In the first book, Isabella uses her imagination to showcase to her mother the amazing scientific women that she is pretending to become. She learns that the sky is the limit if she follows her dreams. In Isabella: Girl on the Go, we watch as Isabella sits in her backyard and talks to her father.

Once again, Isabella’s imagination takes her from her yard and propels her into the adventure of a lifetime. Each time her father asks her who she is, we are whisked off to a new city where we see a famous structure.

Thanks to Isabella, we are able to see that everything in the world is just a dream away. We learn about new careers like being an archeologist, artist, astronomer, and more while traveling to places like Paris, London, China, and beyond. The playful words from Fosberry allow readers to see where Isabella has gone in her imagination. They are paired perfectly with the gorgeous illustrations from Litwin.

The book really could be for multiple age levels. Younger children will marvel at Isabella’s silly imagination and talks with her father while in her own yard. Older children can use the tale as a starting point to do more research about the places and structures that Isabella sees within her vivid imagination. At the end of the book, there is even more information about the places and structures that we visit.

I know that I highly recommend this book and hope to use it for gifts in the future. More information about the book, a downloadable Isabella Girl on the Go Passport and activity kit, and book tour can be found on Sourcebooks website. I know I will be printing these out to try with my kids soon. They look like a fun addition to a book study in a classroom, or something to try at home on a snowy or rainy day.

What have you read recently? Please be sure to link up to your book posts in the comments below. Include something you read on your own, with a child, or someone else. Tuesday Tales are all about spreading the love for books.

Disclosure: I received this book complimentary of Sourcebooks in order to facilitate this review. No other compensation was given. The opinions expressed in the review are my own. Two Amazon Affiliate links are included in this post for the two books mentioned. I will receive a percentage of money for the sale should you opt to buy the book through that link.

The Magic Kingdom

No trip to Walt Disney World can truly begin until you walk through the gates and catch your first glimpse of Cinderella’s Castle down Main Street USA. The first time you being your children (or spouse), be sure to capture this special moment because the mouths hanging open are priceless.

As a child, I remember my first time on Space Mountain with my father and, years later, taking my oldest on it for the first time. We celebrated my youngest son’s second birthday at the Crystal Palace where he fell in love with Tigger. Classics like Dumbo, Small World, Big Thunder Mountain, The Haunted Mansion, and Pirates of the Caribbean all are home in this part. As someone who has read The Kingdom Keepers by Ridley Pearson, there is a special new spot in my heart for where this series begins.

Epcot

My earliest memories of the first summer that Epcot opened is meeting and falling in love with Figment. There was just something special about this purple dragon on the pavilion that he shared with Dreamfinder. Although it has changed over the years, I still adore going to see my purple friend.

While on our honeymoon, TechyDad and I spent a lot of time wandering around World Showcase together. It was romantic, close to the resort we were staying at, and housed many of the restaurants that we dined in. Yes, Epcot is likely my foodie favorite destination just for this reason alone. While we have never been to the Food and Wine Festival, we have fallen in love with the Flower and Garden show that just take your breath away.

Disney Hollywood Studios

My heart still belongs to the amazing Beauty and the Beast stage show at the studios. It is magical to watch, a great break in the day, and takes Disney movie magic into a stage show. A funny thing happened the first time I saw it with my parents and brother, then I watched my boys become mesmerized with the characters dancing and singing in front of them.

Of course, The Muppets have a space here and each time we can visit Kermit, Piggy, and the entire gang before walking over to Toy Story Midway Mania for some family arcade style fun.

Animal Kingdom

The first time that TechyDad and I went to Walt Disney World together, it was our honeymoon. I had been many times before, but it was his first trip. The beautiful thing about Animal Kingdom is that we were both going to this park for the first time together. We were able to stand in awe of the Tree of Life together as we started our life as husband and wife.

Watching the animals, exploring the lands, and seeing the shows makes for a great day. We adore the Lion King and Nemo shows, plus each time on the safari is different.

On our last trip, I was able to do something special. I participated in the African Trek with some of the other Disney Social Media Moms. It was an experience I will never forget.

As you can see, there are just too many magical items at each park to simply pick one definitive favorite. How about you, do you have a favorite Walt Disney World park and why do you feel that way?

P.S. A huge thank you to Mariana from The Domestic Buzz for creating this magical Blog Hop!  The link will be within this post the day after it is published.

