Tag: children’s books

Hummingbirds’ Magic

I was rushing to the car – needed to be somewhere. But the little hummingbirds stopped me for just a moment yet again. We have a few of them hovering over our lovely little lavender patch in the garden. The little bright flurries of beauty never fail to enthrall me. There is at least 1 red ruby throated hummingbird and several Anna’s hummingbirds gleaming in the sunshine with their green plumage catching the light of the day in brilliant angles. 

I am eternally grateful – both for the fact that I have these little visitors and for the ability to stop and appreciate them. 

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I have now stopped trying to photograph them while they flit for I find I am barely ever able to capture them with my iPhone, and my friends are far better photographers. This way, I get to enjoy the brilliant pictures and the momentary flashes of joy unencumbered by the effort of trying to capture it. 

Able to flap their wings upto 200 times a second, they are incredible long-distance flyers too. The ruby throated hummingbirds can fly 500 miles non-stop across the Gulf of Mexico during their fall and spring migration seasons.

The hummingbirds weigh only about 3 grams and therefore the term ‘more than their weight in gold’ doesn’t mean much. What they are able to accomplish with that body weight is phenomenal. Apparently, they can consume half their body weight in pure sugars and eat upto 5-8 times an hour. 

More fascinating hummingbirds facts here:

https://nourishncherish.org/?s=hummingbird

That metabolism doesn’t come easy for the little ones are hardly ever sedentary, They take a maximum of 90 seconds per break and flit almost all day long. Gathering nectar, feeding their littles ones, building their nests, and generally making the world a more happening place. 

If hummingbirds fascinate you as much, try reading this book:

My Tiny Life by Ruby T Hummingbird – written by Paul Meisel. It is a beautiful book that captures the life of hummingbirds. The book is a Theodor Seuss Geisel Honor winner and is a lovely informative little book.

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🪺On May 15th a tiny hummingbird hatches from its egg, and thus starts our marvelous journey with the little bird as it learns to fly, mature, meet and greet its fellow humminbirds and eventually enhance the circle of life by having its own little family to nurture and nourish.

🕊By June first week, the little ones in the nest are ready to fly with their mother, in a flurry of wings, and a soaring of tips. 

“Up, down, backward, forward!” 

🪷 By the first week of July, the bird is getting territorial and fending off its fellow hummingbirds. (Pic from the book, My Tiny Life – by Paul Meisel)

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🚁 By the last week of September the birds are getting ready to migrate before they return in March, sometimes flying upto 18 hours non-stop to get back home where its journey started a year ago.

The illustrations and content is marvelous and once again, I am enamored by artists able to capture the magic of light and movement in art. (Sample pic inserted above to get a feel of the beautiful imagery in the book)

Paint the Wind

Paint the Wind – By Pam Munoz Ryan

The book starts off like most children’s books do, by taking the parents conveniently out of the way. In this one, the parents are killed off in a freak accident and the child, Maya, we meet at her paternal grandmother’s house leading a dull, orderly life in which there is no place for frivolity, laughter or joy. Her grandmother dies and the young child finally gets to see her maternal side of the family who were held in such disdain by her pat. Gran that she does not have any recollections of them.

Of course, all this is meant for us to feel for Maya and hope her life turns around and she gets to enjoy life in her time. She does. 

I don’t know why books do that. But they do. 

The book is a story of how Maya finds herself while finding the horse her mother adored a decade ago. The horse, Artemisia, is now a wild stallion who broke free from her aunt’s ranch and joined a stud stallion, Sargent, and became the leader of the herd. Some wisps of wisdom offered up here and there make the sweet story likable. 

🐎 “With horses, it’s not the biggest or oldest who is the lead. It’s the horse who has the confidence to guide the family in times of danger, who has knowledge of the land and knows the routes to safety, who is herd smart and can make alliances with other mares and keep peace. Some mares have the ability. Others don’t. Think about great human leaders. They have many of the same qualities.”

Pam Munoz Ryan – Paint the Wind

🐎 “When the horses run against the wind with their manes and tails flying, I think they look like fleeting brushstrokes of color.” 

Pam Munoz Ryan – Paint the Wind

I have never had the opportunity to photograph a field of racing horses, but I have admired them. Their power and strength seeming to include the environment around them. I remember pulling over on a whim in Iceland where a field full of Icelandic horses offered us their manes to pat. It was easily the highlight of the trip for the daughter. I hope she remembers the way her face lit up when one nuzzled up next to her. 

