Book Review – MESS – Craft Gossip

ISBN 9780399536007 RRP $13.95

I was lucky enough to receive a Galley Proof for Keri’s new book MESS. My 2 year old grabbed the book and asked if she could draw in it. I had not even read the title and snapped back NO that’s mummy’s book. She informed me it was a drawing book and proceeded to look for a pencil.

After reading the introduction I thought wow, what better way to MESS up this book than to let me 2 year old have a go.

What am I talking about?

You may be familiar with her best selling book “Wreck this Journal” where Keri provokes her readers to Wreck the journal by poking holes in pages, tearing things up and much much more.

Well MESS (the book) is pretty much the same thing, the book is filled with directions on how to MESS up the book with quirky challenges to inspire you to be creative. Not only by yourself but with others too with several pages being directed to Groups.

Edited to add: Now that my children are older I can truly appreciate the importance of children learning that imperfection is okay. I have two children who like to get things right all the time. This book is something we have revisited to show them that mess is not only creative it is also an important step in life, that can be acceptable.

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August is National Peach Month, and it’s the perfect time to learn about, learn with and eat peaches!

According the Utah State University’s Extension Service, peaches originated in China more than 8,000 years ago. There are more than 2,000 species, and they are good sources of vitamins A, C and E. Their fuzzy hair is known as trichomes, which helps protect the peaches against insects and retains moisture. Pretty sweet!

Learn about the life cycle of a peach with this printable pack from Every Star is Different. (Free to subscribers)

Twisty Noodle has a lot of great peach-themed worksheets including a tracing and coloring page, a dot to dot coloring page, do a dot page and practice writing the word peach. You can also learn to draw a peach from Hello Artsy and find more fruit coloring pages, including peaches, at Little Bee Family.

Kids of a certain age will want to read James and the Giant Peach (and/or watch the movie) and you can do activities related to the book for your peach unit study as well.

Simple Living Creative Learning has a James and the Giant Peach printable pack that includes 153 pages of math, literacy, pattern recognition, sorting and tons more (this isn’t free but it’s a great resource for a kid who loves this book).

Where the Magic Happens Teaching has another paid printable set of activities for doing James and the Giant Peach in the classroom, including a banner, quotes, poetry sheets, a STEM activity, lapbook and more.

Peanut Butter Fish Lessons has a good post about reading James and the Giant Peach with kids and using it to make predictions, track descriptive and figurative language and fun ideas for activities related to different chapters of the book. I love how it pulls in a lot of different kinds of synthesizing what you’ve read, from writing a news report to making a poster or acting out a scene.

And if you need a little sensory activity after all that, make some peach-scented playdough with this recipe from Laughing Kids Learn.

12 Perfectly Peach Recipes [Edible Crafts]

Healthy Halloween Dessert: Ghost Peaches [Edible Crafts]

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Have you read?