Little Lost Lamb

This is a picture of Smudge, my brother's stuffed-animal lamb that my mom bought at the PA Relief Sale years ago and dyed black (as well as the wool would take the dye). Smudge was based upon Little Lost Lamb, by Golden MacDonald (a.k.a. Margaret Wise Brown), illustrated by Leonard Wisegard. The link is to the Japanese edition.

When my mom misplaced her copy of Little Lost Lamb after moving across the country, I searched for a reasonably priced copy for her and ordered it. However, it went missing when I went on vacation, despite the vacation hold notice. I did all I could to locate the package, and even though the post office was sure it had gone back to the sender, the tracking information indicated that there was a good chance it was still in Seattle. Several days ago, our new postal carrier presented me with the package, which the previous mail carrier had tucked away in his truck during my vacation. Thus far, USPS has always given me a happy ending.

Even if you've never read the book, you know the story:

"High in the mountains where the green grass ends and the snow begins, the shepherd was singing.

Below him in the green grass huddled the sheep-- a great gray moving field of young lambs with their mothers. And in all that soft flock of moving gray was one little black smudge.

It was the black sheep born in every flock. A sweet little black lamb kicking up his stiff young legs-- leaping with the gray lambs in the small dances of baby animals."

The little black sheep goes wandering off, but,

"For all the the little black sheep cared, it was the sheep and the shepherd who were lost."

The shepherd boy must bring the sheep home, but a storm comes on, and the shepherd goes back out to look for his lost sheep. He finds the sheep, who never knew he was lost to begin with. The shepherd sings,

"Oh, wind, blow softly over my sheep
Away from the lion
And over the lamb
Blow softly.

Over the grasses
And pointed flowers
Blow softly.

Oh, wind, blow softly out of the blue
Over the white
And the black sheep too.
Blow softly."

That is the story of Little Lost Lamb, by Golden MacDonald. In many ways, it is the story of my youngest brother, too, who died on August 8, 2003. I think of him often. This anniversary did not sting like the others. I will always feel his loss, but it's not as sharp as it was the first seven years.

Note to readers: Sometimes people contact me to ask if I will scan for them the pages of an out-of-print book I own. For liability reasons, I cannot honor those requests. If you're looking for a particular copy of an out-of-print book, I will do my best to look with you.

Unnecessary Children's Book Sequels That Never Were: a Contest

The Contest is now closed. Stay tuned for the results, including contest winners, Minh Le's illustrations of the winning entries, and more.



When Millions of Cats was published in 1928, no one, least of all Wanda Gag, could have predicted how successful the story of an elderly couple in need of a feline companion would be. It became the 1929 recipient of the Newbery Honor award, and decades later, the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award in 1958. Gag posthumously won the 1977 Kerlan award for the body of her work, but that award did not include the ill-fated sequel to Millions of Cats, the recently discovered Millions of Rats:


Graphic modified by Minh Le

The book cover, as well as snippets of the proposed manuscript, came from the vaults of Garrulous MacKenzie, hapless editor of Sharper and Crow (whose collection of Children’s Books That Never Were may be found here and here). Notes from the editor read along the lines of “Millions of cats swarming over the countryside and gobbling up each other is wildly amusing. The idea of millions of rats doing the same thing makes my skin crawl.”

Minh Le of Bottom Shelf Books and I thought about some of wonderful picture-books we enjoyed that were followed by unnecessary sequels. such as Esphyr Slobodkina's Caps for Sale followed by Circus Caps for Sale, formerly known as Pezzo the Peddler and the Circus Elephant. We acknowledged that there were probably far more unnecessary movie sequels (i.e. Weekend at Bernies II). Then, we decided to host a children's book sequels contest that would call upon the creativity of our readers.

Between April 1—10, we invite you to submit your book titles and 2-3 sentence synopsizes to the Unnecessary Children’s Book Sequels That Never Were contest. For simplicity's sake, the books should be either picture books or early readers such as the "I Can Read" books. While Minh and I will have a say in terms of which entries we like best, we will have judges determine the winners in order to avoid even the hint of favoritism. The judges are Phil of Pilcrow and Melangell of Pipers at the Gate of Dawn.



The three prizes are a small painting of a random robot by Minh Le, a "butterfly herder" doll (i.e. "action figure") created by Farida Dowler, and a gently used DVD copy of Jim Henson's The Storyteller, series one. The first, second and third place winners get to choose their prizes based on their order. These winners will also have their submissions illustrated by Minh Le. All entries will grouped together in a blog post with links to your blogs if you have them.

