Spinderella is a small, intrepid spider who wants nothing more than to learn about numbers. She finds her family’s absolute disinterest and even disdain on the matter frustrating. Luckily, she lives in a school. With the help of her “hairy godmother”, she learns to count up to twenty, divide up the teams and keep the score at football by paying close attention to the kids at school. She then uses all her newly acquired knowledge to organise her big family into peaceful and fair football playing. 

This is the first Julia Donaldson’s non-rhymed story and one of only two collaborations with other illustrators that we read. But such a big LIKE! The first “fairy godmother” encountered – and oh! Such an original one it is :))). A story about the importance of numbers and basic mathematics. How else would one know how many boots are needed to protect the spider’s feet when playing football, for example? A story about fairness and equal chance; encouraging thirst for knowledge and enabling learning; about not getting discouraged and overcoming surrounding ignorance. Bonus: two strong female role models. One determined and in control. The other one brave enough to learn from her mistakes.

Little gosling gets super excited every time the hairy godmother appears. We take turns counting up to 20 together with the kids and shouting “goooooal” when Spinderella scores the winning point. He finds it hilarious when Spinderella’s family counts everything in “lots” and “loads” and shouts “down with numbers!”. I love it when mummy spider respects Spinderella’s knowledge and takes her guidance, as well as the playful positive strong image school and learning this book portrays. We know now what spiders eat and the use of “up/down with” to express like and dislike. I love little gosling’s habit of repeating the new information and explaining it to me and his daddy again and again.. So sweet! 

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I thought “I want to read her books if I ever get pregnant again”… So, once the first 12 weeks of pregnancy were safely behind us), I diligently ordered a copy of her first book, “The positive birth book”.  

This is an informative and empowering reading, particularly for first-time moms-to-be or mummies who are looking for ways to have more control over and improve on their subsequent birthing experiences. With exposure to the medical systems in three different countries on two continents, with different approaches and options offered to women to give birth, I found the book an especially useful read for women who give birth in traditionally highly medicalised or interventionist settings. 

It can help ease a lot of the anxiety and fears first time moms-to-be experience. It challenges some of the common misconceptions and negative perceptions around birth. It is packed with research-based data, medical and birthing experts’ opinions and all kinds of personal birthing stories. Although rooted in the anglo-saxon ways of doing things, there are many important lessons that can be drawn to improve on birthing experiences of women everywhere. 

I have a positive recollection about the birth of my son: a quick, natural birth, in an informal, quiet, cosy, non-medicalised setting, with a midwife who only made her presence known when absolutely necessary, my husband next to me. The book reinforced my belief that I had done the right things the first time around to help me birth my baby as I wanted and the  wish that my second birthing experience resembles the first one. I noted down a few tricks for labour and preparation for labour looking at how I could improve on my first experience. 

I definitely want to practice more and regularly (and starting much earlier) staying into the relaxed zone. I remember how difficult it was to stay relaxed and focused on breathing during the active phase of labour. I felt out of control of what was happening. I thought about making up my own affirmations and practicing one or two visualisations of my own (e.g talking to my baby, imagining moments together with baby and little gosling, cuddling, singing or reading together or just spending time outdoors). I would also like to try and be more present during labour, including active labout, taking mental notes of my sensations, for an accurate picture of my birthing story. 

I will make sure to have the image of different birthing positions at hand and put a note to move more. During my first labour, I was quite static. This worked amazingly well for me during the first stages, being all relaxed, either sleeping or in the bathtub, listening to my relaxation tracks. The later stages were messy and although I tried a few different things, maybe, just maybe, moving around more (maybe dancing? :)))) and trying a richer variety of positions could render it more manageable. 

More importantly, the book inspired me with two intentions (may be common sense to many, but not obvious to me): 

• Be more assertive in my interactions with doctors/caregivers. Ask questions; discuss options and alternatives; ask for pros and cons. Not be afraid to say “no” or “I want to do things differently”, “I want to wait a while longer” if something does not feel right. One thing I would definitely be more inquisitive and assertive about is the idea of a possible induction or a membranes sweep. Little gosling was born at 41 weeks exactly, a few hours before a planned membranes sweep which we had accepted without much questioning, but very anxiously, purely trusting our midwife. 

