When I woke up this morning, this is the view that greeted me from my window. Pretty picturesque, huh? The snow is still gently falling, and it's definitely a hot chocolate kind of morning. My only wish would have been for this snow to have been here for Christmas. Something about my New England upbringing makes me long for a White Christmas. At least the snow is here now, but snow also means shoveling and plowing- ick! In fact, the thing that roused me from my sleep this morning was the signature clang and crash of the city's plow trucks. That sound reminded me of the snow-themed bedtime story time Eila and her dad and I shared the other night (in honor of the 8 or so inches of snow we got then!).
The thing is, we have an awful lot of books, and sometimes I forget about some of them - until it's time to pull together a themed story time, that is. You see, I worked at Borders Books, Music, and Cafe for 13 years before they declared bankruptcy and closed, and one of my primary jobs was coordinating the parties and story times in the children's section. When you combine that experience with my rather detail oriented nature, what you get is themed story times at home, too.
Despite the fact that Eila is only 21 months old, I found myself asking if she could say the word, "onomatopoeia," and trying to explain to her what an onomatopoeia is. She got into it when her dad and I started making "smash" and "plop" sounds to illustrate. And, for the record, she did a pretty good job sounding out "onomatopoeia," too!
One of the stories we read was Snow Sounds: An Onomatopoeic Story by David A. Johnson (ISBN 9780018473100).
The thing is, we have an awful lot of books, and sometimes I forget about some of them - until it's time to pull together a themed story time, that is. You see, I worked at Borders Books, Music, and Cafe for 13 years before they declared bankruptcy and closed, and one of my primary jobs was coordinating the parties and story times in the children's section. When you combine that experience with my rather detail oriented nature, what you get is themed story times at home, too.
Despite the fact that Eila is only 21 months old, I found myself asking if she could say the word, "onomatopoeia," and trying to explain to her what an onomatopoeia is. She got into it when her dad and I started making "smash" and "plop" sounds to illustrate. And, for the record, she did a pretty good job sounding out "onomatopoeia," too!
One of the stories we read was Snow Sounds: An Onomatopoeic Story by David A. Johnson (ISBN 9780018473100).
This is a really beautiful story, brief in words, and told exclusively through onomatopoetic words and beautiful illustrations that capture the sounds of the snow as it falls, piles up, and is plowed and shoveled.
Anyway, I'm off to go read this story to Eila again and go play. I'll probably put a German pancake in the oven and snuggle in to enjoy the day with my family.