Time to pack up for the beach house, load up the duffels for camp and generally slow down the pace for summer. Time to play and imagine. That’s the really important work of childhood, in case you haven’t noticed. And in today’s world, as we read the daily newspapers, “The world is too much with us; late and soon,” to quote the poet, William Wordsworth.

So, The Snuggery will take its hiatus for July and August with postings from our Archive for that period. And while we look forward to opening our farm stand to the hungry hordes of people eager for homegrown “farm to table” fruits and veggies, I hope YOU will continue to fill the souls and minds of your young ones with books that are every bit as important as what you feed their sturdy bodies. By that I mean books that inspire them to dream, pretend, learn and even languish on dreamily hot summer days as they turn the pages, either with you or alone, of a pile of great picture books. They’re out there in abundance. And while you’re packing up, don’t forget the “classic” reads – what I love to call, “the essentials.” And by that I mean folk tales, fairy tales, Mother Goose rhymes, and fables. A good place to start might be all the Caldecott winners plus Honor books from 1938 – 2014 noting the best picture books of the year, selected by the American Library Association’s Children’s Division.

I’ve provided a link at the bottom for its listings to look at the next time you’re searching for titles. But may I also say, don’t become a slave to “expert lists”! You parents are the ones who know just what tickles your children’s book fancy. And it may just be an obscure or silly title that is the portal to everything beyond. It may just be their “comfort” book that is the calm in the eye of childhood storms. These too are wonderful titles!

Open a book and fall into it this summer with your children, as the door opens to another chance to read the hours away with picture books to stir their imaginations to worlds away. When you think about it, it’s STILL relatively the most inexpensive type of entertainment for your children, (still more inexpensive than, say a movie, in most cases) with the added bonus of giving them something that will provide them with the sustained attention span essential for learning!

So, as we like to say at our farm stand, quoting mother bunny’s last line to her child in Margaret Wise Brown’s classic, The Runaway Bunny, “Have a carrot!” And Happy Summer from The Snuggery!

Liz Shanks

http://www.ala.org/alsc/awardsgrants/bookmedia/caldecottmedal/caldecotthonors/caldecottmedal