trees

In parts of the world, but not where I live in North Florida, plants are stretching tall in springtime.

We always appreciate trees when the leaves are new. But I think in the fall & winter, when the  full show of their

green is absent, this is a time to consider what our every day world would be like, if we lived in a land where the trees as we understood them to grow naturally, in woods, & in clumps at seepages of water, down hillsides and circling fileds, were only planted in rows.  Or if the trees weren’t there at all. Maybe you have lived without the cloaks of trees. But I have not. I grew up by a woods. My mother recited the line, “Woodman! spare that tree,” to me about the youth who was sheltered by a tree & could therefore not cut it, when he was older.

When I read children’s books about the tree woman of Kenya, Wangari Maathai, I felt that she must have loved being a little girl, & that in that time of her life, she must have loved trees.  The shade of them, the fruit of them, the branches of them.

There are several good children’s books about her. The one I currently have is from author/artist Claire A. Nivola.

Like all good books, it made me want to know more about what happened to Kenya’s trees. And about how Ms. Maathai brought them back.

So my bedside reading right now is Unbowed: a memoir by Wangari Maathai.

a funny Halloween

Is “Smell my feet”  the best greeting  a Trick-or-Treater can say at the door today?

That’s how the green-haired twins, Delia & Ophelia, want the neighborhood children to respond when they ring the bell & the door opens.

The twins are witches who are up to their britches stirring up a witchy brew of trouble in this most-inventive Halloween book.

Trick-or-Treat  SMELL MY FEET! from artist-author Lisa Desimini is a treasure.

Her collage art is a wizardry of the highest order.

I was so unhappy when this beloved book wasn’t in our box of Halloween that we unpacked at the beginning of the month.  Then last night, like a work of magic, I found it in a pile of great items in a box in my office – just in time for Halloween.

a little help from some friends

Here are 3 places to go when you need a quick pick-up in your writing world.

www.goodreads.com

www.write4kids.com

www.writeonline.com

I’ll have more next time, but these will keep you busy for now.

This is in birthday celebration.  It’s one year for bookseedstudio here online!

Books for the Boo!

We keep creepy Halloween in a box 11 months out of the year.

Come October, the ghosties & ghoulies, black cats & bats

are let out of the box.

We hammer tombstones into the yard dirt & place home-made pumpkins

of paper around the living room.

My daughter puts read-aloud Halloween books on a low  table.

And she & her father stuff & dress a scarecrow who guards our yard. We will all

carve the pumpkin closer to the big evening.

What are your favorite Halloween titles? Once you read some of ours, these may become a grand part of

your Halloween bookshelf:

SIX CREEPY SHEEP by Judith Ross Enderle & Stephanie Gordon Tessler, with illustrations from John O’Brien

BAT JAMBOREE by Kathi Appelt, with illustrations by Melissa Sweet

THE LITTLE SCARECROW BOY by Margaret Wise Brown (yes, MWB herself, without a bunny in sight) and brought to a delightful modern art interpretation by David Diaz.

Trick or Treat (I want it to be Treat) to You & Yours

september’s garden 2

In the bottom of hurricane season, we check in the morning at the base of our grandmother oak, to see if overnight, something seasonal has arrived.

They are on single tall stalks, like red, curled lollipops.

No leaves, just the long drink of a stem. They bloom once & then are gone for another year.  Hurricane lillies.

& randomly, when you least expect it along your walk, they pop up.

In years when we often take in the lawn chairs in late summer & fall, in advance of tropical storms & hurricanes, I think of them as nature’s red flags. Enjoy!

september’s garden

“Flowers are blooming all over the place… “ the character Lydia Grace, in  The Gardener,

by Sarah Stewart with illustrations by David Small, 1997

“… It is that rarity, a pictorial delight that in 20 double pages gives more and more of itself each time it’s read, and whose silent complexities reveal themselves with continuing pleasure.”  Edward Koren/The New York Times Book Review

My gardening pal Ann gifted me with The Gardener ages ago & it’s now part of my late summer ritual, to pull it down from the shelf near my Frost poetry books & enjoy Frost the farmer & then, the character Lydia Grace’s gardening skills in David Small’s artwork & Sarah Stewart’s inventive series of letters. Late summer is the time when I give my vest-pocket patch an imaginary rainbow-ribbon, for its color mix.

