Library Find Friday For Children: Bear Books

I'm kind of a library junkie.  I'm also forgetful.
If I love a book and return it to the library, I'm bound to forget about it.
Thus Library Find Friday.  Where I record my finds so I won't forget.
For the sake of posterity.  And maybe a few finds for others as well.


This one we actually own, but you can get it at the library.  Yesterday my two year-old walked through the kitchen while I was making dinner saying "Oh, there's a river....can't go over it, can't go under it."
I couldn't do a bear book list without including this one.



I have no idea who brought The Moon of the Bears by Jean Craighead George home.  Since we've loved her Frightful books, I thought I'd give it a try.  It is a short chapter book and is one in a series of thirteen.  An animal for each moon.  The photographs are great and she tells fascinating information about bears and their hibernating patterns while attaching us to a mother bear.  It is non-fiction.  I think maybe next year I will include this series as part of our natural science education.



The Bears on Hemlock Mountain by Alice Dalgiesh
This is also a very short chapter book.  The writing is amazing and the story is gripping.  We couldn't put it down until we were finished.  "There are no bears on Hemlock Mountain, no bears, no bears, no bears at all."  Eight year old Jonathan says this to himself as he trudges up the hill to fetch a pot for his mother.  But when he returns home in the dark just as the snow is beginning to thaw, he is glad he has that heavy pot to hide under.



Another Celebrated Dancing Bear by Gladys Scheffrin-Falk has been a delight.  The courtesy the bears show each other, their giving friendship, and the fact that tea in a samovar is always served makes it a cozy read.  The pictures display Russian life in the time of the czars.
We had much fun drawing our own Russian skylines, listening to Russian music by Tchaikovsky, and reading another book about samovars.



We really can't leave Winnie the Pooh off the list.  The Christopher Robin Book of Verse is our latest library find.  A poem called Lines and Squares captured the kids' imaginations yesterday.

"Whenever I walk in a London street,
I'm ever so careful to watch my feet;
    And I keep in the squares,
    And the masses of bears,
Who wait at the corners all ready to eat
The sillies who tread on the lines of the street,...."

The kids used the tile kitchen floor to play lines and squares.  If they stepped on a line they had to go to the bear cave(under the table).

Snowy Books

Since the Groundhog saw his shadow today, there are still some six weeks left to enjoy snow books.

On the day it snowed here, I grabbed these books, and when the children weren't playing in the snow, they were reading and dreaming about it.

We're still reading them, though the snow is gone.

Here are five worthy reads:

1. White Snow Bright Snow
by Alvin Tresselt

Softly, gently in the secret night,
Down from the North came the quiet white.
Drifting, sifting, silent flight,
Softly, gently in the secret night.



2.  The Big Snow
by Berta and Elmer Hader


"Snow, snow, nothing but snow--and the birds and the animals of the hill were very hungry."

3.  Katy and the Big Snow
by Virginia Lee Burton


"On the way back a plane signalled for help.  The airport was snowed in.  Katy was beginning to get a little tired but she wouldn't stop....not Katy."

4.  Snowflake Bentley
by Jaqueline Briggs Martin

"Willie's mother knew he would not be happy until he could share what he had seen.
'Fussing with snow is just foolishness,' his father said.
Still, he loved his son.
When he was seventeen his parents spent their savings and bought the camera."

5.  Stopping By on a Snowy Evening
by Robert Frost, illustrated by Susan Jeffers



"The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep"....

If you've not already read these, maybe you could grab one from the library and snuggle down with your own little snow-lover!