I have to admit I chose the book because I saw Artemisia on the blurb. That was the name my daughter wanted to name her horse who was secretly a unicorn, and only reveal itself to her. I miss the innocence of her beliefs and the determination with which she loved her book horses. She read American Horse Diaries, watched My Little Pony, though her favorite was The Secret Unicorn. 

So many little tidbits that I’d listened to with fascination when the daughter as a little girl told me came back: #horsemagic

🐎 The color of horses: Audubon (light tan) dun, bay (red-brown) 

https://horseracingsense.com/12-common-horse-colors-patterns-pictures/

🐎 The different strides and their names: trotting, canter, gallop , lope

🐎 Horsing vocabulary such as Remuda: a herd of horses on a ranch

All in all, it was a wild journey into the canyons with a little girl and her horse. We all belong on Earth and there are so many ways in which we can find that feeling. Our attraction to nature, this planet’s nature, is one of them. 

We, The People; On This, Our Earth

One evening, the son and I were milling around the kitchen making dinner. It was one of those rare evenings for no reason. Like a short pause between tides. The winter months fading and yawning before waking into energetic spring. The son was working on a school project on Egypt on the dining table while I pottered around with the onions and spices chattering of this and that. 

These are some of my favorite times. 

Finally, the curry simmering on the stove, I went and sat by him at the dining table peering into his notes for the project. 

He had done a sincere job, researching diligently and writing more notes than was required. That made me proud of him and I said so. He smiled and then it turned into a grin, and asked, “Shall we watch TV today then? Just today – you know as a gift?” The little rascal!

I threw my head back and laughed, almost ready to yield. What else was there to do? It was rainy and dark outside. School work done, just the two of us at home. But I caught myself in time. Somehow, it did not feel like a good time to zone out in front of the Television. This rare, quixotic feeling of solitude in each other’s company. So, I shook my head and said no. I saw the twinge of disappointment in his face anticipating indulgence just a moment ago, and said, “How about we read something interesting and funny out to each other?” I said pointing to The Thrifty Guide to Medieval Times – A Handbook for Time Travelers – By Jonathan W Stokes.

He agreed enthusiastically – and I loved him for it. A petulant fuss would’ve ruined the evening. This carefree acceptance of an alternate plan was amazing.

I started reading about Doctors in Medieval Europe and we both shuddered a bit. The book was written in a manner that was just enough gruesome and just enough brevity to stave off utter misery, and a good deal of humor where you least expect it. So, we had a good time rotating dismay, shock, horror and laughter in turns. 

On our recent trip to Europe, there was many a time when the mind wandered back a few centuries to Medieval Europe. While we stood there admiring the relics and artifacts saved from those truly Dark Ages, I remember thinking how we were able to passively look at the best of the Dark Ages through a museum visitor’s lens. Setting aside the utter misery of the times. Art truly did pull humankind through those times if only by a shred. 

I remember a passionate History teacher from our school days who told us about the Dark Ages, Crusades, the endless years of disease and religious warfare. As children these were disturbing. But they were also distant echoes from the past in a geography barely imaginable by school children in the South of India at the time. Many of us had never traveled past our own country or state. 

But as life went on, I understood more and more of the horrifying acts of evil that humankind is capable of: the Dark Ages become a euphemism for unspeakable things. We had heard of witch hunting but when one finds out that Pope Innocent was responsible for making it a bloody sport and sent 1000’s of innocent women to their shrieking deaths, what excuse is there really for religion or piety or righteousness?

A Handbook for Time Travelers – By Jonathan W Stokes

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Over the next few evenings, we followed a similar routine. We read about 

  • Jeanne de Clisson – the French pirate nicknamed the Lioness of Brittany, who you definitely want to steer clear of, if invited to dinner at her place.
  • The brutality of Genghis Khan – there truly are no words, though there are thousands of words written about him.
  • Marco Polo and his explorations that gave many people a breath of fresh adventure and unheard of places – a little bit of magic in their otherwise terrible lives. 
  • The ferocity of Attila the Hun
  • The deadly female fighters of the Middle Ages
    • Blance of Castile, Queen of France
    • Countess Pertonilla of Leicester
    • Nicola de la Haye
    • Empress Matilda
    • Melisende, Queen of Jerusalem
    • The Order of the Hatchet 

It sometimes takes books such as these to journey to another horrible time and space in order to appreciate what we have now. I was grateful for that. 