The flowers here, shrimp plant, brown-eyed Susan & blue something that I have to ask Ann about the name, grow in my  September garden in the back yard, a flutter of petals and juicy dirt lined with fallen live oak tree limbs that bear the otherwise aboreal resurrection fern…

I like to write outdoors by the garden with a pencil & pad. Then take inside what has taken off on paper & get that into the computer.

signs

I am enjoying  The Signmaker’s Assistant, which carries with it a whimsical, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs (Cloudy is soon to be in a theater near you) sensiblilty that I like.  More on Signmaker in a second.

This story sends me into my library, to look up at a message high on the wall above the window. The message is in black paint, on wood. It’s a sign.

I grew up with this sign &  I think you can guess that I love it.

Among the houses of pals & family folks I visited in childhood, ours was the only house with a sign in it.

It was given to me by my father, who had been a drill sgt. in the U.S. Army. This sign was made for him by a solider. Dad was good at making the guys write their letters home, in the Writing Room.  I love the uneven sides sawed for the sign and the big block letters. I can imagine him walking through the room where it hung at Fort Dix, N.J., making sure the boys had paper and pencils. The sign later hung over a family desk during my childhood. When it became clear I liked writing, my Dad promised it to me.  I can write when I’m not near it. But I have also looked up at it when stuck & found something in it that helped me forge on.

These days, I find  something stuck above it at the top, red words on white paper  - a Florida sign in the form of a bumper sticker.  Every so often here in the Sunshine State some of us think perhaps a fella named Skink should enliven election coverage by campaigning for Governor of Florida.

Skink is the nickname of  a character  Carl Hiaasen created, a rascal who is a book-toting, wilderness-camping, former Florida governor, living out of a station wagon in the cypress swamps of South Florida. The paper sign says “Re-elect SKINK for Governor.”

Both signs are totems in my writing world.

THE SIGNMAKER’S ASSISTANT

Nathan is the young character in The Signmaker’s Assistant by Tedd Arnold who discovers the power of words when he goes beyond his little job cleaning paint brushes for the town signmaker. Nathan posts a few signs around the village that any child would applaud. But are these the kinds of signs that will help the town run smoothly?

I lucked into this book – signed by the talented illustrator-author – in a small art gallery gift shop in North Florida when my husband & I visited it on a recent weekend. Tedd Arnold is the 2006 Theodor Seuss Geisel Honor Book Winner for Hi! Fly Guy. He also won the 2007 Edgar for RAT LIFE, a Young Adult novel & it was his very 1st novel, after publishing more than 50 successful picture books, which keep on dancing out of his studio in New York State.  The p.b. title in his line up that intrigues me most from the title, is Catalina Magdalena Hoopensteiner Wallendiner Hogan Logan Bogan Was Her Name. Makes me think of Double Trouble in Walla Walla from Andrew Clements with pictures by Salvatore Murdocca.

For more on Tedd Arnold,  sign-maker, book-maker, word-slinger:

http://www.teddarnoldbooks.com

Chickees

Inspection

The office assistant weighs in on a summer project, experimenting with different materials for miniature chickees.

Palmistry

First readers looked like this

Is this shape a little Kindle-like?

This is a Horn Book.  The kind before we had today’s The Horn Book .

Horn Books were available to learners, especially children (usually boys) who were able to  sit with a teacher,  in the Colonies, especially Massachusetts, New York, Connectitcut, Rhode Island, New Jersey & Pennsylvania, of Great Britain (later the U.S.A)

This Horn Book is for a wealthy family, crafted of silver and ivory & it most likely was made in England.

