reading – Picture Book Dragons

Inspector Penguin Investigates by Eoin McLaughlin

Posted on July 4, 2022 by Siobhan

Inspector Penguin Investigates: A Penguin with a nose for fishy goings on

You know the frustrating feeling when a book you expected to love lets you down? I’ve recently had the opposite experience when a book which I had zero expectations for proved a smash hit with my children.

I bought Inspector Penguin Investigates by Eoin McLaughlin and Ross Collins in a hurry when the cashier at Blackwells pointed out I was one book off getting a 3 for 2 deal after the children chose a picture book each, and if you’re going to grab a picture book from a table, then the one with a penguin dressed in the manner of Sherlock Holmes is an obvious choice. They both agreed that it should be their bedtime story that night instead of the books they chose themselves, and they’ve been asking for it as their bedtime story with an alarmingly high frequency ever since. I can even tell when their father is reading it as their bedtime story from the squeals and giggles that come out of them.

Inspector Penguin Investigates opens with the disappearance of the Diamond del Mondo from Baron von Buffetworth’s top secret and completely secure mega safe in an impenetrable castle. A detective is called in to investigate, and even though the penguin who arrives at the door doesn’t look like an inspector at first, they provide him with a hat and a magnifying glass and tell him to go off and find some clues. Inspector Penguin isn’t very good at finding clues, but he does have a finely-honed talent for finding fish while the young readers spot a series of clues which lead to the culprit on each page. Remarkably enough, Inspector Penguin does solve the crime at the end of the book, but who’s to say whether that’s because we’ve underestimated his talents, Columbo style, or whether it’s because there’s a large barrel of fish near the final clue.

Inspector Penguin Investigates is an uproariously funny book to read with young children, especially those who fancy themselves as great detectives. It’s great fun to appear absolutely baffled about what’s happened to the diamond, and the children take great pride in pointing out all the clues their silly parents have missed and explaining how the crime went down. I’m excited to check out Eoin McLaughlin’s other books, The Case of the Missing Cake and Secret Agent Elephant.

Funny Stories

I Am An Artist by Marta Altés

Posted on July 1, 2022 by Siobhan

Marta Altes I Am An Artist Book Cover against a colorful rug. The cover shows a small boy surrounded by paint which has splashed on the floor, while crayons lie all around. His pet cat looks at a drop of paint which is about to fall from his brush while the boy looks proudly at the title I AM AN ARTIST that he appears to have painted on the wall. — The perfect book for a little artist who likes to scribble on walls!

Kids who push boundaries are challenging for parents, but they make for the most joyous picture books. One of my absolute favourites is I Am An Artist by Marta Altés, which sees a little boy lament his mother’s lack of artistic vision. Where he sees himself pushing his creative boundaries, experimenting with texture, colour and form; his mother sees a little terror causing chaos. Our young hero decides that his mother must be feeling neglected by his focus on his art, and decides to create something truly special to show how much he loves her.

The first time I read I Am An Artist by Marta Altés to my daughter I was giggling too much to be able to read coherently. I know we’re not meant to use the word as parents, but it was the sheer naughtiness of the boy’s creative experiments combined with his art critic narrative analysis that got me. His calmly oblivious ponderings as his mother runs around trying to save their home from destruction. That and the look of shock and awe on my daughter’s face when she saw the final artwork. It definitely puts my own children’s experiments with wall scribblings in perspective.

If you’re looking for a picture book for a young artist, or a child with a sense of mischief, then I think this is one of the funniest picture books in the world. It’s short enough to be manageable for the most rushed bedtime, and like some of the greatest picture books, the illustrations tell as much of the story as the words themselves. Parents will especially enjoy the son’s assessments of his mother’s own artistic experiments…. The whole book is filled with wicked good humour and I wouldn’t be without it on our shelves.

A photograph of a page from I Am An Artist by Marta Altes, the young boy who has drawn an artist's moustache on his face looks on proudly at an open fridge filled with plants in pots which he has called Spring In Winter. The food from the fridge is spilled on the floor with mud from the pots. — Everything inspires this little artist! He’s just so creative…. his poor mother, and their poor cat!

Big Feelings

My Big Shouting Day by Rebecca Patterson

Posted on January 24, 2022 by Siobhan

Even the toy rabbit is getting a headache

Have you ever had a Big Shouting Day? Let’s face it, we all have at one time or another. Our youngest terror is going through a particularly shouty phase at the moment, so we’ve been reading My Big Shouting Day by Rebecca Patterson a lot in solidarity.

One morning, Bella wakes up to find her little brother Bob licking her jewellery collection, and that is the start of her Big Shouting Day. When she gets going she just can’t stop! Ballet is too itchy, her foot is sore and bed is for babies. Little upsets make for big tantrums, which are very relatable for anyone who lives with their own little terror. Fortunately, it all ends happily with a cuddle with Mummy, a nice bedtime story, and after reflecting on her feelings, Bella feels much better after a good night’s sleep.

The drop and refuse to move is a very popular technique here during big shouting days

This book is a fantastic prompt for talking about shouty tantrums and how we manage our feelings. The first time we read the book, it was a little hilarious to watch the horror and admiration on the face of our own Big Shouter when we read the book the first time. Our own terrors now talk about having had their own Big Shouting Days, and it’s always nice to remember that things will often feel better after a good night’s sleep, even if parents and carers still feel frazzled from the Big Shouting Day the next day!

Toddler tantrums are a leading caused of frazzled appearances in parents

Poetry

Reading a poem a day with kids

Posted on January 9, 2022January 9, 2022 by Siobhan

I Am The Seed That Grew The Tree: A nature poem for every day of the year edited by Fiona Waters and illustrated by Fran Preston-Gannon on a colourful rug

Happy New Year! It’s been a while since we’ve made new year’s resolutions, but this year we have one. The Terrors received I Am The Seed That Grew The Tree – A Nature Poem for Every Day of The Year edited by Fiona Walters and illustrated by Frann Preston-Gannon for Christmas from their Welsh grandfather, and we’ve been reading each day’s poem between the bedtime story and lullabies. So that’s the resolution, a poem a day for the year with the hard work done for us and all we have to do is leave the book in the right place to remind us.

So far it’s going really well and we’ve been enjoying it, and the Terrors are now quite vocal in demanding their poem at bedtime. That might be because it’s another way to eke out an extra five minutes before lights out, but we’re rolling with it. And we’re already getting some poetic criticism from the overtired terrors, in the form of, I really liked that one, or, that was really pretty, and my favourite, “IS THAT IT??? THAT WAS REALLY SHORT! IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN AT LEAST ANOTHER PAGE!!!!” (that was January by John Foster, and personally I thought it was perfectly formed…)

Hopefully reading poetry with children when they’re quite small will prevent that moment in secondary school where they’re confronted with poetry for exam purposes and panic like a horse sighting a cobra. I’ve always loved sifting for the hidden meanings in poems, but I know some people really hate that, so if they can enjoy reading the poems as they stand for now and appreciate them regardless of whether the snow they’re talking about it the kind they’d like to build a snowman in or a metaphor for the weight of possibility stretching out ahead of them then it’s fine.

We like our bedtime poems, and the book is beautiful.