Here are the rules:

1. You may submit entries as many times as you like before midnight on April 10, Eastern Standard Time.

2. You may submit your entries in the comments of this post, or if you want to keep your entries secret until after the contest, you’re welcome to send them directly to saintsandspinners [at] gmail [dot] com.

3. Immediate family members (Minh's and Farida's spouses and siblings) are welcome to submit entries; however, they will not be eligible for prizes.

4. You do not have to be an active blogger in order to participate. However, we ask that you be at least an active reader of blogs and have a viable commenter profile.

5. Please have a means for us to contact you so that we can get your prizes to you, should you win.

6. At the risk of fettering your wild and wonderful creativity, please refrain from overtly lewd and offensive submissions. This is a different contest altogether.

After the contest closes, the judges will have the weekend of April 11-12 to decide upon the top three entries. Then, Minh Le will illustrate them, and after he's done, we will post the winners and the rest of the entries.

By the way, Millions of Rats is an April Fool's joke. The contest itself is on for real!

Song of the Week: Hey Little Red Bird

Dan Zanes is returning to Seattle, and once more, we're going to see him. Last year, it was as much fun watching Lucia dance with the other children as it was to listen to the music taking place on-stage. In honor of the concert, this Song of the Week is an original composition by Dan Zanes called "Hey Little Red Bird." The song is in the key of F, and silly man, Zanes has the chords actually written out in the key of F. That's all very well for violinists (like Philip the Pun) and cellists (like my cousin), but what guitarist likes to play in the key of F unless s/he has nimble fingers for all of those barred chords? Lady K might be up for it, but not I! So, I have transposed the song to the key of E. Slap a capo on the first fret, and you're good to go. The "B" chord is now a B7. It sounds jazzy that way, and if you do an alternating bass line (move your middle finger from the 5th string to the 6th string, same fret), you'll evoke the sound of the tuba harmony.


Click on the image to enlarge it

Speaking of red birds, do you know The Lion and the Little Red Bird, by Eliza Klevin? It's a good storytime selection for when you want to show how people can be friends even when they don't speak each other's languages.

Chew before you swallow

Jules and Adrienne are having a conversation about slightly demented picture-books over at Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast. Go read! Add your own favorites. Oh, and here is a cautionary tale about one of my favorite SDPB that didn't get scanned before being read to children, called Don't Call Me Little Bunny, by Gregoire Solotareff. I got a kick out it as an adult, but it's definitely never made the cut as a storytime feature.

Fairies and Luncheon Baskets

Root children dolls from Silken Sky

Bedtime stories these days consist of the Snowdrop Fairy and the Crocus Fairy running outside to prepare the way for Lady Spring. Often, the Snowdrop Fairy and the Crocus Fairy meet up with their friends, Shy Violet, Jonquil and Grape Hyacinth. The rest of the story goes one of two ways:

1) They meet up with Iris, the Rainbow Fairy, who lets them climb the rainbow bridge and slide down the other side until it's time to go home for supper and bed

2) A picnic with long descriptions of what they ate followed by going home to bed

I do not deny that The Story of the Root Children by Sibylle von Olfershas played a large role in these stories that Lucia requests. By the way, Lucia was looking at the pictures one day, and asked, "Why are the Root Children all blonde?"

"That's a good question," I replied. "I think it's because the author was German." (To be exact, she was East Prussian.)


As far as the second item, it's obvious what influences my food descriptions. I am indebted to The Wind in the Willows, by Kenneth Graham. Notable examples:

From chapter one, a description of what's in Rat's luncheon basket

`There's cold chicken inside it,' replied the Rat briefly; `coldtonguecoldhamcoldbeefpickledgherkinssaladfrenchrolls
cresssandwichespottedmeatgingerbeerlemonadesodawater -- -- '

`O stop, stop,' cried the Mole in ecstacies: `This is too much!'

`Do you really think so?' enquired the Rat seriously. `It's only what I always take on these little excursions; and the other animals are always telling me that I'm a mean beast and cut it very fine!'

From chapter eight, a description of Toad's prison food

When the girl returned, some hours later, she carried a tray, with a cup of fragrant tea steaming on it; and a plate piled up with very hot buttered toast, cut thick, very brown on both sides, with the butter running through the holes in it in great golden drops, like honey from the honeycomb. The smell of that buttered toast simply talked to Toad, and with no uncertain voice...

From chapter nine, the contents of Rat's luncheon-basket once again

There he got out the luncheon-basket and packed a simple meal, in which, remembering the stranger's origin and preferences, he took care to include a yard of long French bread, a sausage out of which the garlic sang, some cheese which lay down and cried, and a long-necked straw-covered flask wherein lay bottled sunshine shed and garnered on far Southern slopes.