It also reminded me of the children’s book, Meanwhile Back on Earth . . .: Finding Our Place Through Time and Space

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  • 1000 years ago – when there was a conflict between x and y
  • 500 years ago – war between rats and zebras
  • 100 years ago – war between everyone

The history of our planet in conflict. It makes for sobering reading, but along with Oliver Jeffers’ artwork, a required reading too.

back_on_earth_2back_on_earth

“Nice to see what all we did in spite of all the fighting huh?” , said the son, pointing to his project on Egypt, and pulling me back from my thoughts. He had written about the culture, ways of life and the many achievements of the ancient Egyptian civilization, and I nodded. We truly are a species worth studying. The sheer potential for good. The very qualities of good fanning our bad:  ambition for instance. 

How do we constantly remind ourselves that we are remarkable in our creative quests, and not use it for anything destructive? But don’t they go hand-in-hand? I peered at the dancing Nataraja statue in the home symbolizing just that, and felt very humble indeed. Nothing new. We are all just discovering and learning. Just figuring out how to belong on our Earth.

The Heart As a Compass 🧭

My heart is a compass – By Deborah Marcero

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Here is a book that spoke to the very depths of the child in me. I am sure many of us have spent time with just this sort of activity, and may be not with such fantastic results to show for it. 

I distinctly remember :

 ❅ ❄️❆  Drawing snowflakes of every shape I could fathom ever since I learnt that every snowflake was different. Considering I had never seen snow, that seems like a pretty bold endeavor, but that right there is the charm of childhood and imagination. I am not sure if I would like to find those pages of doodles now – the memory of those warm afternoons is more beautiful than anything I could’ve conjured up. 

🍃🍀🍁The shapes of all the different leaves. The leaves themselves dried and carefully preserved within the pages of books. All that remains now is the memory of this precious activity and of course the inestimable happiness of afternoons spent drawing the beautiful shapes into notebooks, after the glorious wind swept mornings collecting them.

🌷🌺🪷The nosegay bouquet of wildflowers plopped into brass vases that spotted the house. How could one not look at that and remember the ladybugs clinging to the leaves, the spider webs wet with dew, the scents of eucalyptus that decades later can still send one back to the beautiful countrysides scented with the fresh rain against the eucalyptus trees?

It is always a marvel to me how our mental maps form around these seemingly innocuous objects. The raspberry bushes by the little cave, the eucalyptus trails by the deserted bridge. If only, we had the foresight to etch these into little maps like the lovely little girl in My Heart is a Compass does. What a treasure that would have been?

The book starts off with a young girl wanting to show her most precious innovative unique possession for show-and-tell. But what is it?

Could it be a trip to the stars?

Or a dive into the wonders of the ocean?

Or a marvelous hike through the enchanted forests?

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Pic from her preview on Amazon

By the end of the book, Rose wants to showcase the very best things in life for her friends to see. So she comes up with a marvelous map with the most wondrous her imagination can come up with. (Which can be the most beautiful or the most terrifying, and in this beautiful book is nothing but intriguing and promising)

I set the book down and wondered again why that beautiful feeling of childhood curiosity and the tendency to look at the world as a magical mystical place wanes with time. The imaginary overtaken by reality, knowledge overtaking intuition, logical vs emotional. Our heart is a compass, and in an ideal world should lead us towards happiness. 

In the long journey of life, if only there was a tonic to never lose that wonder, but constantly add to it, how marvelous the adventure of living would be!

The Magic of Just Being

The world of news was being rocked once again. The company I worked for had already endured hard times in the news and the general feeling was one of anxiety and exhaustion. 

Over the week-end, I had come for a walk by a water body that the son & I lovingly christened Reflection Pond – for you could see the skies reflected in the waters, the world from a different perspective.

There were 2 deer peeping out from within the mist and a rustling nearby indicated the hares were getting ready for some morning exercise as well. 

There were a pair of pelicans who took insouciance to a different level. Yet, as they gracefully paddled on that lake, I thought of that little piece in the Fox, Mole, Horse and Boy. 

“How do they look so perfect together?” Asked the boy.

‘There is a lot of frantic paddling going on beneath’ said the horse.

The Fox, Mole, Horse and Boy

As I walked back, my attention went again to the digital town square that is the sign of the times we live in. I had one of those moments that Henry David Thoreau chastised us against, for it was obvious that I brought the village (or in this case, the town square) with me. 