It is one of many treasures in the Children’s Literature Center of the Library of Congress, where the Chief, Dr. Sybille A.  Jagusch, is herself another treasure for you to discover there.

www.loc.gov/rr/child

Follow the Library of Congress on twitter http://twitter.com/libraryccongress

c. 2009 Jan Godown Annino at the Library of Congress

One of Charlotte’s Daughters

The well-fed spider

is a constant reader

when she’s not

browsing the Web

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Lichgate labyrinth

Lichgate Labyrinth

As The Wizard

didn’t give to The Tin Man

anything

“that he didn’t didn’t already have”

a labyrinth arriving at a site

such as Lichgate on High Road

becomes a natural tapestry

illuminating the precious pathways

Laura Pauline Jepsen found

when she first

climbed over the barbed wire fence

into her precious world

A Lichgate labyrinth

will beckon travelers

to discover

the peace of mind

already here

It will beckon travelers

to explore

the spirit

deep within

the one who travels

And as our area glows with

more and more labyrinths

we can become known

as a “city of turns”

much as holy cities have

long been called, for their

spiritual spiral walking paths

image for illustration idea only

source  www.jhu.edu/~chaplain/labyrinth.gif

For information on labyrinths worldwide begin with

Veriditas  http://veriditas.org  or  The Labyrinth Society http://labyrinthsociety.org

Florida garnet and gold

Found in the neighborhood, earlier this week, some Florida garnet & gold.

Let it not be said that The Sunshine State is without an autumn.

Thanksgiving 2008 & American Buffalo in Florida

Native Tribal People &

their heritage

receive the short

stick from our tasty national

holiday in the U.S. , Thanksgiving.

A few days before the 2008

Thanksgiving I took a detour with my

sister & we found this roadside

surprise  in Alachua County,

Florida.

It was late in the afternoon, with a cool breeze

tickling the palm fronds.

As I watched this creature clip the field

for dinner,

near U.S. Highway 27,

I thought of archival reports from

the Old West, of

the thundering herds of bison that

could stampede for days,

which sustained the First Peoples

of North America.

This ranch buffalo of 2008 represents legit Florida

heritage, although the Florida bison were scant

compared to the way their cousins once blanketed the mid-West

& The West.

(Buffalo are featured in the book

SCENIC DRIVING FLORIDA, 2nd ed.

the “Crossing Creeks and Prairie” chapter,

by my own self,  Jan Godown.  The chapter guides

you to the lucky chance for your own encounter to see

(c.) Jan G. Annino 2008

buffalo in a natural setting at

Paynes Prairie State Preserve)

http://www.floridastateparks.org/paynesprairie

For a fine picture book about the adoption & care of a buffalo calf by a father and son and the restoration of the Pablo-Allard herd, please see Joseph Bruchac’s BUFFALO SONG. The author consulted oral history recorded in part in the 1920s & 1930s in Montana. A 1926 Salish tribal story is woven into this lyrical book.  I like the information on it at Oyate.org and at the blog by Debbie Reese American Indians in Children’s Literature

americanindiansinchildrensliterature.blogspot.com

To begin to understand the interesting work of Carol and Joseph Bruhac, please see

www.josephbruhac.com/

For another picture book about the woman who helped save American Buffalo, please see the story of Mary Ann Goodnight,  BUFFALO MUSIC, by

Tracey E. Fern. I like the review of it by children’s book maven Esme Raji Codell, posted  at her blogspot blog, Planet Esme.

(Look for the Oct. 14.200 blog, it’s after her review of a fine picture book bio on one of my picture book heroines, Wanda Gag, who lived for some time in the region where I grew up.)

http://planetesme.blogspot.com/2008/10/wanda-gag-girl-who-lived-to-draw.html

To fully immerse in the topic, Steven Rinella’s new book, AMERICAN BUFFALO, recently reviewed on NPR (I’m pretty sure it was an interview with the very fine Terri Gross) follows the herds in history & also one particular buffalo that the author brings down on foot in Alaska, after winning a spot in a hunt lottery,  butchers by himself & then packs out for eating later. Not for everyone who reads nature nonfiction,  but if you fish ( I have) or hunt (haven’t, wouldn’t, unless for survival) or if you enjoy the buffalo steak in the cafeteria of the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C.   this book may be for you.

Florida Christmas

A tree in CEDAR KEY

photo, Jan G. Annino  2008

A pole.

A fishing net cast over a pole.

Seashells in the net.

(Let’s hope they are castaways &

weren’t taken live.)

Colored lights.

Cheers at Christmas.

The necklace of Cedar Key islands tip-toeing into the Gulf of Mexico are where cedar forests were lumbered-out for the world’s pencils (think Faber pencils, etc.)

So I like it that the village of Cedar Key’s marina tree

isn’t using up a living one.

