Opposite Day?

Remember the conundrum that ensued when someone declared it opposite day in school? Because of course by the very rules of opposite day declaring it so means that it isn’t opposite day. You would have to go and declare it not opposite day to make it officially opposite day. It hurts my brain to think about it. So, I think I’ll make this evening’s storytime with an opposites theme much less confusing.

Tonight’s lineup kicks off with the simple picture book Big is Big (and Little, Little) by J. Patrick Lewis with illustrations by Bob Barner.

Then we’ll have some fun with Otto Grows Down by Michael Sussman and illustrated by Scott Magon. It tells the story of a boy whose unfortunate birthday wish leads to him growing younger and everything (even going to the bathroom!) suddenly happening in reverse.

I just discovered Hip & Hop, Don’t Stop by Jef Czekaj. It’s a fun picture books about a turtle and rabbit who are both rappers but have very different styles. Hip the turtle (of course) raps very slowly and Hop the rabbit raps so fast that no one can understand her. This should be a fun one to read aloud.

The illustrations above come from a nice simple lift the flap book called Black? White Day? Night by Larua Vaccaro Seeger.

I figured I could work in a classic Goldilocks and the Three Bears story to my opposites theme and chose one with beautiful illustrations by Gennady Spirin.

Fellow library story lady (and fellow 2011 debut YA author) Kathy McCullough suggested Once a Mouse . . . by Marcia Brown, which is perfect because I love to always have at least one classic picture book in my pile. I once got to read Where the Wild Things Are to someone who had never heard it before, how cool is that?

Finally, I’ll wrap things up with Big Cat, Small Cat by Ami Rubinger. It’s another simple one, but I like it because it has a rhyming style with a little bit of a fill-in-the-blank thing going on so that my audience can join in. (Completely off topic here. We have a flannel story at the library to the rhyming song “A Hunting We Will Go” with verses like “We’ll catch a snake and put him in a cake and then we’ll let him go.” I always sing the first part and let the kids supply the second part. So I’ll say, “We catch a snake and put him in a . . . ” and they shout “Cake!” So partway through the song we get to the verse about the whale who goes into a pail. I sing, “We’ll catch a whale, and put him in a . . .” as the pail flannel piece goes up on the flannel board and all the kids shout, “Bucket!” “Or pail,” I toss in before moving on with the rest of the rhyming song.)

In case I get too many restless little guys for my storytime. My back up books are A Garden of Opposites by Nancy Davis and Maisy Big, Maisy Small by Lucy Cousins.

Hope my story time goes awfully! (What? It’s opposite day, remember?)