Just pictures
For the story so far click here 🙂
to be continued …. 🙂
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vegan, vegetarian, vegan comic, vegan comic for children, children’s story, vegan children, aquariums, animals, animals in captivity, animals for entertainment, marine animals, fish, crustaceans, art, comics, juvenile fiction, watercolour, adventure, children’s adventure story
The fourth and final of our Honestly Books giveaways is very similar to the first – How Many Friends Could A Bibbolybob Make If A Bibbolybob Came To Earth? – but it’s a little one! It turns out that this early learning title, by Edward Benn and Juliet Mahoney, has been so popular that Honestly Books decided to release a miniature second edition. Well it’s not that tiny – just about the size of a standard paperback – but it’s not as big as the great big first edition 😀
Anyway, let’s get to the point. Apart from it’s size, this has everything the first one had: a cute story with cute animal characters, a cute alien visitor and an introduction to numbers for little children. Look here for our review 🙂
If you would like to win a copy of this dainty little picture book, just comment on this post and you will be entered into Friday’s draw 🙂 It’s your last chance to win so good luck!
For those not lucky enough to win one of these lovely books, of course you can find them all on Amazon 🙂
The lucky winner of our 3rd Honestly Books giveaway, What’s Good For The Goose Is Not Good For The Panda by Lavender Laine, is B Mackela
Congratulations Bill 🙂 Give us your address via our contact form on the About page and we will get the book to you as soon as possible.
There now remains only one more chance to win! The final book of our Honestly Books stash, the little Bibbolybob book, will go into the draw next week. Look out for Monday’s post to enter 😀
Venus Aqueous Episode #4 starts tomorrow!
Don’t miss it! 😉
By the way, you can go to the 8 years and up page to find the earlier episodes and get the story so far if you want to 😀
Edmund’s Lunch is available as a little paperback which includes the recipe for his delicious vegan, gluten-free lunch.
It is also one of the stories in the collection Why are you a vegan? and other wacky verse for kids (not including the recipe)
As soon as I saw this I just had to order a copy! It’s made completely of collage!
Lavender Laine has written and illustrated the whole book completely by cutting out bits from old magazines, wrapping paper, food packaging, yarn and buttons! Talk about recycling! Even the copyright page is written in collage!
Laine’s story is about a panda called Patty who has woken up hungry but doesn’t know what to eat. She meets lots of people willing to share with her but finds that what they’re eating isn’t necessarily her cup of tea.
Each picture is made with different materials so they are all very different, and some are more abstract than others, which will encourage children to make art out of whatever they’ve got lying around.
The story is rhyming, with one verse per page, and every page is a feast for the eyes. Children can read it slowly, or have it read to them, while they study the unusual images and try to work out what they are and what they’re made of.
You really feel like you could pick at the paper and peel off the layers – not that you would. It just looks so tactile.
The story is absolutely lovely and can be enjoyed again and again. It makes the point that we are all different, and what’s good for one might not necessarily be good for someone else. No wonder it is dedicated to the Safer Medicines campaign 🙂
From Honestly Books. Available on Amazon.
Babs wanted you to know that we’ve got some postcards up for grabs, although they’re disappearing fast!
If you like sending postcards through the mail, or if you like this website and would like to share it with others by leaving them in library books or some such, then drop us a line using the contact form below and tell us your name, address (anywhere in the world) and how many you’d like – up to 24, that’s as many as will fit in the envelope 😉
You are so kind 😀
Now Babs is ready for her close-ups:
‘One farmer says to me, “You cannot live on vegetable food solely, for it furnishes nothing to make bones with;” and so he religiously devotes a part of his day to supplying his system with the raw materials of bones; walking all the while he talks behind his oxen, which, with vegetable-made bones, jerk him and his lumbering plough along in spite of every obstacle.’
Henry David Thoreau
from Walden in the chapter named ‘Economy’
Well, they will be tomorrow.
Watch this space!
Episode 2: In The Library With The Elastic Band will be on the 5 years and up shelf tomorrow 🙂
Sherman & Geynes, Expert Sleuths
Episode 2:
In the Library with the Elastic Band
coming very soon 😀
For the story so far, click here
“Hee hee” said the cow,
“Woo hoo” said the hen
“Hurrah!” said the sow
And the sheep cheered again.
“He did it!” they cried
As they skipped and they ran,
“Farmer’s eyes opened wide,
And he became vegan!”
And it’s true! It’s happening again and again!
Click here for some wonderfully moving true stories of animal farmers who awoke to the reality of what they were doing and completely turned things around 🙂
Pop and crackle,
Fizz and bubble,
The witch stirs her cauldron
On the fire in her hovel.
***
She shrieks at the night
It will happen alright,
The life-giving force
Of her potion’s in sight.
***
It’s got onions and greens,
Carrots and beans,
There’s garlic and lentils,
She’s hungry and keen
To gobble it up,
From bowl and from cup,
The magic of plants
She’ll slurp and she’ll sup.
“He’ll soon be dead,”
The doctor said
As she stood at the end
Of her patient’s bed.