Of course, I went to Pinterest and searched for President’s Day. I was pleasantly surprised with quite a few craft, writing, and classroom activities. Remember, once a teacher always a teacher – even if you are not in a classroom of your own. Before I knew it, I had a good amount of items on a board of my own.

I love that a lot of these will be more of a challenge for my third grader, but some could work well for my preschooler. One that I think will tie in nicely with other crafts we already have is the Kids Coins for Presidents Day from Alpha Mom.

There are a bunch of other items that we will have ready just in case we have extra time during the week. If you are interested in seeing the items that I have pinned, just click on my board below.

The best part of these boards is that I have a great collection to not only do with the kids, but also use in a classroom in the future. So, do you have any special items that you will be doing to celebrate President’s Day? Please share your plans or link up to a post about your ideas.

Watching you learn about Jewish holidays at nursery school has been so much fun. You love taking in all of the information and sharing it with us when you get home. Of course, you also adore making crafts that go along with the events.

Last week, your class celebrated Tu B’Shvat. As you told us, it was time for the trees birthday. One day, when you arrived at school, you were going to add paint to a tree project that you had already started. You were so happy to see what this multi media craft would involve. Another day, you planted parsley seeds into the remains of half an orange. As we drove home and you held onto the orange you were proud to announce that you helped to make orange juice before planting the seeds.

Now we will take the best care of your seeds as possible. With any luck, some parsley will grow and we can use it for our Passover Seder. For now, I look forward to seeing your smiling face as you learn all about Purim in the weeks ahead. I have a feeling you will be a pirate for your festival at school.

Thank you for sharing all that you learn.

Love,

Mommy

Thanks to this, I have been looking at Pinterest for crafting ideas to do with the boys. Over the last few weeks, I have gathered some items that may work for one, or both of the kids. I also tried to find items that we could do with supplies that we already own. To see some of the items that I pinned click on the Crafts for kids button below.

I know that NHL really wants to try finger knitting. With all of the extra yarn that I have in the house, this would be great. The boys would also love to make and then play with their own play-dough. Why not pull them into the kitchen to make something that they can use for hours with the toys that we already have. Of course, we will also be testing our their Shrinky Dinks that they got from Nana and Papa for Valentine’s Day. Who knows, maybe I will even have a chance to try some of the items in this board too:

So this week my question is:

If money, time, space, and mess factor were no issue – what craft would you love to do with your children and/or yourself and why?

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Thanks to Kailani at An Island Life for starting this fun for Friday. Please be sure to head over to her blog to say hello and sign the linky there if you are participating.

Aloha #191

I certainly can not shelter my children from the world around us, but as their parent I need to help them to get doses of it that are developmentally appropriate. Of course, the news and current events can be a great way to start conversations. The untimely death of Whitney Houston can be the starting point for talks with children about addiction. Discussing how they can always turn to you, that you will always be there should they be faced with making a hard decision in a social situation.

This reminded me of something I wrote for another project just over a year ago. It was from mid-January 2011. One year later, I could have written it about a number of different events or items that have take place.

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Last Saturday, the world stood still as we learned about the chilling events in Tucson, Arizona. So many lives lost, and others forever changed. After other tragedies, I remember being glued to the 24 hour news channels. I lived in front of CNN and MSNBC after the Columbine shootings and events of 911.

This time was different

I wanted to learn more, but I had a problem. My 3 and 7 year old children were around and I did not want to scare them with the news. My husband and I did not talk about anything with NHL. I kept trying to think about what I should say to my 7 year old, but there were no words..

This made me flashback to September 11, 2001. A day that everyone will forever remember. I was a substitute teacher that day in a first grade classroom. The teacher I was in for was overseas at a wedding. I was scheduled to be in for 1-2 days. As I was teaching that morning, the principal stepped in with a note about what had happened. At lunch, we discussed that we would not talk about anything until the kids went home to their families. The next day, the kids came in. Several had seen news with the planes crashing into the Twin Towers. They knew their teacher was on a plane that day. Counselors came into the classroom and the kids were reassured that their teacher was safe and would be back the following week.

As I watched the moment of silence covered on Monday, I wondered if NHL’s school would observe this. They did, and he came home that evening asking questions. He wanted to know what it was about. I sat there wondering what he had been told, and even more curious about what I was going to say. In the end, I told him that something bad had happened Saturday. A lot of innocent people had been hurt, and several were killed. I told him that everyone stopped for that time to remember those people and to hope that those injured would get better soon. No more was said since he seemed content with this explanation. Still, I worry about what he will hear in school. Kids talk, don’t know the facts, and scare each other with inaccuracies.

