The epidemic has spread to my kids.
Cabin fever. Grumpy Gus syndrome. The cranky plague. Hissy fit harumphing.
It’s bad. It’s cold … and as jagged as an iceberg. Which is why it’s a perfect time to study ice and snow and Arctic regions and the animals living there. Reverse psychology.
We’ve been studying snowflakes. We’ve learned the difference between fern frost and rime frost and hoar frost. My freezer is full of plastic bottles of water, filled to varying degrees for experiments — but that’s ok. It means they’re busy … and hopefully, not picking on each other or driving me up the wall, out the chimney, over the fence or into the woods.
Do you know Jean Craighead George?
(photos belong to Jean Craighead George)
George has magical stories in her heart and mind, and she has crafted them into more than 100 books. You may know her from stories like Julie of the Wolves or My Side of the Mountain — the story of a boy and a falcon surviving on a mountain together.
Get this: her first pet was a turkey vulture!
George is a Penn State grad. She worked as a reporter for The Washington Post, and was a member of the White House Press Corps. After her children were born she returned to her love of nature and brought owls, robins, mink, sea gulls, tarantulas — 173 wild animals — into their home and backyard. These became characters in her books.
We’re reading one of her stories today.
We’re learning about icebergs and polar bears.
And it’s going to be fun, darnit! And if it’s not … if it doesn’t cure grumpy gus syndrome, I’ll make them write a five-page report about the Arctic tundra followed by a polar bear swim in the water trough.
That should do the trick!
“I’ve never known any trouble that an hour’s reading didn’t assuage.” ~ Charles de Secondat
“Books are the quietest and most constant of friends; they are the most accessible and wisest of counsellors, and the most patient of teachers.” ~ Charles W. Eliot
Books to the ceiling
Books to the sky
My pile of books is a mile high.
How I love them! How I need them!
I’ll have a long beard by the time I read them!
~ Arnold Lobel
What lovely ideas my dear. Are you feeling the cabin fever? I’m still not, in fact, I’ve got so many things up my sleeve, that I’ll never finish them before the Squirrel rolls again. It would however be nice to see the sun, I can’t remember the last time it shined.