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| Valerie Everett |
Because I share poetry daily, National Poetry Month can get a bit tricky with all the "extras" I want to to squeeze in! I hope you'll indulge me if I step away from the dinosaur party a couple times this month to share something a little different. (Besides which, those dinosaurs can get pretty LOUD!)
Today I'd like to talk about Amy Ludwig VanDerwater's latest book...
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| WITH MY HANDS: Poems About Making Things Amy Ludwig VanDerwater, Lou Fancher & Steve Johnson Clarion Books (March 27, 2018) ISBN: 978-0544313408 Find a copy at Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble or via Indiebound.org. |
Amy was featured on Today's Little Ditty in March 2016. If you haven't read that interview, I sincerely hope you will, since it brings to light what a special poet, teacher, and human being she is. At the time, we were discussing Every Day Birds, but since then, her fans have gratefully welcomed a few more of Amy's books into the world: Read! Read! Read! and Poems Are Teachers in 2017, and Dreaming of You and With My Hands in 2018.
Along with her books, don't miss Amy's website and blogs, especially The Poem Farm, which I've recommended time and time again to teachers and parents of creative young poets-in-training.
With My Hands is a collection of poems about making things.
It's about the personal experience of building, baking, folding, drawing, shaping... starting from scratch with "empty space, ideas, hope and stuff" and creating something new "that never was before." This is something that all makers can relate to, and if you're reading this blog, I suspect that you're one of them! You'll also love Lou Fancher and Steve Johnson's joyful, collage-style illustrations that help bring Amy's words to life.
Among Amy's many gifts as a writer, probably the one that impresses me most is her ability to tap into her inner 7-year-old while simultaneously presenting a safe and accepting place for young readers. She's a lot like Mr. Rogers in that regard. It's a quality that comes from unconditional love and writing from the heart. For young readers, Amy's voice is as familiar as it is nurturing, providing children with the confidence to grow into themselves.
There are so many delightful poems in this collection (visit Jama's Alphabet Soup for an in-depth look), but the poem I'd like to share today is one of my favorites. It brings back lots of memories from my own childhood and from my chidren's growing-up years as well.
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| From With My Hands, © 2018 Amy Ludwig VanDerwater, used with the author's permission. |
From my own childhood, I remember snow forts my brother and I enjoyed when the picnic table in our backyard was heaped with the freshly fallen white stuff. I also recall how my bedroom closet served as a hideout when I needed time to myself.
My children were fort makers too. Dylan's favorite "toy" was his useful box. When he was eight, he made this elaborate castle fortress for his sister's fifth birthday.
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| Beware the crocodiles in the moat! |
He also made fort-like structures using legos, blocks, and even groceries when Mummy came from food shopping. (I had to put the refrigerated and frozen items away quickly lest he get to them first!)
For his eleventh birthday, Dylan's party guests were divided into two groups. Each team was asked to design and build their own fort using masking tape and packing paper left over from our move. After that, they battled it out with slingshots and ping pong balls.
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| Ready... aim... Oops! Wait for the photographer to get out of the way! |
From an early age, Miranda was a lover of cozy forts—the kind you can spend hours (or days) in, since they were usually equipped with books, toys, snacks, stuffed animals, and blankets for impromptu napping.
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| The book selection was as vital as the fort itself. |
In a pinch, a clothes line or dining room chair would do.
As she got older, her forts became more elaborate and included seating for guests. (Lucky me!)
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| There's no place like home! |
What memories of childhood forts do you have?
Does anyone besides me remember this wonderful poem by Buffy Silverman?
Leave a comment below for a chance to win a copy of With My Hands: Poems About Making Things courtesy of Clarion/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Alternatively, you may send an email to TodaysLittleDitty (at) gmail (dot) com with the subject "With My Hands giveaway." Entries must be received by Wednesday, April 18, 2018. The winner will be selected randomly and announced next Friday, April 20th.
And speaking of giveaways, don't forget The Best of Today's Little Ditty giveaway I'm running to celebrate National Poetry Month and my blog's fifth birthday! I'm giving away five sets (volumes 1 & 2) to educators—teachers, caregivers, volunteers... anyone who shares their love of poetry with students of any age. To enter, just contact me at some point during the month—via blog comment, email, Facebook, or Twitter. I'll be compiling a list (separate from the With My Hands and Don't Ask a Dinosaur giveaways) and drawing five names at the end of April.
I love this post! Your kids made some great forts (love the groceries one especially). Wonderful to see their creative play. Thanks for the link love too! :)
ReplyDelete(No need to enter me in the giveaway.)
DeleteMy pleasure re: the link love, Jama! No sense in me repeating what you've already done so well. :)
DeleteBoy, it's like you stepped into my childhood! I built forts in my closet...and outside in the pine trees, under the pine trees (pine sol and degreaser---my poor mother used so much of that nasty smelling stuff to the get sap out). I even made forts in the neighbor's pine trees....and had to be called back days later to take the fort "stuff" out of her driveway. LOL! I convinced Mom to turn the clothesline into a circus tent with blankets and on several other occasions the climbing gym AND the sliding board in the backyard were covered with old and dusty tarps from the shed and clothespins....again, my patient mother simply bought more clothespins. For all the ways my mother could frustrate me, she never ever got in the way of creativity. For her, that's what being a kid was supposed to be. Oh goodness....I could go on and on. Didn't realize your post would be "the" prompt to get me typing this morning. Thanks for the post and the memories. What a great side step away from the dinos. I'm sure in all their roaring they haven't even noticed!
