Miss MacDonald Has a Farm by Kaylee Gwarjanski and Elizabet Vukovic

 

Miss MacDonald Has a Farm

by Kaylee Gwarjanski Illustrated by Elizabet Vukovic 

Published March 2024

Double Day Books for Young Readers

Fiction

Picture Book

Hardcover 32 Pages

Review copy provided publisher

Goodreads Summary

In this female-forward spin on the traditional children's song "Old MacDonald", readers can join Miss MacDonald on her vegetable farm and see all the work that goes into growing healthy and delicious produce.
"Miss MacDonald has a farm,
She loves things that grow!"
E-I-E-I-GROW! With a "weed-weed" here and a "pick-pick" there, young readers can follow Miss MacDonald as she tends to her vegetable farm. It's a rollicking, rhyming read-aloud that ends in a community feast and celebrates themes of healthy eating, plant-based meals, local produce, gardening, seasons, and female farmers.

My Thoughts

Miss MacDonald takes her garden from planting to tending, harvesting, preparing, and cooking her produce. Readers will be exposed to the vocabulary of gardening in this rhythmic, rhyming text. While you can read it to the tune of "Old MacDonald", this text is not as predictable and offers more information as Miss MacDonald tends to different types of vegetables. 

The illustrations are bright and colorful and show the planting configuration and growth patterns of each unique veggie. 

This adorable book just might have kids eating (and planting) their veggies!

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Kirkus

KALEE GWARJANSKI is a homeschooling mom to four book-loving children living in the woods of Maine. She holds a BS in mechanical engineering and an MS in teaching from the University of Maine. Between degrees, she followed her passion of food by attending Le Cordon Bleu Culinary Institute in Ottawa, Ontario and worked as a personal chef before turning to picture book writing full time. Miss MacDonald Has a Farm is her debut picture book. Learn more about Kalee at kaleegwarjanski.com and follow her on Twitter at @KaleeGwar.

ELIZABET VUKOVIĆ is an illustrator from Rotterdam, the Netherlands with a degree from the Academy of Art University in San Francisco. She is the illustrator of a number of picture books, including An Ordinary Day (Beach Lane/S&S, 2020), which received two starred reviews. See more of her work online at elizabetvukovic.com and follow her on Instagram and Twitter at @elizabetvukovic.

Speck: An Itty-Bitty Epic by Margaux Meganck

Speck: An Itty-Bitty Epic 
by Margaux Meganck

Published March 2024

Knopf Books for Young Readers

40 Pages

Picture Book

Library Binding

Review Copy Provided by Publisher

Received a starred review from Kirkus

Goodreads Summary

Everything and everyone has a place in the universe, but for a little speck, lost at sea, it will take an extraordinary journey to find it.

Deep in a tide pool, too small to see,
Thousands of tiny specks go forth.
Each one searching
for a place to stay, and grow, and thrive...

The little speck does not know what it is, only that it wishes to find out. And so it embarks on a journey across the sea. From sun-flecked surf to darkest depths, past schools of fish, storm-tossed ships and hungry eels.... Until, at last, it finds exactly what it was looking a place to belong.

In vivid watercolor paintings, Margaux Meganck brings this tale to life, seamlessly shifting perspective to show how even the tiniest creatures—every barnacle, every child, every star in the sky—contributes to something greater than itself.

My Thoughts

The sparce text makes this book seem simple, but this beautiful picture book is more than it seems. On the surface (pun intended) it appears to be a story about little specks in the ocean finding a place to land. But it serves as a metaphor for each individual living thing having a place to belong. 

The illustrations are outstanding! Meganck uses colored pencil and watercolor to create a wonderous underwater world that readers will be drawn to. 

I will definitely be adding Speck: An Itty-Bitty Epic to my school library. 

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Kirkus

Cracking the Cover

Mom Read It

Learn more about the work of Margaux Meganck from her website.