Muir fans know the Cedar Keys as  the region where John

Muir regained his strength after his 1,000 mile walk to

the Gulf of Mexico.  I wonder if in his knapsack on that trip he

kept his journal with the assist of a Faber cedar pencil.

Greetings from Florida &  from  Jan G. Annino, a book-published writer of  creative-nonfiction,   new writer of children’s literature, at work on an  mfa in children’s literature from Hollins University.

City

from our Amtrak window  by Anna Annino (c.)

the city, appreciated in this silver light

if you haven’t ridden a long-distance train lately, be prepared for the romance of the clackety-clack

the convenience of no seat belts & movement at will & seats that include pop-up feet rests

& a community of strangers who are the cause of the lonesome whistle sounding

our conductors were friendly & we loved seeing them carry babies down the aisle to their seats

for travel at such a crunch time – the holidays – the clackety-clack tracks were the best

Obama’s poet

A Poet and a Secretary

THE book I just devoured in celebration of Obama’s elevation to the Presidency of the United States is for children.

And it’s not one of the several handy bios of him for young readers.

It’s a picture book of  poems in several voices, by his poet, Elizabeth Alexander, of Yale, and her equally distinguished colleague, Marilyn Nelson, a much-honored creator of children’s literature.

www.wordsongpoetry.com or

http://www.wordsongpoetry.com/another_starred_review_for_mis.html

Elizabeth Alexander’s presence on the platform at this historic event shouts out that this president lauds the arts & art creators.

Already sensing that, Quincy Jones asks for support to imbed the arts in the White House with a Cabinet level secretary post. See

http://www.petitionsonline.com/esnyc/petition.html

and reach it by typing in US Secretary of Arts

Meanwhile, Poet Elizabeth Alexander will receive a wider audience because of her Jan. 20th role on the world stage.

I want you to know she is already beloved by librarians, teachers, students & many others for  MISS CRANDALL’s SCHOOL for YOUNG LADIES & LITTLE MISSES of COLOR.

This book, with illustrations by Floyd Cooper (winner of three Coretta Scott King Honor Awards) is an unforgettable visit to the true story of a Quaker woman’s dedication to her black students in New England in the 1830s.

Her determination to stand tall against local terrorists affiliated with churches, the town council & local business community makes me, “ache with caring,” to borrow a phrase of Mem Fox, about seeing this history presented to a wider audience.

If you are more interested in the present day than in history,  notes in the book mention more recent updates, including how the 1984 dedication of the Prudence Crandall Museum, was also marked in an undistinguished way by the  Connecticut KKK.

Enjoy. Weep. Share. Rejoice in the presidency of Barack Obama.

(And a palette of color to Janeen Mason

http://www.janeenmason.com,   for the petition tip.

Paint a heart for February

Make a squiggly heart, a loop de loop or pizza at

http://www.jacksonpollock.org/

(A box of colored pencils to author M.R. Street of Blue Rock Rescue fame.)

The Pulitzer-winner on Mount Soledad

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1znhk_the-wubbulous-world-of-dr-seuss_creation

Dr. Seuss is one of my favorite children’s literature icons to smile about.

This genius, who was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1984,  knew children are intelligent folks who deserved lively literature.

His advertising work called for  short, often rhyming blurbs that were also action packed &  provided a fine catalyst for his real avocation ahead. His doodles from an early age proved his hands were hot-wired to an artist’s heart.

A cool part of the Theodor Geisel book world is his very own flag. His publishing house (where  he also worked as an editor, RANDOM HOUSE) flew the Dr. Seuss flag at its Westminister, Md. warehouse, while his books were being shipped out.

For more on this national treasure, please see “Dr. Seuss from Then to Now,” A Catalogue of the Retrospective Exhibition, (organized by the San Diego Museum of Art, 1986. This catalogue/hardback book is the  source of these tantalizing facts & many more…)

www.seussville.com

March is for mammas & maidens & the Ms., Miss & Mrs. ga-zillions

It’s Women’s History Month!

http://www.redroom.event/brown-bag-lunch-talk-O

If you can’t attend this March 24 event, find a great biography of a wonderful woman to enjoy at your library.

