My sister and I remember reading a book in the 90s that was word for word the lyrics to silver bells. It had photos that matched the lyrics – I remember the city sidewalks / busy sidewalks dressed in holiday style page was a snowy city street, darker outside, I believe with wreaths and other Christmas decor around town. I believe the whole song was printed out on the last page. It was a larger book, maybe 12” x 6” in size. Darker cover, hardback.
Category Archives: Picture Book
349G: Selfish Witch, Disguised as Regular Girl, Does Selfless Favor
Looking for a beautiful line-drawn picture book from earlier than 1975, about a witch and her daughter who live beyond the seven valleys and the seven seas. The daughter witch is selfish, and does not come home to her mother on time. Her mother sends her away until she can do a selfless favor for someone, while disguised as a regular girl. She is dropped off outside a village. Eventually, she finds a little boy who is also being punished, and helps him peel mounds and mounds of potatoes. She falls asleep doing this, and her mother comes to collect her. Ends with a line something like, "but she could never stand the sight of another potato."
349C: Beaver Patrol?
Looking for children’s book that my wife had as a child. She was adopted, but remembers this book from her birth mom. She is wanting those memories back. Can you help?
This is a children’s book with illustrations, circa 1970-1980. A family of beavers who wore red jumpers, I think. One of their activities in the book was making pancakes and flipping them with their beaver tails.
348R: Fairies who paint?
348O: Book with a page that is a dream about nose turning into a pickle w/ illustration (Solved!)
Book was hard cover, dark blue, about the same size and length as Graeme Base’s “Animalia”.
348N: Fern of the Forest?
I’m trying to find a picture book from the 90s about a girl who lives in a town where they only make dog houses. She runs away to the forest because she doesn’t want to make dog houses, and she builds an amazing tree house with the help of the forest animals. For some reason I remember the title as “Fern of the Forest” but that might be completely wrong.
348E: Girl With a Red Star
I’m trying to find a children’s book that is about a young girl who doesn’t want to get older. She is coming up on her birthday and climbs in the door jams of her house to prove she can still do the things she could do when she was younger. She paints a red star over one eye and I feel like her name might be Nora?
348F: Sam and the Seashore
Looking for a children's picture book written in the 1980s, possibly late 70s or early 90s. The book we had was hard-backed, medium sized average children's book. NOT a toddler or baby book. Illustrations were colorful, and detailed. Almost resembled Where's Waldo but not quite as intense. Images included illustrations of beach animals, shells and sand. and I remember beach trash was involved as well. The main character was a bald or short haired white boy. He might of had a dog. I am almost positive that the boy's name was Sam, Sammy or Samuel. I also remember that he doesn't like the beach at first, and at some point in the plot, he has a problem with an octopus. That's all I can remember. Both my sisters and I vividly remember this book, but cannot find it anywhere. We thought it was called something to the effect of "Sam and the Seashore" but a google search yields absolutely no results. It's been driving us nuts! Please help!
347S: Emperor’s Son Cleans Up His Brother’s Elemental Messes
I got this book when the author came to my elementary school in Maryland in the early 1990s. The book is about an emperor who has to decide which of his (twin?) sons will succeed him. He challenges them both to go recover each of the 5 elements and bring them back to him. The first rash son runs ahead and steals each element leaving angry people and wreaking havoc. The second son cleans up each of his brother’s messes and then is gifted the element. He uses that element to fix his brother’s destruction at the next stop (ex. using water to put out fire). The other notable feature of the book is the illustrations – the illustrator used intricate cutout silhouettes.
347Q: The World of Fairies – Story Collection
There is a book from my childhood that was lost when our basement flooded, and while my parents remember it vaguely they don’t have any idea the title or author. Here’s everything I can remember about it — sorry this is quite long!
- A parable (possibly within another story?) about an impatient fairy who wants to see a rose bloom before it is ready, so she tears open the petals. The rose is beautiful for a moment, but then its petals fall very soon and it dies, while its more patient and kind sister rose blooms naturally.
- There is some sort of war between the seasons, and the armies of fairies representing each season come together to fight. I remember particularly the illustration containing all of the winter fairies gathered together, with armor of ice, launching snowballs at their enemies. Much description of each type of fairy– the autumn ones wearing acorn cap helmets, the spring ones clad in flower petals.
- A fairy from the skies is sent on some sort of quest that involves diving beneath the sea to fetch something– maybe a pearl? She finds all of the underwater fairies very strange and is frightened of them. In the drawings, their faces are very sharp, and I believe they have some fish-like attributes. Even though they are unkind to her at first, eventually she gets what she came for. I think that this story also includes her seeking out each of the seasons, which in this case are personified as beatific humans covered in natural motifs that are relevant to their season.
- A young fairy who grew up in a bird’s nest, I don’t believe she has wings, and eventually falls from the nest and begins wandering the world. I have forgotten much of this story, but have a vivid memory of the illustration of a will o’ the wisp, drawn as a young, pale boy with a huge shining head. I think the will o’ the wisp at first intends to drown her in the swamp, but she charms him with her storytelling or her singing voice or something similar, and he falls asleep and she leaves in the morning.
- One about a human girl who believes in fairies, although she’s never seen them. She grows angry and resentful for some reason, and then one day she is outside and sees all of her wickedness grow up around her in a big black wall, illustrated with many little faces making horrible expressions hiding in the wall.
- I don’t know if this is part of the above story or a separate one, but a human girl who is shrunk down small like a fairy for one day and one night. She learns what a fairy’s life is like, drinks nectar and plays on blades of grass and sleeps in a seedpod. I think there’s a little boat in this one, made of leaves or something.