Tuesdays our public library runs a story time for kids, and this week Miss Lisa, the woman who runs the program, read Go Away Big Green Monster by Ed Emberley and had the children do a pumpkin craft to go along with the book.
The book, Go Away Big Green Monster, starts with two round yellow eyes cut into the page. Then, as each page is turned, a different feature of the monster is added: a long bluish green nose, squiggly blue ears, straggly purple hair, and so on.
When the monster is complete, the children continue flipping the pages to take the monster apart again until all that remains is the yellow eyes and then finally, at the conclusion of the book, nothing of the monster can be seen!
This Tuesday, when Miss Lisa finished Go Away Big Green Monster, she delighted the kids (and adults!) by pulling a Go Away Big Green Monster puppet out from behind her easel! The kids were enthusiastically recalled the story aloud as Miss Lisa pulled the features off the puppet just as the story described.
The children then went back to the tables for the pumpkin craft. Each child was given an orange plate along with two paper triangle eyes cut out to decorate if he wanted. Kaleb didn’t want to color his, and that was okay. They were then given a nose, mouth, and squiggly green vine for hair. The children used glue sticks to paste the features to their pumpkin masks. A sturdy handle was made from cereal boxes and taped to each mask.
The amazing thing to me is that, even though Kaleb just turned two, he totally “got it” the pumpkin craft much more than I did! He loved gluing the pieces of the project together but then kept ripping them off. At first I didn’t realize why he was doing this, but the more I thought about it, the smarter I realized he was (Mom Bragging Moment! Yes, I realize that!). He was actually playing Go Away Big Green Monster by yanking the features off his pumpkin face!
I am so proud of him! He now walks around “scaring” his older brothers with his pumpkin face. The older boys run away crying 😉 The whole project has just thrilled our entire household!
Thank you Miss Lisa. We are grateful to you, our public library, and local story time! Let’s keep these programs going. 🙂 _____________________________
The people read it and were glad for its encouraging message.
Acts 15: 31
God Bless…
