carry home dollhouse

Welcome to the dollhouse of your dreams!  You've got four amiable roommates who all share one stylish wardrobe and go shopping together at the farmer's market every weekend, always coming home with ingredients to make a flaky fruit pie.  Or occasionally, a buttermilk chess pie.

Your new digs consist of patterns and prettiness everywhere you look, with adorable surprises under every flap.  You're dreaming...or are you?  This lovely plush dollhouse will have little ones happily immersed in its imaginary world.  It's a great tool for pretend play that's portable, carried from room to room in the house and toted out and about during mornings at the cafĂ© with mom or on long road trips in the car.

What stories will your little one come up with about the girls who call this unbelievable dollhouse their home?  Here's the beginning of a story told by Avery.

Lulu and Her Teddy Bear  (She named the doll with pink hair "Lulu.")

"Lulu wanted to make a pie once.  And eat it with her teddy bear with some tea.  She had to get the ingredients that she needed to make a pie.  It was going to be a apple pie.  So she got the apples and then she had all the ingredients at home in the pantry that she buyed a long time ago.  She always wanted to make a apple pie..."

Anyone want to imagine what happened next?  Let's just say it was a happy ending.

Thank you to The Land of Nod for sending us the dollhouse for this post.

the skunk

The Skunk is a comical story written by Mac Barnett and illustrated by Patrick McDonnell.  What would you do if a skunk showed up on your doorstep?  And kept following you around, step by step, turn by turn?  Why, you would run away from it in a mad dash around town, right?  Barnett presents us with an interesting quandary--what are this skunk's intentions, really?

McDonnell uses a sparse color palette reminiscent of vintage picture books, then cleverly expands the palette to signify a turn of events.  Both young and old will look at each other in wonder about the intriguing ending.  A good amount of discussion will undoubtedly ensue after reading this well-crafted tale.  One question--will the sequel to this book be written from the skunk's perspective? 

Thanks to Mac Barnett for sending us a copy of The Skunk.

my neighbor is a dog

Another sensation by Isabel Minhós Martins and Madalena Matoso of Planeta Tangerina is My Neighbor is a Dog, a hilarious and zany story about a dog that moves into an apartment building (which looks almost Le Corbusier-inspired), and how his human neighbors react to his arrival.  Matoso uses a quirky color palette of red, blue, pink and white and her charming and graphic style make the illustrations feel musical and animated.  The take-home message of this book?  Don’t judge a book by its cover, even if it’s furry and has four legs. 

Another amazing book by the same duo, When I Was Born, can be found in this post.

when i was born

"When I was born

I didn’t know what the sea was.

I didn’t know that there were forests

and a world with mountains and beaches."

Avery recently asked if she didn’t know anything when she was a baby, so I thought that question was a perfect segue to this book.  Written by author Isabel Minhós Martins and illustrated by illustrator/graphic designer Madalena Matoso, When I Was Born is a beautiful and poignant book about what it's like to be a child and experience the world for the first time.  I am in love with Madalena Matoso's bold and graphic style, and the vibrant color palette she uses to give the book a lively and playful feel.

It gives children an idea of what's it like to grow up and how much you see, hear, smell, touch, taste and learn as a baby and then as a child.  Most importantly, it gets children wondering about what they were like when they were younger, realizing how much they've changed, how much they can do on their own now that they're older, and how much they're loved.  It reminds us the importance and magic of first experiences and milestones.  This book is a must-have!

You can read more about Planeta Tangerina, a publishing house and a design studio in Carcavelos, Portugal, specializing in communication design for children and young people, co-founded by Isabel Minhós Martins and Madalena Matoso, along with two other friends.  I hope their entire incredible collection of books eventually makes its way to the U.S.!

Also, check out this lovely, lovely baby shower on The Indigo Bunting a few years back (her post might have been how I first heard about this book).