the thank you book

I’m always on the lookout for standout picture books – gifting “good ones” is a point of pride for me (hey, if you can’t be proud of your book taste, what is the point?). A couple of years ago a sweet and gorgeously illustrated picture book about why we say “thank you” debuted: Mary Lyn Ray’s The Thank You Book, illustrated by Stephanie Graegin. At the time, I wrote a couple of words about it in my journal. I’m sharing that short review today, during this season of thanksgiving.

Perfect for fans of Margaret Wise Brown and Deborah Underwood's The Quiet Book, The Thank You Book explores the many ways of being thankful that can fill a child's day. Timely, wise, and accessible, the poetic text and tender illustrations celebrate the powerful impact gratitude can have on our lives.

Thank you isn't just for learning manners.
It's also for when something wakes a
little hum—a little happy hum—inside you
and you want to answer back.

The Thank You Book explores the many ways we can be thankful for the pleasures great and small that await us every day. Tender and poetic, it reflects on the role gratitude can play in our lives and celebrates the powerful impact it can have on us.

The Thank You Book explores themes of gratefulness, not just during November, but year-round as well. It also extolls seeing the wonder and good in every small moment and thing, and would be ideal for curious young ones, perhaps paired with Tiny, Perfect Things. Ray’s prose is lyrical, rhymes once or twice, and is meant most of all to evoke feeling (and it does!).

 

Beyond the words on the page, Graegin’s pencil and watercolor art is the focus throughout: it is very whimsical, colorful, and is meant to be pored over multiple times. On some pages the illustrations are framed in a circle, sometimes full spreads, and then there are free-floating illustrations: the variety is endearing. The book’s “characters” are a mix of animal and human, with diverse skin colors. I can’t label it anything other than adorable.

 

The small format of the picture book version is comfortable for small as well as large hands, and the pretty cover is sure to make it a favorite. The text is a good size for one-on-one reading, but not as ideal for storytimes. I personally loved the title page, which looked like it was straight out of one of my bookstagram photos. This title is available in multiple formats: picture book, padded board book, and just this fall as a bilingual board book.

 

In all, The Thank You Book is exactly what the title describes: a book about saying “thank you” – but also learning why we do that, and appreciating the world and people around us. It’s perfect for year-round reading, but perhaps especially in November, as we celebrate Thanksgiving.

 

Recommended for: little ones ages 2-5 and their adults, and fans of adorable, personified animal art.

thank you, omu!

Thanksgiving may now be past in the United States, but there’s no end date on sharing, giving thanks, and giving back. Author-illustrator Oge Mora’s debut picture book Thank You, Omu! is a gorgeous soon-to-be classic. It is perfect for year-round reading, and holiday gifting.

In this remarkable author-illustrator debut that’s perfect for fans of Last Stop on Market Street and Extra Yarn as well as for the Thanksgiving season, a generous woman is rewarded by her community.

Everyone in the neighborhood dreams of a taste of Omu’s delicious stew! One by one, they follow their noses toward the scrumptious scent. And one by one, Omu offers a portion of her meal. Soon the pot is empty. Has she been so generous that she has nothing left for herself?

Debut author-illustrator Oge Mora brings to life a heartwarming story of sharing and community in colorful cut-paper designs as luscious as Omu’s stew, with an extra serving of love. An author’s note explains that “Omu” (pronounced AH-moo) means “queen” in the Igbo language of her parents, but growing up, she used it to mean “Grandma.” This book was inspired by the strong female role models in Oge Mora’s life.

The thick red stew that Omu is making will surely be the best dinner that she has ever eaten. It smells wonderful and the taste test promises great things. However, when she sits down to read while she waits, the scent of her stew draws others to her door – first a little boy, then a police officer, then a hot dog vendor, and so on! After a day spent sharing a bowl with everyone who asks, Omu is left without any stew for her own dinner. Soon a knock on her door reveals everyone with whom she shared her meal, there this time to give, and not take.

