CSLA BLOG: Celebrating Children's Book Illustrators

I was delighted to discover that the CSLA Blog this month is featuring the image from my book A Panda's World that I donated for use on products in the Library Advocacy Store. Many thanks to the California School Library Foundation and to Dr. Lesley Farmer, Professor of Library Media at California State University Long Beach, for her lovely description of my work. I am just one of many children's book authors and illustrators who have participated in this project.

I encourage you to visit the Library Advocacy Store and treat yourself to a cup, bag, pillow and more, or buy gifts for your friends and family. Every purchase supports California libraries!

Butterfly Craft with Yarn and Pipe Cleaners

With thanks to the Craft Train, here is an easy way to make decorative butterflies with yarn, craft sticks and pipe cleaners. https://www.thecrafttrain.com/woven-craft-stick-butterflies/

Learn about raising real butterflies in my book Butterflies in Room 6: See How They Grow! 

 

HAPPY SAINT PATRICK'S DAY! A Visit to Ireland

Newgrange Passage Tomb, circa 3200 BC

HAPPY SAINT PATRICK'S DAY!

I've only been to Ireland once, and that was in October 2004. It was, indeed, an Emerald Isle. Here is a repost of my report of that visit from my travel blog, The Intrepid Tourist.

Rossnaree

Day 1.  We arrived in Dublin, picked up our rental car and drove north to our bed and breakfast, Rossnaree, a beautiful historic private house, chosen by us because it was near the World Heritage prehistoric sites of Newgrange and Knowth, which feature megalithic passage tombs dating to 3200 BC as well as standing stones (similar in concept to Stonehenge) and stones with elaborate concentric engraved designs.  Both Newgrange and Knowth were visible on the other side of the Boyne River from our bedroom window.  The sites can be seen only on tours, so we went to the visitor center, got our tickets for Newgrange, visited the museum, and took the tour.  By afternoon, jet lag had caught up with us and we returned to Rosnaree for a nap.

Day 2.  The next morning we woke up to a light rain, which soon cleared to patchy sun.  We booked a tour of Knowth for 11:45 and then picked up picnic food for lunch.  After the tour, it began to rain again, so we ate our lunch in the car in the parking lot at remains of Mellifont Abbey, the first Cistercian monastery in Ireland, founded in 1142.  When the rain let up and we walked around a bit before taking back roads to Monasterboice to see the high crosses and round tower.

Proleek Dolmen

 We then drove north to Dundalk to see the Proleek Dolmen (circa 3000 B.C.), located on the grounds of the Ballymascanlon House Hotel golf course.  Following signs along the cart path, we walked about a quarter mile to the fifth green, to see an immense stone balanced on top of two triangular stones.  We tossed several pebbles onto the top for good luck.  According to legend, a wish is granted if your pebble stays on top and doesn't roll down.  For dinner that night we stopped at the Gallery Forge restaurant, where we ordered a brace of quail.

Celtic Cross, Monasterboic

Day 3.  After breakfast we drove south through Dublin to Enniskerry in County Wicklow where we visited Powerscourt Estate and walked around the formal gardens.  (It was reminiscent of visiting the Huntington gardens in Pasadena.)  We looked briefly in the Avoca shop on the main floor of the house and bought an excellent scone.  We then drove past the waterfall and along a back road to Glendalough where we took a tour through the abbey ruins. (It dates back to the 6th century!)  We then walked around the upper lake.  After tea in the hotel we drove back to Dublin via Sallygap, a narrow road across the high heath.  We saw a few sheep, almost no cars, and evidence of peat cutting.  All in all, it was a desolate place.  We arrived in Dublin, checked into our hotel, and went to the local pub to watch the Ireland/France soccer match.

Day 4.  While Art was at his meetings I went to the National Museum to see the real finds from Newgrange and Knowth–the visitor center at the site only had reproductions–and a huge collection of Celtic gold jewelry. In the evening, we took a chartered bus to Dublin Castle for a reception.

Georgian House, facing St. Stephen's Green, Dublin

Day 5.  After lunch we set out for a walking tour of Dublin.  We went past St. Stephen’s Green to the Natural History Museum; Powerscourt Shopping Center (mostly eating places, antiques and clothes); to Avoca (bought two teapots and tea towels); through Temple Bar (cobblestone streets and pubs); to Liffey Bridge to Christ Church Cathedral (site of the first performance of Handel’s Messiah); to Dublinia Medieval Heritage Center; to Jurys Inn Hotel for coffee; to St. Patrick’s Cathedral for Evensong service; and finally, to dinner at La Mere Zou on St. Stephen’s Green for mussels and cherry beer for Art and parsnip soup and lamb for me.

Trinity College, Dublin

 Day 6.  On our last day we visited an exhibit of the Book of Kells at Trinity College. It was the perfect ending to a short, but full visit to Ireland.

(update June 2012)
Summer Solstice
Here's a recent note from an Irish friend about observing the summer solstice in Ireland.

The Summer Solstice in the Northern Hemisphere is on June 20th at 23:09 UT/GMT this year. In Ancient Ireland many of Megalithic Monuments were aligned to the rising or setting sun on key solar points in the year. In the Boyne Valley we have the famous Winter Solstice alignment at Newgrange. Townleyhall a small passage tomb located just north of Newgrange is aligned with the rising sun at the Summer Solstice http://www.knowth.com/townleyhall-summer-solstice.htm

At Carrowkeel in the west of Ireland, Cairn G is aligned with the setting sun at the Summer Solstice http://www.newgrange.com/carrowkeel-solstice-08.htm  

(update August 1, 2012)
Lughnasadh
My Irish friend recently wrote to me about another festival, Lughnasadh.

