Category Festivals and Celebrations,

Elves on Strike / Clementine’s Christmas

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Elves on Strike
Nicola Edwards and Pauline Gregory
Little Tiger

It’s Christmas Eve and trouble is brewing in Santa’s workshop. Tired of working their fingers off the toy-making elves decide to stage a walk out. This sets off a concatenation of walk outs from the reindeer-training elves, the gift wrappers, the present deliverers and the mailroom staff. With just one little elf remaining a note flutters into the workshop. Having read that it’s a special plea from the sister of a child who is very sad,

the elf takes it to show Santa and he calls a meeting of all the elves, promising to help them henceforward. Can teamwork and a touch of magic change things and make Christmas a happy and surprising time after all?

Nicola’s rhyming narrative together with Pauline Gregory’s detailed, flap-filled scenes of chaotic elf activities, the strike and what follows, make a seasonal story that shows what Christmas is really about.

Clementine’s Christmas
Annie White
New Frontier Publishing

With Clementine on the scene, things are sure to be lively as the pooch’s family members prepare to celebrate Christmas. The tree is bedecked with baubles and bobbly bits, and the presents stand wrapped and ready. Granny, who has been busily knitting stays up late to complete her garment but then discovers that her ball of purple wool has disappeared. “Clementine, have you seen it?” she asks. The two begin to search until to her delight, Granny finds the wool. They also find the jumbled mess they’ve created. A quick tidy leaves everything sorted out but the labels are no longer on the presents. Granny hastily deals with re-attaching them and off to bed she goes.

Come the morning however, when the family presents are opened something is definitely not right. Can the bemused recipients find a way to sort things out? And who was responsible for the muddle?

Another fun, rhyming story about the loveable dog illustrated in amusing watercolour and pencil illustrations by the author.

One Wise Sheep

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One Wise Sheep
Ulrich Hub, illustrated by Jörg Mühle
Gecko Press

Originally published in German, this is a hilarious retelling of the nativity story unlike any other. It’s a chapter book with occasional illustrations that are perfectly appropriate for Ulrich Hub’s wryly humorous text.

Meet seven sheep, a small flock if ever there was one; it includes one that has a plaster cast on its leg, another that wears a bobble hat, one has its wool parted on the side, there’s one that wore braces but now has a retainer (in a case), one with a snuffly nose that means it needs to sleep away from the rest, one with an eye-patch, plus one more.

One night the sheep, unable to sleep see a bright star and the one with a bobble hat tells the others how it was woken up by a voice singing “ ‘I bring you good tidings’ … ‘And suddenly a host of angels appeared in our field singing praises. I think I even heard trumpets.” Where though are the shepherds? Certainly not kidnapped by UFOs, a goat (with attitude) assures snuffly nosed sheep, going on to say, “For unto us a child is born and you shall find it wrapped in swaddling clothes – “ This sheep reports back to the others, they all assume that the newborn is a girl and set off to find the town where this special baby is said to be.

All kinds of misadventures ensue

and eventually they arrive at their destination only to be told that the baby – a boy – and its parents have departed. The sheep are of course disappointed, especially after creating their own present: a song that begins, “Si-i-lent niiiight”—a song that they speculate is sure to be a hit. `’People will still be singing it in a thousand years.” However, they return to their fields (stopping on the way to pick up litter) and there a special treat awaits.

With a plethora of anachronisms (the shepherds have backpacks containing such items as spare socks and toothbrushes, UFOs, gift cards, wolves wearing mirrored sunglasses to name a few), this is a terrific read aloud (so long as audiences know the traditional Nativity story) to share in the classroom or with a family.
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Can You Find My Eid Presents?

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Can You Find My Eid Presents?
A.M. Dassu and Junissa Bianda
Scholastic

Panic sets in when, on the day before Eid-ul-Fitr, while her Mum is busy with preparations for the festival, Hana is sent up to her parents’ bedroom to collect the Eid presents ready for the family visit to Nani’s the following day. Having searched high and low in places both likely and unlikely, she hasn’t found a single one. Could they be outside in the garden, she wonders going out to check; but no luck. Without gifts this will be the worst Eid ever, she thinks to herself that night.

In the evening when her dad comes back in the car she rushes to ask him what to do, but is told to go and ask her Nana for help instead. Off she goes next door and …

As the story unfolds and young listeners join Hana in her present hunt, they will sense her mounting panic at her failure to locate them; this is captured in Junissa Bianda’s expressive illustrations of the little girl.

With Eid coming up in April, this book, with its search-and-find element, is one to share with young children at home or in an educational setting prior to the celebrations. You might also consider buying it as an Eid gift for a youngster you know who will be celebrating the festival.