A Forest of Stories

A Forest of Stories, by Rina Singh and Helen Cann, is a collection of "magical tree tales from around the world." These folktales reign from China, Guatemala, Japan, India, Nigeria, Israel, and Morocco. As Rina explains in the introduction to A Forest of Stories,

Trees are here with us now. We have a direct relationship with them-an unfair alliance, in which we accept a multitude of gifts from them and offer nothing in return. We nourish ourselves with the fruit they provide, and we use their wood to make our homes. We plant them in our gardens and parks, and we heal ourselves with the medicines they give us. We have both creatively and selfishly put every part of the tree to use, and yet they make no demands on us. they stand still, holding the soil in place, controlling floods and providing homes to countless animals.

Here is a list of the wonderful tree tales from A Forest of Stories:

• The Cypress Tree (Chinese)


• The Kapok Tree (Guatemalan)


• The Chestnut Tree (Japanese)


• The Cherry Blossom Tree (Indian)


• The Palm Tree (Nigerian)


• The Fig Tree (Jewish)


• The Pomegranate Tree (Moroccan)

My daughter's favorite story is "The Chestnut Tree", the tale of a Japanese girl named Aiko who is comforted by a tall chestnut tree on her way home from work everyday. One day, the tree tells her he is to be cut down and made into a great ship. Ironically, Aiko's father drowned when his boat was hit by a large fishing vessel during a great storm.

Aiko is heartbroken when she discovers the chestnut tree's stump, but she remembers its words that only she would be able to launch the great ship it by hugging it and saying, "I am Aiko, your friend."

The prince comes to launch the great chestnut tree's boat into the ocean, but it will not budge. All the strong fisherman tried to move the ship, but only Aiko had the power. In the end, the prince is enchanted by her story and asks her to marry him. "Her good fortune was indeed a gift of friendship from the chestnut tree."

Why do so many stories end with strong women marrying princes?

This review originally appeared on Eco Child's Play.

Herb, the Vegetarian Dragon

My daughter is a vegetarian, a choice she made on her own as a four-year-old. I am a vegetarian, but her father eats fish and the rare locally-grown beef. As a toddler, we let her make her own food choices, as I figured her body would tell her what healthy choices she needed.

When she was old enough to realize that an animal was harmed for her food, she made the choice to join me in a vegetarian lifestyle. She was the only vegetarian in her kindergarten class. Now, her best friend has become a vegetarian and her teacher is a vegan. Thus, she was very excited to read a book about a vegetarian dragon!

Herb, the Vegetarian Dragon, written by Jules Bass and illustrated by Debbie Harter, is the tale of the only pacifist, vegetarian dragon in the forest of Nogard. The other dragons ate royal princess, brave knights, and wild boar meat, but Herb had his own vegetable patch. When all the dragons fled to hide from the brave knights who decided to retaliate and capture all of the dragons, Herb was mistakenly imprisoned as one of the meat eating, killing dragons. While he was incarcerated, the other dragons tried to tempt him to eat meat:

"Thanks, but no thanks," Herb said. "I don't see it your way, so I'll take my chances. I don't ask you to stop eating meat, so why do you ask me to stop eating vegetables?"

Eventually, Herb was rescued from execution by a little girl, who knew he was a vegetarian and not guilty. The other dragons agreed to stop eating people, and peace was brought to the forest of Nogard.

My children really enjoyed this story, but I found it awkward. I think there is an attempt to show how vegetarians and meat eaters can live side by side in peace, a message of tolerance; however, the violence has caused some readers to be appalled. To tie up, tempt, and almost execute a vegetarian does not make for a very gentle and peaceful book.

Herb, the Vegetarian Dragon has his own website! There, I discovered that the author Jules Bass has produced classic animations, such as Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer and Frosty the Snowman. The illustrator Debbie Harter is also a jewelry designer. On the website, children can send an email to Herb, get vegetarian recipes, and send greeting cards. Herb also has his very own kids' cookbook, which may be better than his tale. Herb is a good guy, even if his story is a little awkward and violent.

This review originally appeared on Eco Child's Play.

What's This? A Seed's Story

There's a plethora of wonderful children's books on gardening, but there is always room for more! What's This? A Seed's Story by Caroline Mockford is a charming story about a child's discovery of a seed and the cycle of plant life. I was lucky enough to have my six-year-old daughter read this book to me for her homework.

What's This? A Seed's Story begins with a bird discovering a seed one winter morning. I anticipated the bird would eat the seed, then deposit its droppings somewhere and begin the plant's life; however, my prediction was wrong. Instead, a little girl, along with her marmalade cat, discovered it and "planted the seed carefully in a corner of her garden." My daughter has her own garden, as I believe every child should, so I was happy to see the main character in this book also has her own garden bed. Beth recently wrote about her child's birthday garden, but back to our story...

The girl tends to her seed, and then one day, it started to grow. At this point during our reading, I asked my daughter what kind of plant she thought it would be. She guessed a flower, and I guessed a pea. As the plant grew taller and taller, I changed my prediction to a bean, and noticing the pole used to support the plant, my daughter thought it must be clematis.

Every day when she woke up, the little girl ran straight out to the garden to look at the plant that was growing from the seed. And one morning, when she ran outside, there, turning its head to the sun, was a magnificent sunflower.

At this point in the story, I was reminded of Melanie Eclare's A Handful of Sunshine. Like Tilda in A Handful of Sunshine, the little girl saved her sunflower head in the fall. In What's This? A Seed's Story, the little girl takes her sunflower head to school, where the teacher helps her shake the seeds out gently. Too bad the teacher didn't take the opportunity to teach the children about Fibonacci and flowers. When spring returns, all of the children in the class plant the sunflower seeds "And when the next summer came, every child had a beautiful, smiling sunflower!"

You can read more about organic gardening with children on Eco Child's Play.

Airport

Airport by Byron Barton is one of my three-year-old son's favorite books. We just took a cross-country trip on three airplanes, and my son would hold this book, point to pictures, and look at it over and over again while traveling. Like other books by Byron Barton, the text and illustrations are simple, and there is a lot children can relate to their own experiences in airports and flying on airplanes. It is a great book to read in preparation for a trip, as well as while flying. I wish this book included a part about going through security though, as both of my children are always unnerved by this experience, especially now that you have to remove your shoes.

Trade Children's Books on Swaptree

While reading one of my favorite parenting blogs Z Recommends, I noticed an advertisement for Swaptree. Swaptree provides an online service where you can trade books, music, dvds, and video games for free with other users. This is a great idea for children's books, especially as children outgrow pictures books and are ready for chapter books.

Swaptree was started because the founders noticed:

• their mothers were frequently trading books with their network of friends


• their nephews played a new $55 dollar video game for a week or so, and then never again


• their shelves (and everyone else's shelves that they knew) were filled with hundreds of CDs and DVDs that weren't going to see the inside of a CD or DVD player anytime soon


• the price of college textbooks had gotten out of hand

Swaptree works like this:

1. List an item you have to trade.


2. Swaptree's algorithms discover what you can receive in trade for your item.


3. You chose what you want in trade.


4. Print postage and mail your item.

You can read more about Swaptree on Eco Child's Play.