2 THINGS I LEARNED & CANT WAIT TO SHARE!

Howdy Campers, and Happy Poetry Friday! (The link to PF is below)

I'm starting off our final topic of the year: 

Something New I Learned and Can't Wait to Share 

Sadie learns something new: TV!

There are soooo many things I'd love to share!
But lucky, lucky you, 

I can't remember all of them,
so I'll just offer two.

#1: This Splendid Blog Came Knocking at my Door...

Many of you probably already know this one...it's a blog! it's a newsletter! it's a splendid picture book/poetry/gift resource and more!)

I'm talking about Orange Marmalade Books ~ with the tagline: spreading the word on delightful children's literature  

And who's the wonderful writer behind the curtain?  Her name is Jill Swanson (though I think of her as Ms Marmalade.)

Jill's October 14th post, "Five for Autumn's Splendor" introduces us to the beauty of picture books that celebrate fall, including Buffy Silverman's On a Gold-Blooming Day: Finding Fall Treasures  

I love that her posts are never too long to read on a busy day, and I love that they're always full of the illustrations of the picture books she's introducing us to...such as this illustration from Buffy's book:

If this photo is cut-off on your device,
the words on each picture are: 
Clouds rumble. Mushrooms Pop.
Raindrops Tumble. Acorns drop.

I also love that this blog shines its light on books that are hot off the press and those that have been around for a while. Good books shouldn't be lost in the shuffle, and Ms Marmalade sees that they aren't.

I like getting her blog as a newsletter, which comes every two weeks. If you haven't already, check it out!

#2: A Poet I've Just Discovered: Arthur Guiterman

This past weekend, our pup Sadie was overjoyed to be in the center of a circle of my folk music friends in our living room. Janet, who was tossing Sadie a ball, told me that when she was young, her family put this short poem on their dog's house:

MOTTO FOR A DOG
by Arthur Guiterman

I love this little house because
It offers, after dark, 

A pause for rest, a rest for paws,

A place to moor my bark.

Sadie prefers Kitty's bed to her own

Born in 1871, Arthur Guiterman was famous for his clever humor and quick language.  He wrote of technological advances and modern progress in poetry, novels and satires. He addressed the hypocrisy of the ladies of Daughters of the American Revolution and other similar organizations. Guiterman co-founded the Poetry Society of America in 1910. Guiterman was forever caught in the “now,” addressing the rapid and shocking evolution of society with humor and mental agility: "First dentistry was painless;/Then bicycles were chainless" as well as...“Now motor roads are dustless, The latest steel is rustless, Our tennis courts are sodless, Our new religions, godless.” ~ The information above, which I've shortened, is from this source.

In looking up Guiterman, I discovered that one of my fellow blogmates, JoAnn Early Macken, posted information about him in 2016 and shared the very poem you just read.😊 

In her post, JoAnn writes: "The last line always grabs me. I didn’t realize the double meaning at first: a bark is a kind of boat; of course, a dog’s bark would be moored (tied up) somewhere cozy and safe. And the pause/paws homonyms add to the poem’s genius." 

Thank you, Matt, for hosting Poetry Friday this week 
on Radio, Rhythm and Rhyme

posted with hope by April Halprin Wayland,
with help from Sadie's big sister, Kitty

Celebrating a New Anthology Featuring Poems by Two TeachingAuthors!

Our current TeachingAuthors topic is "Something New I Learned and Can’t Wait to Share." I've been learning lots of things this year and am pleased to share a few with you today! You'll also find a link to this week's Poetry Friday roundup at the end of this post.

I'm especially pleased to announce that today we're celebrating this week's release of Clara's Kooky Compendium of Thimblethoughts and Wonderfuzz edited by Sylvia Vardell and Janet Wong and illustrated by Frank Ramspott (Pomelo Books).

This new anthology includes poems by me and my fellow TeachingAuthor, April Halprin Wayland. I include samples of our poems below. But first, here's a bit about this amazing new book for grades 3 and up. Clara's Kooky Compendium is a "fun-filled journal-style book featuring a mixture of dandy doodles and drawings, fun facts, quirky questions, and 150+ poems that will get your kids giggling and guffawing while they learn about language arts, science, math, research skills, writing techniques, and more." No wonder the book has been named a Children's Book Council "Hot Off the Press" Selection for October 2024! You can see the list of the over 100 poets who contributed to the anthology on the Pomelo Books website. That page also includes printable activity sheets to go with the book. (While you're there, you may notice that a portion of the profits from this book will be donated to charities that bring joy to children in hospitals.) If you'd like to learn even more about this anthology, watch this video from Pomelo Books posted on Twitter/X.

I am honored to have two poems in Clara's Kooky Compendium, both of which came out of a course I took with Sylvia and Janet on Writing Humorous Poetry. In that course, I learned that a poem doesn't always have to make the reader laugh out loud to be humorous. Instead, it can employ rhyme, repetition, sounds, wordplay, etc., to simply invoke a smile. And when Sylvia sent me the final images of my poems in the book, I also learned how much art can add to the fun! You can see that for yourself from the page featuring my poem "Pasta"!  

I even learned something from the Thimblethought that accompanies my poem--I had no idea the first U.S. pasta factory was built by a Frenchman! My other poem in the anthology is also in free verse, but it's quite different from this one. You'll have to get the book to read it for yourself, but I'll tease you with two facts about it: The poem is called "Invention" and it's related to math.

My fellow TeachingAuthor April Halprin Wayland also has two poems in the Compendium. Here's the first one, called "Errand Dog:"

Don't you just love April's poem? Her second poem is also about a dog, but again, you'll have to get a copy of the book and read it for yourself.

Just this week, I also learned that April has a poem in another anthology that released on October 1: The Mistakes That Made Us: Confessions from Twenty Poets edited by Irene Latham and Charles Waters and illustrated by Mercè López (Carolrhoda Books). Congratulations, April!

I'm looking forward to learning a lot more from the posts in this week's Poetry Friday roundup hosted by Tabatha Yeatts at The Opposite of Indifference

Happy Writing!
Carmela