When I realized what I was doing though, I shook myself out of this and firmly pushed these thoughts aside telling myself that  shall attend to them when the time was right. I looked up from the previous posture of a head bent with woe, and that is when I saw the pelicans take flight. 

There is something majestic about large birds taking flight. The little ones flit and twit with ease, while the larger ones seem to be much like our cargo aircraft. Huge, but still not half as unwieldy as our man-made designs during takeoff or landing.

By the time I fumbled for the phone for the pictures, the pelicans had flown leaving me with a sense of awe.

The clouds that paint a different picture for us every day had painted a lovely dragon or an enormous swan taking flight that day. The crescent moon in its waxing phase was shining amidst all this glory.

The pink hues against the light blue skies were enough to make the heart rejoice. As the pinks turned to orange and then grey, my spirits lifted slowly.

I had an idea for a lovely children’s book that has since morphed and evaporated like the clouds that day.

A few deep breaths made me realize that fresh air, beautiful clouds, a time of transformation are all things we take for granted, but when we do stop to think about them, they fill us with a sense of contentment.

Nature had worked its magic yet again: There is no better place to learn the lesson of Just Being.

I realize that I cannot quite capture the serenity of a walk such as this one. But I can jot down the gratitude for this magnificence so I may be able to dip into it at will.  

An Orchestra of Avocets

A few black and white birds, most probably avocets, if I remember correctly were flying calmly around me in great circles. They seem to have their beaks open, and relishing whatever they were eating as they flew. They were completely at peace around me, and a great sense of serenity swept through me watching them. My vantage point was perfect. I was on a hill overlooking a lake and the avocets darted in and out at times, but glided seamlessly at others. I had just decided to not reach out my hands and touch the beautiful birds  so I could have them comfortably flit above me for a while longer, when the alarm went off. 

It was one of those nights that melt into morns – seamlessly, and far too quickly. It is a blessing indeed to be able to get up when in the midst of a beautiful dream, so surreal, calm, peaceful and oh so vivid, and I felt a great sense of possibility and serendipity as I bustled through the morning and hustled the children to school. 

The son & I hummed and listened to our favorite Disney songs on the way to school. Before starting what promised to be a full day I wondered what a group of avocets are called. Then, my meetings called and I forgot all about them.

Before piling into bed sixteen hours later, I said to the daughter, that I wished to be a hedgehog. You know just curl up under a cosy tree and forget about everything and sleep. I don’t know if hedgehogs really do so, but they definitely look like it.

I have often wondered while standing and admiring birds and other fauna in suburbia whether they ever feel the same way. Do we give them peace the way they give us peace? Do they decide to stop and look at us so they can feel peaceful as they go about their days? I think not. But what a lofty goal that would be. I suppose we are curious creatures to many of our fauna friends.

That night, I opened the book, Sweet Dreamers – by Isabelle Simler, and was I in for a surprise?

This is a children’s book that shows the many denizens of the planet settling into sleep. A bat hangs upside down, while whales float with one eye closed amidst jellyfish floats, and koalas hug eucalyptus trees. There is a page for hedgehogs curling up to sleep.

The hedgehog in the book, Sweet Dreamers

It is a sweet lyrical book, but the illustrations are what seals the book. On every page are stunning revelations. Scratch that – they are beyond stunning. Every page looks like the artist got up after seeing themselves in this joyous avatar in their dreams and just captured the sensations. 

Children’s book illustrations are always a joy to behold – this one tugs ones attention. 

Before flitting to sleep, I checked what a group of avocets is called. They are referred to as an orchestra of avocets. What a fitting collective noun for the birds of joy?

koi sonder

One day during a particularly windy bike ride, I stopped to catch my breath. Riding against the wind even if the terrain is flat can be hard. I watched the windy skies blowing the fluffy cirrus clouds away, and said aloud that it would be nice for some rain. The husband gave me that look he reserves for my references to eucalyptus, rain and all things Nilgiris. “You and your rain!”

But the universe has a strange way of granting wishes sometimes. A day or two later, the temperatures dipped, a cold spell gripped the area, and I sat up around midnight watching the rain pelt the windows. It was beautiful to watch in the warmth of our homes. I felt a blast of warm air from the air purifier in the room and sent a little note of gratitude for warmth and security when it must’ve been cold and wet outside. 