Mora’s story is full of good cheer – generosity, hospitality, sharing food, and sharing company. It’s a simple story, but an evocative one, and it serves as a sort of modern parable. Omu’s unselfish giving prompts others not only to enjoy what they take, but also to give back themselves. It portrays an ideal, but one that is always worth sharing in hard times.

Other themes/things to love about the story: giving thanks when you can’t contribute things, making community, kindness to strangers, and a new plan or situation being even better than the old one because of a gratitude, and a full heart.

And the art! The art is *kisses fingers* fantastic. Truly classic picture book material, reminiscent of Ezra Jack Keats’ work, including perennial favorite The Snowy Day. Mora’s cut paper artwork utilizes painted and patterned paper, some clipped from books or maps. She also uses markers, acrylics, and more. It’s a mixed media wonderland. The endpapers are the city street grid rendered in blocky cut paper squares. The wafting scent of the stew is illustrated by rising steam that reaches farther and farther in the city. A mix of cut paper lettering and type make for evocative text setting – readers will know when to emphasize certain words to make the story sing. I can’t praise the art and design enough – they are truly special.

In all, Thank You, Omu! is an artful, food- and community-themed picture book with a diverse cast of characters and gorgeous, vibrant cut paper art. It belongs in every picture book collection.

Recommended for: any and every reader ages 3 and up, and especially for Thanksgiving and Christmas storytimes, though the messages of sharing and caring are necessary and important all the year long.

Interested in other food-related posts? Check out Beth Fish Reads’ Weekend Cooking!

fangsgiving

I find the picture book world vast and intimidating – do you? It seems as though at least fifty new picture books are released each week. Only the strong could survive such an onslaught (not me, I am not that hardy)! Still, I need to keep up a bit, if only so that I have new titles to recommend to friends and gift to the littles in my life. Ethan Long’s Fangsgiving is a fun monster-mash of a Thanksgiving book that will be a hit year-round, but especially during the autumn months.

It's the fourth Thursday of November, and the members of Fright Club are cooking up something spooky… a Thanksgiving feast!

But when Vlad's family arrives unexpectedly, they put their own spin on each of the dishes. Now, the rolls are as hard as headstones and the turkey has been cooked to death. Vlad loves his family, but they've made a mess of their meal!

Can this monster-filled family come together to save their feast and celebrate what the holiday is truly about?

Did you know that monsters celebrate Thanksgiving too? Vlad the vampire and his friends (a werewolf, a mummy, a ghost, and a witch!) are getting together for the holiday in Vlad’s treehouse. They’re nearly ready to sit down to eat when… Vlad’s whole vampire clan descends! Vlad’s family have their own ideas about what food looks good – from lump-kin pie with maggot meatballs to completely charred turkey. Will Vlad have a meltdown and kick out his family? In the end family and friends combine efforts to prepare and celebrate a Thanksgiving (Fangsgiving) worthy of the name.

Long’s loving mash-up of Halloween and Thanksgiving elements makes for fun, if predictable, picture book success. Fangsgiving includes themes of family vs. friends, “ruined” holiday plans, and working collaboratively to save the day. Long livens up the text with monster puns that will delight adults, while children will love the slapstick humor and seeing familiar Halloween-staple paranormal creatures in a new context. It’s not scary, though there are some gross-out food combos that will make kids scream “yuck!”

The art is a huge highlight, with appealing nighttime scenes (they’re creatures who go bump in the night, after all!) done in dark purples (graphite pencil, colored digitally), funny sequences rendered with care, and fantastic details (like skull-printed potholders) on each page. Long gives every character googly eyes – even the spider hanging from the ceiling, and this only adds to the enjoyment. With monster-ific food prep depicted on almost every page, kids should have plenty of questions and opinions to share, especially about the vampire family’s idea of cuisine.

In all, Fangsgiving is a cute, lighthearted holiday tie-in picture book that will delight readers young and old, especially at group storytimes in October and November.

