A Welly full of Christmas
Attie Lime, illustrated by Nadine Licence
Tiny Tree Books

I loved Attie’s Blue Jelly and Strawberries and so was eagerly anticipating her new seasonal offering, which is subtitled ‘Poems for Festive Fun’ and fun is what is contained herein.

There are forty poems, just over half of which actually contain the word Christmas; others focus on wintry weather, snow and there’s one, The Concert that took me way back to my very first reception class Christmas concert. This talks of a boy who wanted to ‘strum’, ‘hum’ and ‘drum pa-rum-pum-pum’ but was allocated a triangle to play. In my class two boys side by side were energetically playing maracas when one accidentally knocked the other’s instrument and the result is summed up in the delicious onomatopoeia of the final verse: ‘BASH CRASH THUMP and THWACK and SMASH … WALLOP, WHACK and CLASH … SMACK and BANG and THRASH’ that ensued as the boys started whacking one another with their maracas. Fortunately the audience thought it hilarious while I, thoroughly embarrassed, was endeavouring keep things going.

My two favourites don’t mention Christmas; both have a weather theme. There’s one describing a Sunday walk: I love the idea of sending ‘ pebbles skittering over ice clatter rattle, clatter rattle, clatter rattle’. I’ll try that at the next opportunity.

The other is Snowflakes, which describes these amazing forms as ‘sparkling icy glow-flakes / putting on a show-flakes’.

With a variety of poetic forms and moods, and an abundance of wit and warm-heartedness,.plus black and white illustrations by Nadine Licence, these offerings are a joy to read aloud to foundation stage/ KS1 children in the next few weeks.