A few days ago, we had visited a quiet spot tucked away from the hustle and bustle of Bay Area freeways, and turned in past the almond farms into a quaint garden and farm. There, in the corner was a small koi pond with koi fish whose size looked magnified several times given the size of the pond itself. The fish swam towards where we were standing peering into the waters.

The curiosity of these creatures 🙂 If I knew Koi-polese, I could’ve translated. But I think they wanted to know more us: Who were these people who are peering at us? Would they be kind enough to feed us? 

I thought of Dr Dolittle:

These fish languages, they really only work underwater. It’s fascinating! The basic system is mouth movements and bubbles signals.

Dr Dolittle

For some reason, that night looking at the rain against our the windows, I thought of the koi fish peering out of the waters and contemplating the gathering clouds. How they would react to the gentle rains falling from the skies? Would their sea brethren feel the same way when they navigated the oceans? I remembered reading an article in the New York Times about how the fish used stars and starlight to navigate the oceans. Polar bears and many creatures do so too. How do they fare when the cloudy skies 🌌 obscure their vision?

“Did you know that an ant has more intelligence than a hippopotamus? And that a grasshopper, in relation to his size, has more power in his hind legs than a kangaroo. Absolutely, fascinating! There’s no doubt about it, animals are much more interesting than people.”

Dr Dolittle

There is a word that captured my fancy when I read it, for I have often felt that especially when traveling. (Grocery shopping in Afghanistan post) . 

sonder (the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own).

That night I felt that word with respect to all our fellow creatures. We have no Dr Dolittles among us to know the extent of our fellow creatures feelings. But we do know we have many creatures around us show feelings of warmth, love, clannishness and so forth. 

Dream Boats

Oh! Books! Marvelous Books! 📚

I am so grateful to live in a world that has an abundance of books. Take this one for instance: The Wanderer – By Peter Van Den Ende.

Paper boats have held a fascination all its own. The oceans must’ve been the first great frontier that humankind was enthralled by. How we came to design boats in the manner we do now must be an interesting journey. Why this shape – why not in the shape of a whale, or a swan with paddlers underneath? 

How long have boat designs stayed in this cup shape that floats? 

I remember making paper boats all the time. Setting them to sail on little puddles or watch them scooting along with a fast flowing rivulet of the rainwaters. Either way, the joy is never dampened, though the paper may be (please pardon the pun). Some folks made paper planes pretty well, but the paper boats were my little special things. I made them out of napkins in restaurants, out of spare paper in schools and work spots, and chocolate wrappers. I wrote poems on Puddle Boats, The Dream Weaver. A boat has an endless fascination: a mystical vessel with its ability to journey into places unknown, and encounter adventures unimaginable. Which child has not enjoyed the finale of The Adventures of Dr Doolittle even if the rest of the book did not enthrall?

Imagine my joy then in seeing this book. I had no words, and neither did the book.

Some books capture the heart’s yearning with no words at all. The Wanderer by Van Deck Ende is one of them. A simple concept, one that any one who has played with paper boats in rain puddles, rivulets and streams has often dreamed off. It takes a true artist though to capture those dreams and meanderings onto paper for others to enjoy. And an exemplary one to make the possibilities even better with monochromatic themes.

The little paper boat starts its journey off simply enough. As it traverses streams, rivers, oceans, and peeks into lakes, the pages come alive.

Whether you look around above the waters and take in the egrets and herons by the lake

Or peek into the depths of the ocean below and take in the sights of the reefs and whales below, this book is sure to take us on a journey of a lifetime. 

Every page is a different destination on its own, and every stop along the way adds unto a wonderful journey.

What a marvelous book! The above are a few sample pictures taken from the book to enable a review. The book has many more.

Tonight, after all is quiet, and the world can be left to its own devices, and the land of dreamlands can be entered; these images should help us along to the beautiful lands of possibility. 

Kimêtawânaw – we all play

The daughter was giving me Tea. 

‘Tea’ I was enlightened earlier, is not the beverage that I love, but interesting events of note in her life. The child told me about her new teachers, the classes, the people around her – the ones who were mean, and the ones who weren’t, something about Discord, and something else about friends with their heart strung in different directions. 

“How long since school reopened?” I asked bemused at this barrage of interesting information. 

She gave me a sheepish smile, “Well… Mother. Would you like to hear this or not?”

I nodded and she rattled on about the joys of companionship. 

