Tag Michaela Dias-Hayes

Family and Me! / Wildflower

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Family and Me!
Michaela Dias-Hayes
Owlet Press

What a gorgeous celebration of herself, her family and her heritage, the little girl narrator of this rhyming book shares with readers. Feature by feature she presents key parts of herself starting with her eyes – these are just like her mum’s eyes, caring and true; her nose is similar to the beautiful one her Nanny has, which she puts to good use when they cook together . 

From grandad comes her glowing skin, from her aunt dazzling hair to crown her super sense of fashion. Her dad has passed on his super smile and cheeky expression, 

uncle his gentle touch and love of creating art, she has her grandma’s finely tuned ears whereas with his amazing dance moves, Grandpa has passed on his joyful sense of movement and ever dancing feet. 

Thus we see this little girl has dual heritage and she goes on to show off her framed portraits of her Mum’s family that make one half of her and her Dad’s, which provide the other half. How wonderful to celebrate such a super family – nine individuals (plus pets) – who so clearly love one another dearly.
That love shines forth from every single one of Michaela’s gorgeous warm illustrations is so evident and the shared tenderness between adults and child is unmistakeable throughout.

Wildflower
Melanie Brown and Sara Gillingham
Greystone Kids

Newly in bloom, Daisy is happy in her sunny spot in the garden. However her happiness is short-lived thanks to Rose’s hurtful words, “My mama says you’re just a weed, and you don’t belong here.” Poor Daisy’s petals droop even further each time another flower tells her she’s a weed. Sage says that she is a chef’s best friend, Sunflower towers over the garden and has seeds that are good to eat, 

Chamomile makes soothing tea that helps people sleep, and Strawberry Flower produces sweet, juicy fruits to feed people. Then, Sweet Pea shares the information that like Daisy, she wasn’t planted; she too was blown in by the wind and is sometimes called a weed. Up chimes Blackberry Vine imparting the news that despite the delicious fruits she produces, she also gets called a weed. Moreover Dandelion’s seeds are windborne but she calls herself a wild flower that grows wherever the wind drops a seed. 

By now, Daisy’s self belief has been restored. Finally there grows a Milkweed flower, meek and mild; this one introduces itself as a weed but Daisy is ready to speak out against Rose, giving her vital information, “Every plant I met today has something special about them to be proud of, no matter what you may call them.” She also warmly welcomes the newcomer to the garden they all share.

The ‘believe in yourself and love yourself exactly as you are’ and ‘stand up for others against prejudice’ messages are engagingly conveyed for young children in this beautifully simple story where words and pictures work in harmony.

The Gifts That Grow

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The Gifts That Grow
Monika Singh Gangotra and Michaela Dias-Hayes
Owlet Press

This story is based on a true one from author Monika Singh Gangotra’s own family
When Amrita, her best friend Kiki and their pal Finn, return from school Finn tells Amrita’s mum that they have to create a recipe. Happily Amrita’s mum is busy in the kitchen preparing spices; it is, so she says a ‘garam masala grinding day.’

Having helped grind the spices, Finn notices that the background to a photograph hanging on the wall looks exactly like the tree growing in his backyard. Amrita’s mum confirms that it is the very same tree and that the person in the foreground is her own mum, Amrita’s Nani. She mentions that she has skin the colour of the masala they’ve been preparing and her smiling lips are the colour of jamun. This needs some explanation: Mum says it’s a purple fruit and that her mum brought a seedling from her jamun tree in India to their old house, the one Finn now lives in.

When they take Finn home, his dads Hayden and Andy welcome everyone warmly and Amrita asks their permission to show Kiki the jamun tree. Then Amrita’s mum tells them the wonderful, sometimes tear inducing story of the big tree, allowing space for a few interjections from Amrita along the way. 

Said tree was brought by Nani from India as a cutting taken from one planted there by Amrita’s mother’s great-grandmother when the little girl was a ‘little seed’ growing in her mother’s tummy as a celebration of that special time when Amrita was born.

With Indian motifs, objects including a tuk-tuk conjuring forth Amrita’s heritage land as part and parcel of Michaela’s brilliant, gorgeously hued illustrations 

and Monika’s beautifully told story rich in detail, full of love both intergenerational and that between the friends and their families, and that perfect ending, this is a book for everyone, everywhere.

If you eat eggs, there’s a recipe on the final page that sounds delicious, though if like me you don’t, you’ll need to think of an egg substitute.

Colour and Me!

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Colour and Me!
Michaela Dias-Hayes
Owlet Press

I’ll never forget, back in the day when I was doing my very first teaching practice in a primary school in south London coming upon a six year old West Indian boy, Errol, during an art session with white paint all over his hands – backs and fronts – trying to paint his face white too. ‘I hate by brown skin’ he said. That memory has stayed with me ever since and it saddens me that in the twenty first century, Michaela’s young son should have said something similar to her, prompting her to create this celebration of brown skin.

Michaela’s narrator is an adorable little girl who like many children of her age, loves finger painting. She shares with readers, her pet turtle Myrtle and her grandmother her experiments in colour mixing using the three primary colours.

First she makes orange by mixing red and yellow, then mixes yellow and blue, which results in

the same colour as her turtle and so on. Putting all three primary colours together gives her brown, which she recognises as her own colour. “This is ME. This colour suits me … PERFECTLY!” she announces and then goes on to create a glorious rainbow shaped design on the wall …

The positivity of both the rhyme and the glorious illustrations in this, the first of Michaela Dias-Hayes’ books as both author and illustrator, shine through on every spread of this, the first of a new series.

Sunflower Sisters

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Sunflower Sisters
Monika Singh Gangotra and Michaela Dias-Hayes
Owlet Press

This is the first in the publisher’s new ‘own voice’ series of picture books. The story focuses on Amrita and her best friend Kiki, both of whose families have weddings to celebrate.

It’s when a taxi arrives carrying Amrita’s Aunty that things start getting a little difficult. Aunty has outdated views and her negative comments about skin colour do not go down well with the rest of Amrita’s South Asian family, not with the bride and especially Mum and Dad. “We need to teach (people) that the skin we are in is EXACTLY as it is meant to be.” Mum tells Amrita and on the wedding day itself she continues to support and empower the girl

who looks amazing in her gorgeous yellow lehenga.

As bride Jas and the groom are bidding farewell to the family,

Amrita hears music coming from over the road where Kiki and her Nigerian family are having a wonderful time celebrating too and Amrita is allowed to peep in at the dancing.

Kiki and Amrita then make each other a promise: henceforward they’ll both ensure that every day they feel like sunflowers … and so they did …

It’s sad that familial colourism, indeed colourism of any form, still continues to wield its influence and this beautiful book will, one truly hopes go some way towards changing people’s minds as well as empowering young women to feel positive about themselves, no matter what colour their skin is.

I recall some years back when visiting Ranakpur temple in Rajasthan being approached by two beautiful young Indian women. One of them put her arm next to mine and said, “Your fair skin is beautiful, my brown skin is too dark.” I felt hugely saddened by her comment and assured her that she was beautiful. We sat and talked for a while, she told me she was getting married soon and even invited me to her wedding. If only I’d had this book back then to give her.

Debut children’s book illustrator, Michaela Dias-Hayes’ vibrant scenes with the gorgeously patterned clothing of many of the characters, as well as those golden sunflowers, make every spread a delight in this much needed book.