How do you talk to your children about current events? Do you tell them everything, let them watch the news, or try give only details that they need to know?

Disclosure: This post was previously published on a project I worked on during the time when Former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was shot in Arizona. The text is mostly the same, but I placed a new introduction for events happening one year later.

Once again, Pirates are on JSL’s mind. Yesterday, he wore his Jake shirt for the premier of Peter Pan Returns. Yes, Peter Pan finally arrives on the scene with Jake and the Never Land Pirates. This is a huge event in a four year old’s world.

The popularity of all things pirates is evident when you see all of the pirate themed birthday items, costumes, and lots and lots of books. Yes, authors are reaching out to new landlubbers to take them on an adventure with their own cast of pirate friends.

Last year, a Scholastic Book Club flyer came home and a book caught my eye. When I saw the title by June Sobel, I knew it was being purchased for our family. Shiver Me Letters: A Pirate ABC seemed like a perfect book to help my little pirate loving child to immerse himself into his alphabet learning through literacy.

This book is now a family favorite. Big brother NHL even likes to practice his pirate talk when reading this fun tale to JSL. The pirate adventure begins with the captain of the pirate ship ordering his crew to find him more letters. After all, a pirate does need more than just his R’s you know. The bright, cheerful illustrations by Henry Cole add another dimension to the story. What I really enjoyed was allowing JSL to search for each new letter within the pages. This helped him with letter recognition and gave us time to talk about what we could see within each page we turned.

As an educator, I love picture books that tell a story, captivate their audience, and teach children at the same time. Shiver Me Letters certainly does this and more. What I also adore is that June Sobel has a page on her website for teachers. Here you can find some great items to print and pointers to use when reading this with your class. She also linked up to Scholastic’s PDF with Read Aloud Activities to accompany the book. I have a feeling that JSL and I may have an alphabet treasure hunt next week during break. I know NHL would love to help us to make a map and I think it would be a great activity for all of us to do. I highly recommend this book to use with preschool and kindergarten age children to reinforce alphabet recognition and to create fun adventures with pirates and letters.

What have you read recently? Please be sure to link up to your book posts in the comments below. Include something you read on your own, with a child, or someone else. Tuesday Tales are all about spreading the love for books.

Disclosure: An Amazon Affiliate link is included in this post for the book mentioned. I will receive a percentage of money for the sale should you opt to buy the book through that link. We bought this book on our own from Scholastic and know it is on our gift list for other children.

Epcot had just opened and I fell madly in love with Dreamfinder and a cute purple dragon named Figment.

My love for Figment held on during that trip when it was time to pick something special out. The figment I am holding below was the special friend I picked out from a bribe my father made with me for going on Space Mountain.

Growing up at Walt Disney World, I watched as it went from one park to four over the years. The Contemporary Resort and Polynesian Resort soon had more and more resorts cropping up throughout the sprawling land that Walt Disney had purchased in Florida. Going to Orlando and spending time at Walt Disney World with my mother, father, and brother was priceless. It was a place where we were carefree, all kids at heart, and my father and mother laughed, smiled, and were relaxed. Memories of my father leaving his lens cap on during the Hoop-De-Do Review always make us laugh. Then there was soaring high over the Seven Seas Lagoon with my brother as we went parasailing for the first time. Classic times that were even more magical at Disney.

It’s no wonder that TechyDad and I picked Walt Disney World as our honeymoon destination. He had never been and I wanted to share my passion for this special place. I do not think it took a day and he was hooked. We even had a special tenth anniversary trip planned there in September. Unfortunately, that trip was canceled thanks to Hurricane Irene.

Now we both have watched as our two boys have caught the Disney bug. We have watched NHL and JSL meet characters, grow big enough to try out new rides, and many other items with us.

There are other places that we could go on family vacations, but each time is unique and provides us with special moments. Disney World is like a home away from home where we can forget about our troubles and enjoy time together.

So now it is your turn. What made you fall in love with Disney? Feel free to share a story, link up to a funny memory, or anything else in the comments.

P.S. A huge thank you to Mariana from The Domestic Buzz for creating this magical Blog Hop!