A Few Creative Kids Books

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I love books. Mostly non fiction like books on health, crafts, arts & design.

And then there's kids books. When we go to the library the kids choose some... I choose some...

I get really excited if I find a book that is illustrated by an artist I love. So I was super excited when I came across "The Day No One Was Angry" by Toon Tellegen, & illustrated by Marc Boutavant. (The artist behind the TV series Mouk.)

I am greedy for these illustrations; he somehow has figured out the right dose of contrast, colour and texture; adds in his own style, design & composition and then uses this perfected illustration recipe to create amazing illustrations. 

And the stories! They are mini stories that made me excited when I started reading them. They are so creative & different. I got excited because it's not often you read something that seems quite different from everything that's already out there. The stories are strange, poetic and thought provoking. And some just downright laugh out loud weird & funny! Hearing the girls laughter at one of the weird stories where an elephant literally has an argument with himself... This is a fabulous book. 

Listen to this line:  "The earthworm's eyes flashed with sparks. The grass caught fire." Such writing is a springboard for creative thinking for children, who are able to, with their already unencumbered imaginative brains think in this wonderful way already. And when we foster that and feed it...  Joy. :)

The Day No One Was Angry

Rules of Summer is another creative thought provoking book. Poetic with awe inspiring creamy paintings. (Oil paint? I think oil paint.) Shaun Tan, a master of children's book illustrating in my eyes, has written and illustrated this book. There's a random, dreamlike 'rule' on each page. Also a little dark & spooky. 

Miss 5 thought she needed to make a book called "Rules of The Weekend" after reading it. How fun.

See? It's that kind of creativity that I like books to inspire.

Rules of Summer

And 13 words is one I read a while back, that has stuck in my mind ever since. I'm quite taken with the naive illustrations. Painterly and colourful. Thirteen words are featured in this book, and I like that "despondent" is in there along with "bird" and "dog". And "Haberdashery"! Too often we dumb it down for kids but introducing them to a few bigger less common words along with a quirky story & arty illustrations ticks the box for me.

13 Words

Do you have any quirky, creative kids books that you love? I'd love to hear about them.

Jules :)

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Keeping Creative in Everyday Life

Miss 5 has started school. If you didn't get a whiff of my excitement regarding that from my previous post! But last Wednesday was a rest day (I needed one too after a couple of days of frenzied work plus getting back into routine & school preparations).

I didn't have any big plans for the day; except for watching a movie together & visiting an arty friend who now runs the Jindivick Tavern where I have some art hanging.

We started our day by watching How To Train Your Dragon. Seen it? I personally love watching movies that are inspire me creatively. I love checking out character design (the dragons are especially good) and just watching how they move, the backgrounds, the colours. Not to mention How To Train Your Dragon is a pretty entertaining movie.

Miss 5 really got into it. She wanted to save her snack for when the main dragon Toothless ate some fish. Then after the movie she found her Toothless toy and some dolls and little wooden table tops from the dolls house to use as shields and got stuck into some pretend play.

Later we got into the car and she requested the one song from the soundtrack that we have on the iPod. Toothless dove and flew around in the backseat to the song. (She did mention that she 'needs' the characters from the movie to use in her play, as equestria dolls just don't have the same effect..)

At the Tavern, Wendy (who runs it along with her partner) gave her some paper and pencils (as she sits in there & paints, too) and Miss 5 did a drawing of Toothless.

I just loved watching the inspiration Miss 5 got from the movie evolve into imaginative play & then art. It was so fun to watch how involved she got with that unplanned theme of the day.

Kids are just naturally so creative, passionate and spontaneous. They amaze me all the time.

Jules :)