Welcoming Spring with Froggy Books and Wild Experiences
This much-anticipated froggy season and this week's World Frog Day mark a time of increased appreciation for our amphibian neighbors. It's the perfect time to study frogs
outdoors
How Parks Connect Us
… and Why It Matters
Spring is in the air, and we’re pulled outdoors to wander in our favorite city parks. Ducks are dabbling; frogs are trilling; the apple trees are bursting into bloom. Everywhere, it seems, children frolic and neighbors wave. It’s been a long winter, but our cities are alive.
Doorways to the Wild and Wondrous
Today, writing about nature and outdoor play just feels as natural and right to me as breathing. All my happy memories of chasing frogs, climbing trees, and splashing in summer lakes easily inform the stories I write.
Wild Girl
WOW!*!&! I want to carry a backpack with me wherever I go, handing out a copy of this book to every person I see. I loved every daredevil, detailed, astonishing minute of reading this book. I believe you will, too.
Mind, I grew up at a time where I heard two phrases constantly: “Sit still” and “Ladies don’t roughhouse.” Roughhouse meant any kind of running, climbing, jumping, or playing in the dirt.… more
Sense of Wonder
In her book A Sense of Wonder, Rachel Carson wrote:
If I had influence with the good fairy who is supposed to preside over the christening of all children, I should ask that her gift to each child in the world be a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life, as an unfailing antidote against the boredom and disenchantments of later years, the sterile preoccupation with things that are artificial, the alienation from the sources of our strength.… more
Fresh Air: Taking Storytime Outdoors
“We could never have loved the earth so well if we had no childhood in it.” —George Eliot
In the state of Iowa, where I live, the change from winter to spring is like an on and off switch. Yet, at the end of another vortex, Spring has finally come to Iowa. Spring is a perfect time to schedule your storytime programs outdoors.… more