Recommended for: children ages 5-7, and for classroom, library, and bookshop storytimes.

cape cod october pie

Last year I took on the job of making the pies at extended family Thanksgiving.  It went well.  I’m doing it again this year.  The problem with pie-making is that I’ll only expend that kind of energy on a ‘need to’ basis.  But knowing me, I would forget the secrets of pie dough from one year to the next.  So…I decided to host Canadian Thanksgiving this last Monday to keep my hand in.  To make life that much more interesting, I tried a NEW type of pie.  The original recipe was provided by Big A’s mother (Big A is my roommate’s boyfriend), and it says it’s from Miss Ruby’s Cornucopia.  It was a HIT.

Cape Cod October Pie

INGREDIENTS

pastry for a two-crust pie (I used this pie crust recipe)

1 1/2 cups cranberries, coarsely chopped

1 cup peeled, cored and diced apples (I added an additional 1/2 cup)

1/2 cup raisins

1/2 cup chopped walnuts

1 1/2 cups sugar

2 Tablespoons flour

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 cup cranberry juice (I’d leave this out if I made the recipe again)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

4 Tablespoons butter

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.  Line a 9-inch pie plate with pastry rolled to 1/8-inch thickness, set aside.

Toss together the cranberries, apples, raisins and walnuts with the sugar, flour, cinnamon, cranberry juice and vanilla in a medium-sized bowl.  Spoon carefully into the unbaked pie shell and dot with butter.  Cut strips from remaining pie crust (which can be rolled a tad thicker than the bottom for ease) and make a lattice over the top of the pie.  Crimp together the edges of lattice and bottom crust.  Sprinkle lightly with sugar if desired.  Bake for 40 minutes, or until fruits are tender and pastry is brown.  Let cool for at least 10 minutes before serving.

I noted above that I’d leave out the cranberry juice if I made the pie again – and that’s because there was a lot of liquid in the fruit mixture even after baking.  It didn’t seem to affect anyone’s enjoyment – it was gone before I could even get a piece.  I’d say Cape Cod October Pie was a smashing success.  Besides, it’s so pretty!  Although clearly I am not the world's most expert lattice maker.  Whatever.

Recommended for: a flavorful and unusual pie at any party that requires an autumnal crowd-pleaser.

Interested in other food-related posts?  Check out Beth Fish Reads’ Weekend Cooking.

thanksgiving food fest

First off, Happy Thanksgiving! I know it’s a US holiday, but it doesn’t hurt to count up your blessings every once in a while, regardless of your particular nationality. This year I’m thankful for family, friends, a job (part-time), a job interview (in December, for a full-time position!), health, the wonderful blogging community and for God’s remarkable provision.

Of course, a lot of Thanksgiving ‘on the ground’ is about the food. I LOVE the neurotic mess that is Thanksgiving cooking. That’s probably a huge failing in my character, but I think it’s okay to be cranky and gourmet and ridiculous in the kitchen for this one day. After all, what else is the family going to fight about?

And one of my favorite (and surprisingly simple) Thanksgiving foods is Peach Potato Puffs. I usually make them myself, in a triple batch, and they’re often the first dish finished on the buffet. This year my mother did them, but I fully intend to take back the recipe next year. In the meantime, enjoy – it goes extremely well with ham, too!

Peach Potato Puffs

INGREDIENTS

2 cups mashed sweet potatoes (oven bake 4 fresh sweet potatoes, then peel skins when cool)

1 teaspoon lemon juice

2 tablespoons brown sugar

¼ teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons butter or margarine

6 canned peach halves

dash of cloves and cinnamon

DIRECTIONS

Combine sweet potatoes, lemon juice, salt, dash of cloves, cinnamon and butter; whip all ingredients until fluffy. Arrange peaches in greased 10 x 6 x 2-inch pan. Add potato mixture to top; dot with butter. Bake at 400˚F for 20 minutes. Serves 6.