Rabbits, Rabbits, Everywhere - Review

We got a fun book from Ann McCallum books.


The book we got a copy of is called  Rabbits, Rabbits, Everywhere - A Fibonacci Tale.  I would say it is designed for elementary school ages.




Ann McCallum is a former math teacher, who has found a really fun, creative way of teaching math.

This book was disguised as a children's book, that someone like A-man would normally have turned his nose up at and thought it would just be a baby book.

At first, he did that very thing and told me I could go ahead and just read it to S-girl and V-girl.  The first time I read it, I was volunteering at the church, answering phones during their staff meeting. (One of the beauties of homeschooling is the ability to pick up and do school wherever you need to be:  doctor's office, with a sick friend/relative, or doing a quick few hours of volunteer work at church.)

A-man was sitting over in the corner, working on his critical thinking work and told me to just go ahead and read the book to his sisters.  He was fine.  He would just keep doing his real work.   LOL

I was a little less than halfway through the book when I noticed he hadn't written anything down in his critical thinking book in a while and was looking every time I turned the book around to show the girls the pictures.  (Don't tell anyone, but secretly like reading books to the kids, library-lady style.  You know....where you have the book pointed at you and then at the end of the page, you flip it around and do a slow pass with the book so the kids can look at the pictures.  I don't know why I love it, probably because once upon a time my dream job was to be a librarian.)

I just kept on reading.

Back to the book!  The illustrations are really well done.  Realistic, rather than cartoonish.  They definitely had a classic look to them.

It tells a story of a town over run with rabbits.  They call in the famed Pied Piper (who it turns out is an egotistical snot)...but he can't get the rabbits to follow him.  So, a little girl named, Amanda, had to figure out the pattern to be successful.

I won't give the whole story away, but it really has some clever turns of phrase and puns - which I love.

A-man read the book by himself when I was done.  His favorite part was the Endnote page that told about the real life Fibonacci and how those number sequences can be found in nature.  The next time the kids ate an apple and banana, they cut into it trying to find the Fibonacci patterns!

This book was a fun way to get a little extra math and number sequencing in front of the kids....and, honestly, just to get them to look at numbers a little differently.  I actually enjoyed it too.  This was a fun one.

You can get a copy of Rabbits, Rabbits, Everywhere:  A Fibonacci Tale for about $8.00.  It would make a fun Christmas present for grandkids or something.

The TOS Review Crew got to try a few different Ann McCallum books.  Take a look and see what they thought of them.

Kinder Cottage Publishing - Review

This was such a sweet set of books.



These hardcover books, by Kinder Cottage Publishing, were originally written by Duff Graham for the Henry Altemus company over 90 yrs ago.

Kinder Cottage Publishing was started in 2012 by parents, Howard and Ann Closs, who wanted to make sure their four children love of their rich heritage of western civilization. The company focuses on materials such as literature, history, culture, and Christianity. 

There are ten books in this set.  I got to choose two hardcover books.

I didn't even let the kids vote.  I was selfish and picked the ones I was interested in.  I knew they wouldn't agree on two anyway, so, I picked.......

The Tale of Peter Rabbit



and 

Peter Rabbit and Jack the Jumper



I ended up picking the first and last book in this series.

Like I said, these are absolutely sweet read aloud books for you and your kids.  They are recommended for ages 3 to 9.  They are sweet.  They are old fashioned.  They will hopefully teach your kids a few life lessons.

They are the right length for a read aloud.  You know how you inwardly groan at some of the read aloud books your kids want to read because they are too long?!?  But, feel bad if the books are too short?!?

These ones, like baby bears porridge,chair, and bed, are......just right.

The Tale of Peter Rabbit tells the story of Peter defying his mother and going and doing the very activities that got his father into an"accidental" pie on the McGregor farms.

I liked this page from The Tale of Peter Rabbit, because it reminded me of my dad. (Not the grumpy looking rabbit!)

