The Noisy Clock Shop

 Another fun book about sounds and noises accompanied by Art Seiden's colorful midcentury pictures.  Seriously, how wonderful are all the clock illustrations?!  

Mr. Winky, the clock mender, decides to leave his shop and go where there is no noise.   He travels all the way out into the countryside, only to realize that there are noises everywhere, and he's happy to return to the familiar tickity tick and dings and dongs of his clocks shop.

The Noisy Clock Shop

Jean Horton Berg

pictures by Art Seiden 1950

(I can't explain it, but I am such a sucker for faux bois!  I collect a lot of midcentury, vintage images because of it.)

The Ogre and His Bride

 This Japanese folk tale is similar to "Beauty and the Beast" as a poor farmer must choose one of his daughters to be an ogre's bride.  But this is no love story, but rather a tale of Kaiko who travels back to her family because she misses them.  While they, out of their great love for her, find a way of outwitting the Ogre year after year to keep him from taking her home.

The Ogre and His Bride

Nami Kishi

pictures by Shosuke Fukuda

English version by Alvin Tresselt 1971

This is my favorite picture!

How God Gives us Chocolate

 I think I had this book as a child.  I'm about to send it away as a gift for a friend of mine but I thought I'd post it here first since it reminded me of Chocolate World at Hershey Park.  There's a ride there that takes you through the process of how chocolate is made, starting with the harvesting of cocoa beans and all the roasting and sugar and milk involved.   These "A Happy Day" books from Standard Publishing were a Christian version of Little Golden Books and are the same size and format, even with a similar metallic spine. 

How God Gives Us Chocolate

Henrietta D. Gambill

illustrated by Kathryn Hutton 1982

The Fireside Book of Children's Songs

One of my very favorite bookstores is The Archive.  It's a warehouse filled with old books, magazines, and every kind of paper ephemera you can possibly imagine.  It's a treasure trove!  It's organized in a way, but you have to be prepared to really search and don't be surprised if you're unexpectedly rewarded with books like this.  Dale, the owner sometimes does $1 sales up on the second floor.  That's where I found this Fireside Book of Children's Songs with the most delectable 1960's illustrations.  Each page is more glorious than the one before.  I didn't even pay any attention to what the songs were!

The Fireside Book of Children's Songs

Edited by Marie Winn

Musical arrangements by Allan Miller

Illustrations by John Alcorn 1966

Definitely look up the artist John Alcorn.  I was so pleased to see that he also made some designs for Federico Fellini films (I am a Fellini fan!). He was pretty prolific in the publishing world which might explain why his designs look familiar to me.

This spider!!