the farmer is a woman.  Formento uses words like apiaries and pollination.  The illustrations show a diverse class of kids.  My 5 year old loved hearing about how honey is made from inside the bees stomachs and that they spit it into the honeycomb.  There is also an opportunity for counting  which is always engaging for young readers.

I think that this is a great book to be used in classrooms where students are learning about ecosystems, gardens and communities.  This book is a great addition to the home library as well.

Hide and Seek Bees

Hide and Seek Beehive Toy is from Lakeshore learning and has been a favorite of my youngest petite for a while.  When she was 8 months old she received this as a gift and has loved playing with the bees and hive ever since.  The idea is that it teaches object permanence when you put the bees in they are still in there.  What I like best about this is that each bee does something different.  Some rattle, crinkle, squeak etc.  There are five adorable bees that at 17 months she still loves taking in and out of the hive.

Anyone else out there reading books about bees with their petites, I’m always looking for new titles to share with my girls.

Happy Reading,
Erin

 

 

Reading: Why 20 minutes a night is so important.

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Now that school is in full swing and our petites are back in their routines, I wanted to take a minute to talk about why teachers tell students/parents to read for 20 minutes a night.  When I first started teaching in elementary schools I was asked a lot about the 20 minutes and why it was 20 and not 15.  When you did deeper into the research it is pretty astounding and that 20 minutes is really critical.

Most theorists are agreed that the bulk of vocabulary growth during a child’s lifetime occurs indirectly through language exposure, rather than through direct teaching.  Miller & Gildea, (1987) Nagy & Anderson (1984).

Why to read for 20 minutes

Nagy & Herman 1987

 

When you consider the amount of words and exposure to words kids need to be successful and when you think about 20 minutes a day, that really isn’t that much time for the investment you are making.  With that said, we are all super busy and short on time.  I find that keeping a schedule makes it easier for us to get that time in.

There are so many benefits to reading with your child for 20 minutes a night.

  • improves listening skills
  • engages children in discussion about books
  • builds connections with parents/guardians
  • opportunity to discuss new words or ideas from the books
  • realistic opportunities for growth – sometimes your kids get to see you making mistakes which is GREAT!
  • more contact time with words
  • practice makes perfect
  • builds confidence in kids reading skills, even when basic skills
  • improves test score success over time

I realize as I write this that, as a teacher, I might be a lot more comfortable than some in reading aloud with children.  For some reading aloud doesn’t come naturally and feels a little strange or forced – what I will say here is practice makes perfect.  I guarantee that your kids are so thrilled to have your attention and focus that they won’t judge if you pronounce something incorrectly.  In fact, I bet that the more silly voices you do the more they will love it.

I plan to continue to talk about reading and the benefits of reading with kids in this blog. If there is something that you would like to know more about or if you have suggestions for me please let me know in the comments below.  I would love to hear from you.

Erin

Library Love – Part One

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Library Love Part One

Here in the Pacific Northwest it’s the time of year where the weather gets a little drizzly and we find ourselves seeking out indoor entertainment on those really rainy days.  That is where our deep love and appreciation of the library comes in.  Here are some of our favorite books about libraries.

The Boy Who Was Raised by Librairians The Boy Who Was Raised by Librarians –  Carla Morris has created such a sweet story about a little boy named Melvin, who visits his library frequently and his three librarians help him learn all there is to know about all of his changing interests.  This story places a true emphasis on what a fantastic librarian, or in Melvins’ case a team of fantastic librarians, can do to support a young mind.  They show him books, websites, and a general interest in everything that Melvin wants to know about.  Such a great story, the ending is fabulous, you going to have to check it to see what happens to Melvin.

Check out this link to a YouTube video.

<a href=A Library Book for Bear (Bear and Mouse) – This is an incredibly cute book, by Bonny Becker, about a bear who is convinced that he already has enough books at home, he is convinced by his pal Mouse to go to the library and although he is one picky bear when it comes to his literature choices, he has a most enjoyable time.

If you want to know more about Bear, he is a very interesting character, read his most recent interview with a certain Mr. Pig from The Little Crooked Cottage.  Mr. Pig ask some very thought-provoking questions you might have been wondering about yourself.

No Pirtates Allowed Said Library LouNo Pirates Allowed Said Library Lou – Argh Matey, Rhonda Gowler Greene, has written this fantastic story about a strong-willed librarian named Lou, who can handle anything that comes her way.  This is a silly story about a pirate and his parrot too, they come to the Seebreezy Library looking for buried treasure.  Pirate Pete is not prepared for the adventure he encounters when he meets Lou the Librarian.  If your petite loves books and pirates you are in luck this book is a fantastic story.  This would be a great read for a little one who needs reminding about library behavior and manners.

Activity: It might be a fun time to make a treasure map for your little one with clues about finding a certain book, maybe even this book.
Bats at the LibraryBats at the Library (A Bat Book) – I’ve written about this lovely book before, Brian Lies has written this amazing story about a colony of bats that has quite the fabulous evening at the library.  What my girls love about this book is that the bats just can’t wait to get into the library and enjoy their time reading books and exploring.  This book is so much fun, we have had some great conversations about what the bats might look forward to the most, and what would happen if the library was open every night.  My favorite is when we talk about what book we would jump into like the bats.  The illustrations make this book so special, Brian Lies is a new favorite author in our house.

Activity: Brian Lies has this awesome bat story activity: http://www.brianlies.com/Activities/activities_fold_a_bat.html this is an incredibly cute activity where your petite to color a bat and talk about their favorite book, or make a whole garland of bats with their favorite books.

 

Stay tuned for the next installment of Library Love!

Library Love Part Two