Lughnasadh (pronounced Lou-na-sa) the Celtic Festival falls at the beginning of August, midway between the Summer Solstice and the Autumn Equinox http://www.newgrange.com/lughnasadh.htm

In Celtic mythology the god Lugh established the Lughnasadh festival as a funeral feast and games commemorating his foster-mother Tailtiu. She died on August 1st of exhaustion after clearing the plains of Brega for farming. The first Teltown Games (Áenach Tailteann) were held where Tailtiu was buried.

(update October 31, 2012)
The Origins of Halloween
My Irish friend Michael Fox sent me this Halloween message:

Failte,

As millions of children and adults participate in the fun of Halloween tonight, many will not be aware of its ancient Celtic roots in the Samhain festival. In Celtic Ireland about 2000 years ago, Samhain was the division of the year between the lighter half (summer) and the darker half (winter) http://www.newgrange.com/samhain.htm

Back 5000 years ago in Stone Age Ireland at this time of year there were sunrise alignments at Loughcrew http://www.knowth.com/loughcrew-cairn-l.htm and the Hill of Tara http://www.knowth.com/tara-samhain.htm

Best Wishes from the Boyne Valley,

Michael Fox

http://www.facebook.com/DayToursDublin

(update from Michael Fox, Feb 3, 2013)
Celebration of Imbolc

Failte,

Imbolc has been celebrated since ancient times, it's a Cross Quarter Day,

midpoint between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox, this year it

falls on the February 3rd. The ancient Celts celebrated The Goddess Brigid

at Imbolc which in Christian times became St. Brigid's Day. At the Mound of

the Hostages on the Hill of Tara the rising sun at Imbolc and Samhain

illuminates the chamber. With the ongoing conservation works at the Mound of

the Hostages, there won't be any access to the entrance this Imbolc

http://www.newgrange.com/imbolc.htm

Best Imbolc Wishes,

Michael Fox 

Butterfly Bookmark Project

Soon it will be butterfly season! To grow your own butterflies, you can order caterpillars from Insect Lore or other companies on the internet. 

To learn about raising butterflies, you can read my book BUTTERFLIES IN ROOM 6.

With thanks to Insect Lore, you can get the link HERE to download directions for making your own folded paper butterfly to use as a bookmark or for decoration.

PLANT A BUTTERFLY GARDEN

You can attract butterflies to your yard by planting flowers. You can buy packets of seeds at your local garden store. Then find a sunny spot and follow the directions on the seed packet for planting. In a few months, when the flowers bloom, you will find butterflies visiting your garden and sipping nectar from the flowers.

Learn about raising painted lady butterflies in my book Butterflies in Room 6: See How They Grow.

THE TERRIBLE HODAG. Its Origins in Rhinelander, WI

As a child, I spent my summers at a small camp in northern Wisconsin, originally called Camp Hodag, now called Camp Bovey. In the evenings we sat around the campfire telling stories of a huge creature with the head of an ox, feet of a bear, back of a dinosaur and tail of an alligator--the terrible Hodag! When I grew up and became a children's book writer I wrote some of those stories down. One of them, The Terrible Hodag, is available as a Kindle book on Amazon. It is also available in Spanish, El Terrible Hodag.

The original Hodag stories were invented more than one hundred years ago in the logging camps of Rhinelander, Wisconsin. In an article written by Emily Bright for the Wisconsin Life blog in 2016, you can read how practical joker Gene Shepard created the Hodag and perpetuated the myth until he was finally debunked by an investigator from the Smithsonian Museum. She writes, "Rhinelander still has the hodag as its mascot for the city and the high school. Hodag statues line downtown like a cow parade with fangs. ....Thanks to Gene Shepard, Rhinelander is unique—and proud of it."

In the summer of 2006, I visited Rhinelander and took the photo below of the Hodag in front of the Chamber of Commerce greeting visitors as they drive into town.

 

MARY ANNING, FOSSIL GIRL, Discoverer of Ancient Giant Sea Reptiles

Mary Anning. Illustration by Laurie Caple for Giant Sea Reptiles of the Dinosaur Age by Caroline Arnold

Last night I watched the movie Ammonite, about Mary Anning, the woman who made remarkable fossil discoveries of ancient giant sea reptiles along the English coast near Lyme Regis in the early 1800s. I have long been fascinated by Mary Anning and wrote about her in my book GIANT SEA REPTILES OF THE DINOSAUR AGE. It is illustrated with beautiful watercolor paintings by Laurie Caple. (The book is out of print. You can look for it at your library.)

Although Mary Anning had little formal education, she had an uncanny knack for finding fossils and for understanding how the bones fit together. After excavating her specimens, she carefully reconstructed them and made detailed drawings. She collected fossils for many of the leading scientists of the day. Her work helped develop new ideas about what the world was like in prehistoric times.

Ammonites found at Lyme Regis

Many of Mary Anning's discoveries are on display at the British Museum of Natural History in London. Several years ago I visited the museum and was surprised to find a Mary Anning's look-alike sharing some of the fossils with museum visitors. It almost seemed like meeting Mary Anning herself! You can read about that visit in my post at The Intrepid Tourist.