***
“He ignored my advice,
Never gave up his vice,
‘Those flesh foods will kill you’
I said more than twice.”
***
The nurse shook his head
As he straightened the bed,
“Avoidable suffering,
What a waste,” he said.
We are having fun making videos of some of our stories being read aloud and have decided to make Story Time a permanent fixture on our site. So, if you want to be read a story, just click on the link in the sidebar to your right (or the big picture above) and choose a video 🙂 There are only two on there at the moment, but give us time, we’ll keep them coming 😉
Click on the pic to read this new short fairy tale
Or find it on the Fairy Tales shelf along with a couple of others 🙂
will be on the shelf tomorrow! 😀
There’s a spider in my shower cap
And she doesn’t want to go.
She’s determined to hang on,
Whether I shake or whether I blow.
So I guess if it’s that important,
And she really wants to stay,
I don’t mind getting my hair wet.
It looks better on her anyway.
Chickens are people
Just like dogs.
They enjoy dust baths
And jumping on logs.
Chickens will play games
Like ‘chase’ and ‘steal your smalls’.
They’ll splash you in the paddling pool,
Though not keen on fetching balls.
Some of them are gentle,
Some of them are tough.
Some of them are bossy,
Some timid and soft as fluff.
They all have personality
And every one is different.
Just like Rover and Fido and Max
They might be quiet or exuberant.
Crab noun
Oxford Dictionary definition: 1. Shellfish with 10 legs 2. This as food
Our definition: 1. Crabs are sentient beings who live in all the world’s oceans, in fresh water, and on land, are generally covered with a thick exoskeleton and have a single pair of claws. They attract a mate through chemical (pheromones), visual, acoustic or vibratory means. Pheromones are used by most fully aquatic crabs, while terrestrial and semi-terrestrial crabs often use visual signals, such as fiddler crab males waving their large claw to attract females. Crabs are mostly active animals with complex behaviour patterns. They can communicate by drumming or waving their pincers. Males will fight to win females or to defend territory. Fiddler Crabs dig burrows in sand or mud, which they use for resting, hiding, mating and to defend against intruders. Crabs are omnivores, feeding primarily on algae, and taking any other food, including molluscs, worms, other crustaceans, fungi, bacteria and detritus, depending on their availability and the crab species.
2. Crabs are boiled alive by humans who want to eat them.
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The Cc page is done now (click on the pic or go to the dictionary in the sidebar).
I’ll be starting on Dd today 😀
“‘From caring comes courage.’ We might add that from it also comes wisdom. It’s rather significant, we think, that those who have no compassion have no wisdom. Knowledge, yes; cleverness, maybe; wisdom, no. A clever mind is not a heart. Knowledge doesn’t really care. Wisdom does. We also consider it significant that cor, the Latin word for “heart”, is the basis for the word courage. Piglet put it this way: ‘She isn’t Clever, Kanga isn’t, but she would be so anxious about Roo that she would do a Good Thing to Do without thinking about it.'”
Benjamin Hoff
The Tao of Pooh
Page 128
You’ve got until midnight Sunday (GMT) to let us know if you want to enter the prize draw to win a copy of Why are you a vegan? and other wacky verse for kids
TICK TOCK 😀
Where are you going Deidra? is one of our favourite, and one of the most popular, stories on this site so when we decided to publish a compilation of short stories and rhymes for little ones we really wanted to include it. Unfortunately the new book – entitled “Why are you a vegan?” And other wacky verse for kids – is full of rhyming stories (of course), and Deidra is not one of those.
So, we made it into one – and here it is, the true-ish story of Deidra the dairy cow, in rhyme, in case you’re interested.
This is how it begins:
Once there was a dairy farm
With fifty lovely cows.
Most of them were black and white
But some of them were brown.
***
Gripping stuff I know! 😉
Where are you going Deidra? – In Rhyme
Well look at the time!
It flies by so fast!
With chime after chime
The present is past!
So we’d better make the most of it!
How much do you wanna bet there’ll be more veg*ns at the end of 2015 than there were at the beginning? 😉
Happy New Year everybody,
Love from Violet and Miranda
xxx
Story begins tomorrow 🙂
“T-wit T-woo,” go the owls,
Sc-ratch and dangle, the spiders.
The witch is thinking, she frowns, she scowls,
New brooms fly by with riders.
***
A flickering light, the rising of smoke,
From the clearing, through the trees,
Gives away the location of quivering folk
Around the fire, on their knees.
***
In a fairy tale world with fairy tale rules
The wicked have much to fear.
They’ve been unkind, selfish, heartless fools,
Which won’t be tolerated here.
***
Fairy tales, creepy tales, mystical magic tales,
Castles and fairies and witches and ghosts.
Suspend disbelief for these ‘anything can happen’ tales,
Where innocents get rescued and evil gets smote.
Try saying these 10 times fast!
Vegan Velma Viewed a Vase of Vibrant Violets
Friendly Felix reFused Forthwith the Foul and Fetid Flesh Foods
Vegan Vendors Val and Victor Vend Veg and stuff at Vegan Venues
For the whole episode click here
That’s all folks!