ReplyDeleteWhat a delight to read all about your childhood fort fetish, Linda! Except for the sap, it sounds ideal. MORE CLOTHESPINS! MUST HAVE MORE CLOTHESPINS! :D
DeleteI love this new book by Amy, have it, so no need for me in the drawing, Michelle. I too built forts, 'hideaways' with the clothesline, in my closet and in one special tree, draping old sheets around me. You, and Amy with her poem, have brought wonderful memories today. Thanks for all!
ReplyDeleteThat's exactly how I felt Linda. Reading Amy's poem, the memories came flooding back!
DeleteThank you very very much for this, Michelle! I adore these pictures - that FOOD FORT is fabulous! As a girl, I loved forts outside in snow around the mailbox, in the ditch out back, in my closet, everywhere! Your reviews are so generous and always have a cool, different take. My gratitude. xxxx
ReplyDeleteAlways a pleasure sharing your books and poems, Amy! xo Sounds like a wonderful, outdoorsy, imaginative childhood.
DeleteI love Amy's book (and Amy!), and I love this fort-y post! We made all sorts of forts too, but my favorites were the elaborate snow forts that encircled one of our maple trees. We'd build it high, with two rooms and built-in seating, and then spray it with the hose so it would last into the second or third thaw. Then in spring/summer, we'd hike up to the The Pine Tree and use the tall grasses that grew on the hill to weave a two-room fort (we liked room options) in the lower branches. My initials are still visible in that tree.
ReplyDeleteThanks for bringing back the memories, Michelle and Amy! <3
Wow! Wow! Wow! How cool is that, Renée? What I want to know is how you ended up as more of a costume person than a set person?!!
DeleteAmy's book looks so inviting for someone like my 4-year-old, who is always drawing, cutting, pasting, painting - creating SOMETHING!
ReplyDeleteDefinitely! Your daughter needs this book, no question about it.
DeleteOh I love Amy's fort poem (not to be confused with the Amy of my fort poem--thanks for including the link.) And those photos of your two and their forts are treasures. My favorite fort as a kid was the Norway maple tree in front of our house--I spent many hours sitting on a branch, hidden away from the world.
ReplyDeleteHow could I not include a link to your poem, Buffy? (It's pretty unforgettable.) Your childhood maple sounds like the perfect hideaway!
DeleteYour poem is wonderful, Buffy, and zoomed me right back to my childhood!
DeleteForts are a fun part of so many children’s young lives, love this and can’t wait to share it in class!
ReplyDeleteThanks for stopping by, Mac. I'm sure Amy's book would be a hit in any elementary classroom!
DeleteBuilding forts is a part of childhood, in any language. I had a small group of students a few years ago that would build forts for read aloud time. I had to put on the timer for them to create them quickly. Now they have that memory to carry them into middle school when forts are a thing of the past.
ReplyDeleteHow wonderful, Margaret! Something those students will always remember, I'm sure. Something they might even tell their own kids one day! :)
DeleteLove. Love. Love. Love. Love. This book, Amy, forts.... As a child, I escaped to the tree/roof in our little front courtyard, or to my wee closet in my bedroom. It became my rocket ship and when I opened the door, I was on a different planet! (In Florida, we watched rockets from the back yard.) Our youngest, Seth, made yarn and string "forts" all over the house. It was like living in a Spyrograph, if you remember those... ;0)
ReplyDeleteWhat fun memories of rocket ship forts, Robyn! Kind of a mash up between Star Trek and Narnia. :) And OF COURSE I remember Spirograph! One of my favorite toys... and Miranda's too, actually.
DeleteInspiring post Michelle, glad I didn't miss it. Love Amy's Poem "Fort." Both of my kids built all kinds of forts and of course I was there to–fun memories and generated so many creative juices. I remember Buffy's Poem "Fortress" a moving piece. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteI'm also glad you didn't miss it, Michelle. :) Forts are a great place to hunker down and draw, no?
DeleteI'm glad I made it back to this post, Michelle, and honestly I'll take forts over dinosaurs any day. There's science behind all this fort-building, you know: http://phillywaldorf.com/building-forts-minds-importance-child-built-space/
ReplyDeleteI'm adding one of my favorite poems I've ever written to the padlet for your entertainment....
and I'd love to win this book. :)
Cool article, Heidi— thanks for sharing it, and your poem too!
DeleteForts are a fond childhood memory of my own and I remember making them with my own kids.
ReplyDeleteThanks for stopping by, Danielle!
DeleteFrom Dianne Moritz:
ReplyDeleteLove the poem about forts. When I was a kid we made forts in the backyard trees with old sheets and blankets; one special fort was under the weeping willow tree, perfect, as the branches hung down to the ground.
The willow fort sounds amazing, Dianne!
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