Book Group-- Dear Mr. Henshaw

Dear Mr. Henshaw   by Beverly Cleary was our book for October's group gathering.

Leigh Botts, the main character, was asked by his second grade teacher to write a letter to an author. He chose his favorite author Boyd Henshaw.  He continues to write him year after year (for similar assignments) When he's in 6th grade, Mr. Henshaw reverses the roles and ask him to answer many questions, to which he didn't not want to do.  At his mothers insistence, and because the TV was broken and she wouldn't get it fixed, he finally does so.  Through these questions and his encouragement to begin writing in a journal, he comes to learn more about himself and how to better deal with situations in his life that he has no control over, yet needs to learn to accept.  (Parents divorce, new kid in school, a lunch box thief, a complex relationship with father)  He learns to make friends, accept that his parents will not remarry, and that his father loves him even though he's unreliable.

 Leigh father is a truck driver, so we had fun looking at interstate routes going from east to west.

.....and Ryan enjoyed reading  The Count of Monte Cristo  by Dumas.  He's not thrilled that I make him join in with book group discussions....he just needs to learn that like Leigh, there are some things he can not change and must learn to accept....like a book group insistent mother!! :)

The younger crowd played a game with the map of the states.   Do you know?   I am in New Mexico and I travel three states east along the Gulf of Mexico.  Then I travel two states north.  What state am I in?

or  I am in West Virginia and I travel five states west.  The first letter is U.  What state am I in?

Leigh's mother works in a bakery that also does catering.  The owner loves Leigh and often gives him yummy horderves or appitizers.  One such treat are canapes.   Canapes (pronounced like canopies)are layers of goodies on a bread base.  The second layer is the spread.  The kids could choose from a  french mustard butter and a garlic butter.  Then come to toppings.  The could choose from cucumbers, boiled eggs, pepperoni, pickles, baby lettuces, and ham slices.

They got quite creative!!   Don't they look yummy!!

Bread cut into creative shapes is also encouraged by the culinary artist...and these artist loved that part of the creating.

We also covered composition books.  What beautiful journals!

Some of them were decorated with pockets to hold pens and pencils and others were  cleverly created with fun details....we had fun and now let the writing creative juices flow!

(answers to above questions--  Kentucky and Utah