I’ve decided I’ll feature a book from our library bag on Wednesdays because I’m pro alliteration, Wednesdays (generally) and library books (always).
Confession, you guys: I don’t want to return our library books. I’ve already renewed them once. I requested a stack of books curated from my fellow #kidsbookstagram bloggers’ recommendations, and they did not disappoint.
Bonnie has her favorite, and John has his, Margs can’t share her opinion yet, but mama’s favorite from our stack is Extra Yarn by Mac Barnett and illustrated by Jon Klassen. Nothing says Fall like curling up with a skein of yarn and attempting to re-learn how to crochet. A book that celebrates yarn? I was hooked! (😏)
Extra Yarn is a story that explores the limitless depths of generosity, and shows that acts of love, even in the face of unkindness, greed, or injustice, always return love back to us.
The yarn goes like this: Annabelle lives in a cold, colorless little town, until one day she discovers a box of yarn. She decides to make a sweater for herself but still has extra yarn, so she goes on to make her dog a sweater too.
The magic yarn still does not run out, so she knits sweaters for a boy, who at first wasn’t very kind to her, then her family, classmates, and her whole community. The extra yarn never runs out, and so Annabelle keeps on knitting till the whole town, all its animals, and even buildings and bird houses have sweaters.
Her knitting not only fills her town with color and warmth, but it connects them. To me the most powerful imagery of the book is the thread of yarn that goes from one sweater to the next. Her quiet creativity, generosity and love changes and quite literally brings her community together.
One day an Archduke who hears of her magic box of yarn wants to buy it from her. When she refuses to sell it, he plots to steal it, only to find out the magic box does not work for him.
You’ll have to read to find out the ending – it’s just so perfect. Check it out at the library, or if you can’t wait that long, I’m sharing a beautiful animated reading of the book below! (Jon Klassen’s illustrations, as usual, are so perfect!)