• Stay open-minded and flexible about the way in which birthing could go. If my plan A cannot happen (a natural, full-term, non-medicalised birth), there are ways to make other courses of action more palatable. I intend to prepare myself as much as possible, so as to have a birthing experience that I can feel good about and remember without angst.

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Oli is the cutest worm, with those big, red glasses and contagious smile, who unknowingly  lands in the Magical Garden, falling from an unfriendly beak. He makes friends with a Witty Apple who takes him to Madam Onion, the knowledgeable garden healer, master of the vitamins’ secrets and slayer of germs and viruses, to have his broken tail mended. Accidentally, he knocks down the jar where Mucus is locked away from the world. A fierce battle ensues between the inhabitants of the Magical Garden on one side and Mucus on the other.

Great opportunity to learn how useful and beneficial earthworms are to our gardens, true super-heroes, much like the broccoli, onion and garlic that put their strengths together to annihilate Mucus. Even more so as little gosling is not a fan of tomatoes, onions or garlic. Tomatoes, it beats me why, because he loves tomato sauce and ketchup. The other two he finds too spicy (“maybe I’ll like them when I grow up”), although he does occasionally taste some onion heart, but only because he can dip it in the salt and he loves that ;).

It’s an amazingly fun and playfully informative read. The scattered little poems and witty names are charming. The characters each have their own distinct personalities and add flavour to the story. The panicky Lisp Tomato and Madam Onion’s Whisk are my favourites. The illustrations marry well with the text, perfectly depicting the conviviality of the garden community. 

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The story captures in all its details the emotions Jabari goes through in attempting his first jump from the diving board. His initial courage (“how hard can it be?!”), his doubts, his fear and anxiety, finding excuses to delay the jump, whilst trying to put on a brave face, the courage he draws from his dad’s empathetic attitude and finally, the excitement of the accomplishment. Love dad’s attitude – encouraging in the key moments, without being intrusive or insistent. So effective! What a great bond the two of them must share! Great for modelling parental behaviour when little ones deal with challenges. 

After reading this, little gosling has become fond of squeezing. He gets it could be a part of a secret language we can develop together. And he’s been asking whether we could find a pool where young kids like him can swim and do exercises in water (alongside mummy and/or daddy, certainly). So, there’s some homework for me

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Sully feels anxious and intimidated to compete against his colleagues in the sea school contest. He’s not particularly good in any of the disciplines in the competition (that is being polite). He tries to avoid participating, but Miss Trout encourages everyone to just try their best and he feels obliged to do so, all the while fearing and knowing he’ll come last. He wishes he could have one of the talents his colleagues possess.. Until he amazes everyone with his ability to change colour and become invisible in the sea, in face of danger from being caught by a diver. He realizes, then, how special he is :). 

This is a cute, lovely rhymed story, populated with sea creatures, full of emotion, with brightly coloured illustrations. Sully is relatable and one can’t help wanting to hug and comfort him. For some reason, little gosling is hooked on Miss Trout, the teacher. He gets excited at every start of a race “On your marks, ready, get set… go!!!” and he’s fascinated by the shadow of the boat underwater. He calls it “the book with the shadow” On one of our readings, I told him the words in the book : “you are amazing” and he said “no, I am not amazing, I am a baby!” :))) 

Little gosling has his own little pink seahorse buddy, which he carefully chose himself after our visit summer 2020 to Sea Life Blankenberge, where we saw some less glamorously coloured seahorses. 

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The second time, we paused a bit more on some of the interactive elements of the Dinosaur Gallery. The virtual moving Pachycephalosaurus was still an object of fascination. Therefore, taking turns, his daddy and I employed a little trick to try and make little gosling feel a little bit less scared of it. I sat in front of him, on the specially designated spot and responded to its every move with a roar and a claw-like hands movement of my own. It must be designed to play this game, since it seemed like it stopped disconcertedly, wondering every time I did that. I kept doing that defiantly and very vocally until it smashed the virtual glass panel that separated us. I repeated the trick several times whilst little gosling came closer and closer to me and started mimicking me. It frightened him less and less, although the smashing still made us all jump :)))). 