Really, it is all too much. If I had paws, I'd be waving them in ecstacies. I shall leave you with a new photo of my garden. Today, I edged the sidewalk with decorative bricks that hold up the dirt and make the garden spot look tidier. Now that there's a definite border, some of the hardy succulents can trail over the sides. With all of the digging and delving I've done to remove roots (but not root children!) from the soil, I have reasonable hopes that the shade plants will actually grow in the part of ground that has been inhospitable to my offerings in years past.


May you all have a relaxing weekend. Happy Leap Day!

The Justice League interviews Max and Pinky

Max and Pinky (of The Adventures of Max and Pinky: Superheroes, by Maxwell Caton III) have decided to apply for membership to the Justice League. Minh Le of Bottom Shelf Books has the scoop, though for some reason, Green Arrow missed out on the interview panel. However, I can just imagine what the interchange would have been like:

Green Arrow: So, what are you going to do for the little man?

Max and Pinky: We are the little men!

Green Arrow: You're a little man and a little pig, but who quibbles over the details? Right then, here you go (hands Max and Pinky fliers for the next labor rally).

Seven Tips for Satisfying Library Preschool Programs

Pictured: Chester, my storytime monkey. Every year, I'd celebrate Chester's birthday on my birthday. Every year, Chester turned 3 years old, and he baked cardamom sugar cookies for the children and their caregivers.

MotherReader would like you to submit tips related to children's books for her November 2007 Carnival of Children's Literature. I didn't have any tips specifically related to children's literature this year, so I made some new ones. Please add your own library program tips in the comments section.

Seven Tips for Satisfying Library Preschool Programs

1) Start the opening song late. Before I had a child, I was incredulous that these caregivers couldn’t get it together to bring their children to the storytime room at 10:30 am for a mere 30 minute storytime. After I had a child, I understood the reasons for the tardiness. My solution: I would pretend to start the program with a warm-up song. By the time the late-comers arrived, they thought the storytime had already begun. At 10:35, after the warm-up song, I’d make any general announcements that I needed to convey, and then start the official opening song.

2) I used to have a number of guidelines for the caregivers before I began my programs. Now, I have just one: turn cell phones and pagers off. Everything else (the rowdiness of the children, the nannies chatting away in the back, the toddler grabbing the cardboard and construction displays off the walls) is gravy. In the end, no one can truly control a child, but for thirty minutes, a grownup can control electronic noises.

3) You really don’t need a specific theme. If a unifying theme helps you prepare a storytime, that’s great, but don’t choose mediocre books just so you can read 5 books about frogs or fingernails. Choose books for their pacing, their ability to convey plot in a short amount of time, and how much you yourself enjoy the books. If you need something to unify them, there’s always “And now, for something completely different!”

4) Read your picture-books ahead of time. I cannot stress this enough. The one time you think, “Oh, I’m sure this book will be just fine” will be the one time you realize midway that the book is tedious, too long, or simply too weird for you at that juncture.

5) While some people are not comfortable with their singing voices, I prefer the storytime leader’s own natural voice, no matter how weak it may be, over playing recorded music. Whether you play an instrument or rely on your voice alone, when you lead the audience in a song, you are the one in charge. Besides, if you’re playing prerecorded music, there will always be the young toddler who persists in crawling behind you to unplug the player.

6) “Eensy Weensy Spider” often calms a fussy room. For slightly older kids, suddenly bursting into “Simon Says” will compel the room to order. I don’t know what it is about “Simon Says,” except that children don't want to be caught putting their hands on their heads if Simon didn’t Say for them to do it. The mortification is too much to bear.

7) Have a good ending song or rhyme. All flaws are forgiven with an ending that helps everyone walk out feeling good. I'm a fan of "Roly Poly" for the wee ones, and a song or poem in 3/4 time for the older ones.

A few of my favorite picture books for preschool storytimes:

Zzzing, Zzzng, Zzzng! --Phyllis Gershator
Chicken Chasing Queen of Lamar County--Janice N. Harrington (long)
Mama Don’t Allow—Thatcher Hurd
Round Trip—Ann Jonas
The Old Woman Who Lived in a Vinegar Bottle—Margaret Read MacDonald (long)
Flossie and the Fox-- Patricia McKissack
Guys From Space—Daniel Pinkwater
How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World—Marjorie Priceman
Saving Sweetness---Diane Stanley (long)
Twenty Four Robbers—Audrey Wood

Related post: Seven Tips for Successful Storytelling at Parties