Spinning Yarns

I have just enough time to get a post in before the end of April.  I've been knitting like crazy this month and while I was knitting, I listened to a couple of books.  I listened to the Wizard of Oz read beautifully by Anne Hathaway.  I had never read the Wizard of Oz before, though I loved the movie as a kid.  It was fun to compare the book to the movie and, of course, a lot more happens in the book.  I really enjoyed the story.  I wish I had read it as a kid though.  One's perspective is so different as a kid and I wish I had read this book with a kid's perspective.  It's a wonderful fairy tale adventure and deserves a place in a young person's psyche.

Another book I listened to was Among the Hidden by Margaret Haddix Peterson.  This is a distopian novel, a genre much requested by the 5th graders at Marshall Lane, and the first in its series.  I'm interested in getting them as many distopian books as I can but I feel I need to read them first.  Distopian fiction tends to be a bit depressing but also presents the reader with an interesting thought experiment.  Take a flaw from current society, magnify it, and follow it through to its worst case scenario conclusion.  Could this really happen?  What would the world be like if it did?  Anyway, it was an interesting story but it lacks conclusion because the first book is a set up for the rest of the series.

I'm currently listening to Fablehaven by Brandon Mull.  I like the story but I don't care for the reader's voice so it's a bit distracting.

And here's what I've been knitting:

I finished a pair of sweaters for Ms. Wright's twin boys who will be joining the world soon.

I also made this sweet little doll inspired by the book Coraline by Neil Gaiman.  The book is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year and it's one of my favorites.  Here Coraline is wearing her blue coat with a hood, her red scarf and her yellow Wellington boots.  She's holding the seeing stone given to her by Miss Spink and Miss Forcible and she's ready to go exploring.

Also, you might have heard that I bought a spinning wheel.  Here is some of the yarn that I've spun on my spinning wheel.  (The big lumpy one is my very first skein!)

In other knitting news, last week was the last meeting of the Sticks and Strings knitting class.  Miss Colleen has done a very nice write up of it here.  I'm going to post the coin purse on Ravelry soon, I'll let you know when I do. 

So that's my kidlit and knitting news.  

CYRM: Marshall Lane Votes

After spending several weeks reading the 5 CYRM nominees which were:

 

The students of Marshall Lane cast their votes for their favorite nominated book.  Mrs. Richards carefully tallied those votes and determined that the official favorite CYRM nominated book of Marshall Lane is:

On Meadowview Street by Henry Cole.  It's so interesting.  I had this book in the library almost a full year before we started reading these books and it barely circulated at all.  Now that we've been reading these books, they are all in high demand, but especially this one, now that it's a winner.  I should pull out some of my other poorly circulating titles, read them allowed and see what happens.