The son patiently listened to all of her tales with an intent and bemused expression on his face.

“What about you my dear? How have your days been going?” I said turning to him.

Thankfully, elementary school children are still spacemen and super-heroes. The throes of the heart have not yet occupied their minds. In his stentorian voice, he regaled us with a tale of a newly invented game that others had been willing to play along with. Time-tastic Adventures. 

Apparently, the den was tasked with picking a date in the past or the future, and then, they all play and enact games during this period. Medieval times, times in the future, making their way to the stars, or the fields for strawberry picking, it was all done together.

“Such an interesting game! Did you come up with it?” I asked

He looked shy and proud at the same time. “Yes! Did you guess because it was all about time?”

I nodded. His fascination with Time and playing outside is well known.

What about you ma! What’s your highlight for today? 

I told them about the antics of a particularly adventurous little squirrel that hot summer’s day when I had gone out on an errand. All the world preferred to shelter in the trees, or stay indoors, but this one was practicing for a hurdle race. He or she ran gaining speed, and elegantly leaped over the mounds on the fence. Not once, not twice but at least for 100 meters. The Olympic committee was probably cooling off in the summer heat, but I was there – I pulled the car over and watched the little creature leap joyously.

That evening, I opened this beautiful book, We all play = kimêtawânaw By Julie Flett 

Kimêtawânaw – we all play – by Julie Flett

In simple language and beautiful pastel colored pages, the joy of play and companionship is etched.

I smiled my way through the book, and as I closed my eyes to sleep, I thought of the little squirrel jumping over the hurdles in the heat.

The little squirrel somehow embodied the spirit of choosing joy in the pursuit of happiness on that hot day. 

Often times when out on a walk I would stop to enjoy the different creatures playing outside. The ducks splashing together, the squirrels chasing each other up and down trees and running across one’s path, the co-ordinated flying of the geese, and the deer bursting into what looks like spontaneous sprints. The urge to skip and pirouette in the sunset often overwhelms me. When I think there aren’t too many people about, I give in – feeling thrilled and somewhat sheepish at the same time, for adulthood frowns on these displays of spontaneity. But, like the children say, “People know you are the official kook of the house, so you’re okay ma!”

Well, kimêtawânaw – we all play!

Life’s Lessons – Fun Pockets

Life’s lessons are imparted in many ways. On walks in nature, yaps with the children, and of course in the moments of reflection from the constant doing. 

Sometimes, all these come together in the form of lovable books.

Take these 3 for instance:

  • You are a beautiful beginning – by Nina Laden Illustrated by Kelsey Garrity-Riley. The book takes all of those trite sayings and manages to make it a beautiful compilation of images. A joy to thumb through. Stop me if I have mentioned this before, but the illustrations in children’s books are brilliant, and I am so grateful to be able to see so many of them and appreciate them in my own simple way.

Lovely wise things in beautiful settings:

It is not wishing to be different. It is learning to love being you

It is not about winning the game. It is having fun while you play,

  • You are a beautiful beginning – by Nina Laden Illustrated by Kelsey Garrity-Riley.
    • Wild Symphony by Dan Brown (yes, the author of  Da Vinci Code.) I do think this book is much better than all of his other best sellers (I liked Da Vinci Code, but subsequent ones rambled and tumbled downhill I felt) If I need to remember his work, I would gladly remember Wild Symphony. He manages to combine whimsy, poetry, and music to the most marvelous effect. The illustrator has taken things even further by the beautiful imagery in the book.

    Side note: Dan Brown has become a sort of joke between the husband and daughter.
    You see, we each try to get her to read things that we are fairly sure she will like. With what result? A shrug. Some nonchalance. Maybe a snort. She takes the husband’s recommendation for movies far more than his recommendations of books. I stopped keeping score of the statistics on my side. It was heavy going, and the odds aren’t encouraging.

    Wild Symphony – By Dan Brown, illustrated by Susan Batori

    Anyway, back to Dan Brown, this book is in my opinion his best. Every animal plays a different instrument, and teaches a different lesson.

    Do you feel like a little alone-time would be nice? 

    A swan song would be just the thing

    Do you feel alone in the world?

    A walk in the evenings with Cricket song might be just the cure

    Animal Orchestra – By Dan Brown

    Here is a link to some of the songs in Wild Symphony.

    Really between these books, life does feel meaningful, purposeful and joyful. Most importantly, it reminds us to watch out for wonder and learning on every side.

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