It gave me a chance to pause the story and tell the kids a story about my dad.  When I was growing up, we didn't go out to eat much, but every now and then, after church, my dad would take a right instead of a left on our way home and we knew that we were going to Mel-O-Lanes....a little tiny diner about 10 minutes away. No matter what you ordered, your meal came with a big, old piece of parsley on the side of the plate. My dad would stick the whole thing in his mouth and eat it.  He would be greeted by rounds of, "Ewwww, gross!:  Then we would explain to him that it was only for a garnish and you weren't supposed to eat it. To which he would reply that parsley was good for you and helped your stomach digest food.  

Sometimes, we would take a teeny, tiny bite of ours before passing it down the table to him, but most of the time, we just passed it down as soon as our plate arrived.  He would end up with a whole pile of parsley to eat.

 When reading both of these books, I had to laugh at a few things....mostly inside my own head.

The first thing that made me chuckle was how much Peter reminded me of A-man.  Not necessarily "naughty" even though the author actually says Peter is a naughty rabbit.  But, just because of the scrapes and messes that he finds himself in...just because he is curious....or, to be more honest, because he isn't in the mood to listen to his mom.  Both books gave us a chance to talk about obedience and how important it is, even if your mom or dad aren't around to see what you are doing.

The second thing that made me laugh, was how different parenting was 90 years ago than it is now.  Just the fact that the mother left the kids home while she went out for the day....and they were kids, not teenagers....was shocking to my 2014 sensibilities!

Yes, I realize I am comparing parenting techniques with a mother rabbit and her bunnies and myself in 2014!  It is just that some of the little things are odd.

Another example of  2014 thinking versus 1920s thinking  that made me laugh, but in a a more sad way, was found in the book, Peter Rabbit and Jack the Jumper.  

In this book, Peter and Jack decide they don't want to stay home with Peter's sisters and decide to go out running around  (doing naughty-ish things).  While they are out doing things they shouldn't be, they run into the Hurdy Gurdy man and his pretty little girl.  

As soon as these characters showed up, I was suspicious.  What is a Hurdy Gurdy man?  Why did they feel the need to mention that the little girl was pretty?

What were they going to do?  How would Peter and his friend  get away?  Were they going to kidnap them?  Eat them?  Steal from them?  Somehow, I knew they were going to con Peter and Jack out of something.  And, why were they asking about Peter's sisters and how many he had?  Hmmmm??????

My brain was very much in 2014 when children don't talk to strangers and certainly don't share details about their family!

Ahhh, yes, I have apparently become a very jaded individual, when I look for bad guys(child molesters) in a children's book from almost 100 years ago!  

It really makes me kind of sad. 

Just like when I have to tell Rainman not to be so friendly  to other people's babies/kids at the grocery store, because I can tell it is making the parents uncomfortable because he might be a bad guy....instead of what he actually is.... a friendly guy who likes kids.    That is all.  

There are a few difficult to understand parts of the story.....like what is a Hurdy Gurdy man?  You can sort of figure it out from looking at the pictures in the book, but we looked it up to make sure.   The hurdy-gurdy is the first stringed instrument like an organ grinder would use for his monkey to dance to.  Kinder Cottage has made a few small changes to help makes things more clear for readers now, like changing the word velocipede to bicycle.  

Once I got over my uncomfortable mom in 2014 vibe, I realized just how charming these stories are.  The good news is, the Hurdy Gurdy man and his pretty little girl were good people that were very kind to Peter and Jack.

I also realized that my youngest 3 hadn't even heard of Peter Rabbit and that somehow I had missed out on reading some of the older more classic children's books to them along the way.

These are just charming, old fashioned, sweet little children's books. 

Enjoying these books has nothing to do with whether you homeschool or not.  They are just nice, innocent little children's books.  

They would be a great gift for a new mom. They would be great for your own kids.....especially, if you have skipped some of the more classic books with them, like I apparently have.  They would great for grandparents to have for when grandkids come to visit.  I am sure it would spark some stories of the "olden days" as they read along.  


If you buy the books individually, they are $4.00 each, or you can get the entire 10 book set for $30.00





Take a look at what other TOS Reviewers thought of these sweet little books.