little library project

I picked up this little freebie booklet at our local library. It has 100 tiny pictures of new children's book covers. It was the weekend, we were bored...so we did this...even Papa joined in.

I love children's literature. The illustrations for Japanese children's literature is especially phenomenal. A lot of the titles here are books or characters whose books we have read and that just makes it even more fun.

Step 1: Help tiny hands cut out tiny square book covers. These will be used as the tiny library book covers and book pages. We didn't cut out all 100. The pages were printed on both sides so we had to choose which book "pages" we wanted to use, although I have more than 1 of these little booklets.

Step 2: Measure and draw rectangles onto construction paper. I think ours were about 2 inches x 4 inches. And each book used 3 rectangles.

Step 3: Help tiny hands cut out rectangles. (Step 3.5: Finish cutting them out when child gets lazy.)

Step 4: Assemble tiny books by lining up rectangles and stapling down the center.

Step 5: Choose book cover pictures and glue to the front of little books. This may be important or not. If you will make up stories to write inside or tell verbally, the cover may or may not determine the characters involved or the topic of the book. Have fun with this! Our covers ended up being either favorite book characters or random. Papa had the idea of making books of different subjects. In that case sort the images you have into categories and choose an appropriate cover. Or draw one!

Step 6: Glue in your page images! This can be done however you want. After covers were glued we each worked on the pages for different books. Each of us had a different way of choosing our pages and we all had fun.

Step 7: Write your story! Creative reign here.

Step 8: Invite doll friends and animals to their new library! Have a storytime! (The above book is a funny character, its called "Daruma-san ga")

bobei's doll Rose is the current owner of this library but it is often shared with the Carebears and Minnie. I still need to fashion a little cardboard bookcase to hold them. Oh! Papa also wrote a copyright on the back and had bobei sign some of them. You could also create a library card for the back page where little hands could stamp them in or out of circulation. Oh! I should have done that!!

why?

Did I cut my hair? We came back from Florida, my hair was below my shoulder blades, Japan was a furnace and I chopped my hair off. I took this picture the day after the initial cut. Really, it was all a mistake. The guy was cutting layers into my hair that were too short, already the length you see above and the shoulder length hair I was going for was looking pretty yuck. I have hence decided, with the approval of husband, that I will no longer do this. Its another pattern of repeated behavior that always ends with the same result...WHY?

I got a little adventurous this summer and started cutting up shirts and sewing different things. This shirt I cut right down the middle. For some reason this shirt has not stopped shrinking and continues to shrink every time I wash it. I liked wearing it this way, but unfortunately it continued to shrink and I don't think will fit around my arms anymore. More why?