We played at identifying the dinosaur skeletons (and marvelled at the very long tail of the diplodocus) and matching the skull molds to the dinosaurs. We played with the levers mimicking the power and easiness of movement of the femur of upright vs. sprawling posture dinosaurs. We measured our heights against that of some of the dinosaurs. 

When little gosling asked to take a break and rest for a moment and looked up at me: “mummy, do you have something to read?” I brandished with a proud smirk a new acquisition: Giles Andreae and David Wojtowycz’ “Mad about dinosaurs”. It was a surprise I had held in store just for this occasion. We quietly sat down and read all the quatrains in the book, looking around for the corresponding dinosaur skeletons. 

Much like the other books in the “Mad about..” series, this one describes in verse and super-colourful and suggestive illustrations twelve types of the most known dinosaurs, including the T-Rex, the triceratops, the stegosaurus, the diplodocus, the brontosaurus or the velociraptor. The star of the book was however the lesser known (to us) ankylosaurus, whose body is protected by an armour, so if you’re a T-Rex and unwise enough to attack it, you’ll end up breaking your teeth :))). Consequently, from then on, on our games of “if you were an animal, what would you be?”, the ankylosaurus has come up repeatedly. Why? Because he is obviously not afraid of the fierce T-Rex, like most of us would be if it was still roaming the Earth. The short poems and funny illustrations make for a playful and thoroughly enjoyable learning, for both mummy and little gosling, with just a nutshell of information easy to absorb by young minds. 

The reading finished, we moved on to “The living planet” exhibition, identifying animals (“I like best the…., because it is….”, pointing to them) and dwelling on the different habitats. Great learning opportunity all the photo visuals and the regrouping of animals per habitat. 

Little gosling sat down for another rest pretty soon and luckily chose to do it inside the Tetrapodium and Arthropodium – a small room exhibiting skeletons and sketches, all in ivory and black, of four and six legged animals. We played, taking turns at identifying and finding the different animals: “ I see a tortoise” – “Here”. “I see a rhino” – ‘There”, running around the room, with little going pointing excitedly at every find. We must have been at it for 15-20 minutes minimum, covering almost all of the animals in the room. 

We ended our tour with a visit to the museum cafeteria and a tasty sandwich. I’m sure we’ll be back again soon, as it was lots of fun.

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“The wonderful wizard of Oz” was one of my favourite stories growing up. I still carry with me bits and pieces of its dramatised version for radio/vinyl in Romanian and have been singing its song about the yellow brick road to little gosling to sleep. I’ve long wanted to share the story with him and I finally decided to do it when he showed a strong and persistent interest in tornadoes

It’s retold in a simple fashion, a bit abruptly, but totally easy to follow for my 3 years and a half old, without it being too poor in language. Little gosling has been totally fascinated by the words “cellar”, “twister”, “booming” and “scrub”:)); he keeps asking me every time about their meaning and then runs to ask his daddy “daddy, did you know that….?” 

The whole page spread out illustrations help a lot with the understanding of the text and have captivated his attention. The tornado, the witches and the wizard, the flying monkeys (“we all know monkeys can’t fly, but these ones do”), Oz’s giant head screen and megaphone (“to make the booming voice”) are elements on which we dwell quite a lot each time we read it.. Which is pretty much every night for more than a week, already.

I get lots of “why” questions: why do they have to go in a cellar? Why does Dorothy live with her uncle and aunt? Where is her granny? Why is her uncle called Henry? And so on…We talk about emotions and what each of the characters experiences in different situations, particularly who gets scared of what. Dorothy and Toto look quite fearless. He also has me singing “We’re off to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of Oz” from the movie several times :))).