Episode 3 will pick it up from here …. eventually 😉
I’ve got a bamboo toothbrush,
It’s the best one you can own.
It’s not as good as mine though,
Mine is red and yours is brown
****
Yours is red because it’s plastic,
You know plastic isn’t good.
It is good coz it’s shiny.
Yours is dull, it’s made of wood.
****
Toothbrushes by the millions
Are thrown away each year,
And because they don’t rot naturally,
Lifetimes later they’re still here.
****
Well at least my plastic toothbrush
Won’t make forests get the chop.
Your wood one’s killing all the trees,
You shouldn’t kill trees, so stop!
****
No, bamboo is not like other trees,
Because it grows so fast.
They’re always planting new ones
So their supply will always last.
****
And when my toothbrush is old and useless,
When I have to throw it out,
The natural fibre it’s made from
Will safely, quickly rot.
Would you like a bamboo toothbrush?
Look here
and here
and here
and here
Or maybe they sell them at your local health food store? 🙂
Why would you wear leather?
It’s cow skin you know,
Or goat skin or calf skin,
Or even kangaroo.
Why would you want to wear someone else’s skin?
Isn’t it a yucky thing to put your body in?
Everyone should have the right, if they have no other,
To keep their own skin fully attached, not have it worn by another.
This book is absolutely beautiful.
Treat yourself to a copy or borrow it from the library – that’s where we found it 🙂
‘Twas the night before the weekend,
And something was in the air.
His face looked concerned when he told me,
Though he tried to hide his despair.
****
“The internet’s stopped working!
I don’t know what to do!”
To ease his mind by distraction I said,
“The hot water’s stopped working too!”
****
He reached for my hand and squeezed it,
Breathed deep and smiled at me.
“At least after your cold shower,” he said,
“You can still have a hot cup of tea.”
****
[Inspired by an internet-free 3 days which turned out to be very liberating and enjoyable. Internet’s back but not the hot water – that’s ok, cold showers are very refreshing 😉 ]
Cheep, chirp, tweet, caw,
These sounds we make, and more.
Quack, squawk, gobble, cuckoo,
We’re saying something worthwhile, twit twoo.
****
If you don’t follow, if you don’t know,
What we’re saying or why we crow,
That doesn’t mean there is no reason
For our calls and conversation.
The gamekeeper walks, shotgun in hand,
A frown on his face, he litters the land
With barrels and bags of game bird feed,
With cages and wire, and bodies that bleed.
****
The bodies of animals killed by his gun
Are hung on the tree, one by one.
With hardness of heart, and misery of soul,
The gamekeeper’s is a grotesque role.
****
Day after day, and year after year
He does his job with no guilt and no fear.
What he doesn’t know is that someone is watching
And when the storm comes … his clock will stop ticking.
****
Land Rover won’t start, the engine’s kaput,
The storm closes in as he trudges on foot.
He strides for the castle, to find some shelter,
He’s whipped by debris as the wind rises higher.
****
It’s darker now as the rain lashes down.
The ravens watch the sinister clown.
He’s soaked and he’s angry, he yells at the sky,
And the lightening yells back “And now you must die!”
“Dear Giovanni wouldn’t eat a bird.”
“He wouldn’t eat a bird?”
“No, haven’t you heard?
Lovely Giovanni wouldn’t eat a bird,
Because he loves them dearly.”
****
“Dear Giovanni wouldn’t cook a bird.
He wouldn’t cook a bird
In his restaurant, take my word!
Kind-hearted Giovanni, beloved restauranteur,
Wouldn’t cook a bird, no sir!”
****
“Giovanni has a motto,
I don’t know if you’ve heard it,
He says ‘Don’t hurt friends,
Or friends of friends,
Because none of them deserve it.'”
****
I had fun painting this cityscape and the name for the restaurant, Giovanni’s, just popped into my head. Then, because I wanted to make a post in keeping with this week’s theme – birds – I wrote a quirky poem to go with it. Then I thought – wouldn’t it be great if there really was a vegan restaurant called Giovanni’s? So I googled and, guess what – there is! What are the chances???
Giovanni’s Pizza Grill, 100% Vegan Organic Restaurant, Rock City Rd and Tinker St, Woodstock, NY 12498, United States
The Margherita
The Benedetta
Poppy’s Potato Croquettes
“meatballs” (made with whole grains and seeds) covered in a flavourful tomato sauce with onions
Sausage with peppers and onions
Fantastic tantalising pictures pinched from The V Word.
Click here to read the full restaurant review. Ooh, I wish I lived near Woodstock right now 😉
Thanks Rhea 🙂
STOP PRESS:
Since posting this, Rhea has been in touch (see comments below) and she, in turn, told Giovanni who also dropped us a line (see comments again). Anyway, I thought you might be interested in Giovanni’s fascinating story about how he became a vegan chef which is revealed in his interview with Green Door Magazine, so click here
Violet's Vegan Comics 