Consider PUSH COMES to SHOVE the autobiography of Twyla Tharpe

In children’s picturebooks, have you looked at:

PLANTING the TREES of KENYA : the story of Wangari Maathai by Claire A. Nivola

(Wangari Maathai is a Nobel Peace Prize winner)

KATE SHELLEY: Bound for Legend byRobert D. San Souce with paintings by Max Ginsburg

Kate Shelley was a child who made a difference

Or check out these online ways to be immersed in women’s history:

National Women’s History Project  http://www.nwhp.org/resourcecenter/whistoryday.php

Jewish Women’s Archive  http://jwa.org

National Organization for Women  http://www.now.org

Womens’ Studies  http://userpages.umbc.edu/~korenman/wmst/index.html

the fine print: this blog & site are a work in progress, evolving monthly, thanks for your patience…

Irish imps

wee visitors for the st. pat's holiday

4-leaf clovers might be here...

StoryTubes 2009

Children reading books.

Children reading books & taped on video.

You, voting soon,  for the video that tugs your heart. The most.

I especially am drawn to the reading of  BECAUSE OF WINN-DIXIE, by Kate Dicamillo, &

the interpretation of Laura Numeroff’s IF YOU GIVE A CAT A CUPCAKE and the presentation on

KATE KLISE and … there are too, too many to highlight. Go see!

www.storytubes.info/

for information on this Bookseedstudio site, the online office of writer Jan Godown Annino,

please see Hello…or Books …Home returns you to this blog … THANKS!

Outside

this past weekend, in the woods of Florida…

c. 2009 Jan Godown Annino

… For all things wild turkey, please look for the modern classic Illumination in the Flatwoods, by Joe Hutto.

Hope you are finding time to get outside this spring if spring is already where you are, or

that you can manage time outdoors when spring arrives….

photo c. 2009 Jan Godown Annino

for your school bookshelves

Do you know the work of these  writers?  Take a peek.

Laura Purdie Salas     She has a new poetry book for kids with the word stampede! in the title.

http://www.laurasalas.com

Fiona Bayrock           She has a new science book with the phrase “bubble homes” in the title.

http://www.fionabayrock.com

Check them out at your library soon.

You have landed @ the blog of  Jan Godown Annino, a children’s writer tapping away

in her own Bookseedstudio in Florida. Please look around.

~ jga 4.4.2009

There is a p in April for?

P is for Poetry in April!

http://www.poets.org/

Read a poem ….

Pick purple or perfect or plump words & present a poem to princesses & princes you know…

~you’ve landed at the 2X a month or so,  blog of jan godown annino. more info is at Hello.

5 million minutes

Until JUNE 30 you & your family can read together for travel prizes including a FLORIDA trip.

http://www.rif.org/

You’re going to read with them anyway!  See how quickly you can reach the 5 million words read goal.

For more fun this summer,  join a Read With the Kids team.

(we  suggest Al Roker’s team  because we’ve enjoyed watching him on TV since a chance meeting in the Yorktown Heights health food shop …)

~you’ve landed at the 2X monthly or so blog of writer jan godown annino

more info is at Hello.

The r in April is for?

REMEMBER  the Sweet Children

http://www.holocaustresources.org/html

May 17 is the awards ceremony set up by the Holocaust Education Resource Council, with details at the above site, along with amazing stories of survival.

Every day is the time to read the very special “Angel on my shoulder” story of sweet Miriam, who

lives in Florida & shares the many kindnesses that brought her through Nazi brutality.

Remember the Children  HOLOCAUST REMEMBRANCE DAY

this is the blog of writer Jan Annino Godown in Florida

Eye Candy

c. Jan Godown

Havana (Florida) 2009. The sweet view inside Little River General Store.

Every child should have visits to places like this in their experience, eh? Mine were in Cherryville, N.J. and also in a town in Connecticut where I would stay-over to visit a childhood pal. Until I moved to North Florida, I spent all my South Florida childhood years without a visit to such a fantabulous place. Support your regional general store!

You’ve landed at the pages & blog for Florida children’s writer Jan Godown “JG”Annino . HELLO

is my home page. Thanks for visiting.

c. Jan Godown 2009

In the Library of Congress

To visit the Children’s Literature Center online, in the Library of Congress :

www.loc.gov/rr/child

For an online visit to the Library’s Rare Book and Special Collections

www.loc.gov/rr/rarebook

Cozy in the Children's Literature Center