Can’t wait to read the original story and watch the move with him when he grows a bit older! 

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Until such time we go to the forest (one without mean wolves!!!, only with friendly wolves) to pick up sticks and twigs to make our own witch broom and wand, he runs around the house in complete outfit: our (much smaller and different, imperfect-looking) broom; a big bucket for a cauldron; one of his daddy’s fancy hats, almost invariably covering half his face; and a spatula for a wand It’s cute, albeit a bit anxiety-inducing :))) seeing him ride the broom up and down the living room and struggling to hold everything together, just  like the witch in the story. 

The wonderfully catchy rhyme (one of those that stick inadvertently and definitively onto your cortex) goes about the witch losing some of her items, one after the other. As she does, she repays the animals who help her get them back by taking them on her broom. Until… the broom snaps in two!!! A chase ensues, with a dragon and a terrible four-headed monster involved. But the story has a happy ending! The witch gets to show she can do magic, when all her gratefulness translates into a plane comfortable-like broom. 

A truly engaging read-aloud, it is fast-paced, full of suspense, loud, scary, funny, happy. Little gosling has fun reproducing all the sounds in the book. I love his shrieks and croaks :)). He never lets me forget going in a lower, scary voice for the dragon and gets so excited with the jumping; the one that gets the broom to break and the jumps for joy at seeing the newly refurbished broom. He’s truly fascinated by the cauldron and he uses his most mysterious tone to recite the witch’s spell: iggety ziggety…..

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In “Anna Hibiscus’ Song” by Atinuke, illustrated by Lauren Tobia, Anna Hibiscus explores her extended family’s ways to express happiness, until discovering her own. There is counting the reasons why, holding the loved one’s hand or telling them “I love you”, the quiet contemplation or dancing, working or walking on one’s hands. Whilst all are valid, Anna feels inspired by the birdies that keep her company up in the mango tree in the middle of the family yard, to sing, to sing about everything that she sees and makes her heart burst with happiness. 

I just love this book! I love the intimate vibe, the conviviality of sharing a home with the extended family, the sheer joy it exudes in the simplest and most familiar context possible. Little gosling was fascinated (and a little intrigued) with Anna Hibiscus and her cousins running around barefoot. He also promptly asked to visit his grandparents, so that we could climb trees in the garden together.. So, that’s two things we have on our to do list when the weather gets warmer, although I was not the climbing trees kind of kid growing up. The walking on our hands part we can do already in our living room :P. As for ways to express happiness, smiling blissfully while sitting still is what seems to be working these days. I saw him smiling without an immediate reason the other day, laying back in his chair at the dinner table; when I asked what made him smile, he simply said: “I am happy” :). Singing also works, but only if it’s about his best friends, the kitchen robot and the mixer :))))). What I like most about the book is that it reminds me the delicious taste of my favourite jam: the mango jam…

Such a great reminder of the importance to share all the good emotions, feelings and sensations with the loved ones.

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Little gosling took to Paddington quickly and passionately :). He rediscovered one of his first stuffed toys, a gentle bear more than half his size, whom he diligently makes space for under the covers every evening now, keeping it close to himself so that they can listen together to our bedtime stories, declaring with a big smile: “I also have a bear called Paddington” :)))). And Paddington is sure to find his way among his chosen stories at least one every two evenings. 

The first in the picture book series, it introduces Paddington and the Browns, telling how they found him at the train station and decided to take him home to stay with them, his first encounter with a loaded tray of sweets, a grumpy taxi driver, as well as his first bath and his falling asleep whilst recounting his adventures to his new family. It does feel unfinished, so I’ll just have to get my hand on further picture books with Paddington Quickly! 

Little gosling loves the way Paddington politely raises his hat to say hello and his eyes sparkle and laugh when the bear shows the almost empty jar of marmalade that has fed him on his journey from darkest Peru (bread with jam may be his favourite snack !!!) He frowns at the grumpy cab driver who seems less than happy to have a bear in his back seat and loves Paddington bath time. He asks for our bath mirror to be full of steam when he takes a bath! 

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