before i wake up...

In love with Britta Teckentrup’s latest.  Before I Wake Up… is about a dream that a little girl has while asleep.  In her dream, she flies through a nocturnal sky, her bed carried by a moon balloon.  She goes down to the ocean and then to a jungle, all the while with her stuffed lion by her side (who has of course, come to life).   She befriends animals on her slumberous adventure and when it’s time to return home, the moon balloon drifts her back to bed.  Britta Treckentrup’s melange of illustration and collage is exquisite and ethereal and the scenes of the story are rendered in dusky and muted tones, with a quietly luminescent and hopeful quality about them.  I'm guessing this'll be our bedtime story for this week.  What is everyone reading?

inside, outside, upside down

Another book by one of our new favorite illustrators Yasmeen Ismail—Inside, Outside, Upside Down.  It's filled with drawing activities that reinforce opposites, spatial concepts and quantity concepts (e.g., above/below, front/ back, left/right, behind/ahead, right side up/upside down, full/empty, short/long, one/many).  The word pairs are presented with drawing prompts from a variety of perspectives, in Ismail's characteristic bold and playful lines.

s is for salmon

Hannah Viano’s S Is for Salmon: A Pacific Northwest Alphabet, an alphabet book that shows off the majestic beauty and small wonders of the Pacific Northwest.  If you love her work like I do, check out my previous post about one of her other books, Arrow to Alaska.

Hannah shares about the story behind the book on her website. “The book is the offspring of a grant project funded by the Seattle office of Arts and Cultural Affairs. For that project I made a set of 26 papercut images depicting Northwest flora,fauna, and elements and used hand silkscreening to make large format display cards sets. These sets were then donated to childrens programs around the city such as libraries, schools, and community centers. I also had the pleasure of joining a few of these groups to do in-class presentations that mixed natural history, art, and active storytelling.  Now those images (with some revisions and the addition of wonderful colors) have been made into a lovely little hardbound book that everyone old and young can have and hold.”

keats's neighborhood: an ezra jack keats treasury

I never knew this wonderful anthology existed until I saw it in @ohcreativeday's Instagram feed (Thanks, Shannon!).  Keats's Neighborhood: An Ezra Jack Keats Treasury is a collection of ten of his most notable works: The Snowy Day, Whistle for Willie, A Letter to Amy, Peter’s Chair, Goggles!, Jennie’s Hat, Hi, Cat!, Apt. 3, Louie’s Search and Pet Show!  Keats’s Neighborhood also features reflections on his work and insights into Keats's life, methods and legacy from five writers and illustrators who had the privilege of calling him their friend.  An excerpt from Anita Silvey's introduction:

“With nearly two million copies in print, ‘The Snowy Day’ alone would confirm Keats’s place in the pantheon of great children’s book creators.  To have made one of the two picture-book masterpieces of the early 1960s (the other being Maurice Sendak’s ‘Where the Wild Things Are’) would be enough of a legacy.  But by bringing multicultural publishing to the forefront of our consciousness, Keats has influenced children’s books for four decades.  Hence his achievements proved even greater than his books.

On the fortieth anniversary of ’The Snowy Day,’ children and adults alike can celebrate this giant, Ezra Jack Keats, and his accomplishments.  Because he could think with the mind of a child, children love his books.  Because he remained true to his convictions, adults admire his artistic integrity.  With great courage and in the face of adversity, Keats took the less-traveled, more difficult road—and that has made all the difference in children’s books.”