BETH RECOMMENDS: ONE DAY AT WOOD GREEN ANIMAL SHELTER by Patricia Casey

Beth and Mummy read this book today and we loved it!

Here's why: the author combines hand-drawn cartoons with photos of actual people and places. The result is a very lively, unique and charming book that kids will enjoy.

The pictures tell what goes on in an animal shelter on a typical day:

• a lame pony is brought right into the surgery,
• a pigeon with a broken leg is fixed up with lollipop sticks,
• a young deer is rescued from a cemetery and released back into the wild,
• there's even a fox who enjoys a cup of coffee along with the staff!

In fact, as I'm blogging here, Beth is flipping through the book for the 2nd time today, asking really detailed questions and recounting bits of the story from memory.

There's no doubt about it: this is one fantastic book for preschoolers!

Milestone: She Had A Dream

This morning, Beth woke up and announced, "Mummy, I had a dream. I dreamed that you and Daddy were playing the piano, Ignatius, Kieran and I were on stage singing and the music was 'We wish you a Merry Christmas'."

Now, lest you wonder what is so blog-worthy about this announcement, I should mention that Beth is (just?) 3 1/2, and this is the first time she has remembered a dream and articulated it clearly.

Our little girl is growing up fast!

PS. For the past few days, she has been trying our patience and fortitude with her illness-triggered tantrums, the most recent of which was tonight. Despite (or due to) a raging fever of 39.9 deg C, she refused to have any of her Ibuprofen, or a fever patch, or a cold bath, or even a sip of water.

At that point, Mummy surrendered. I sat next to my sobbing baby and prayed to God for her healing, for her to be comforted, and for her to be amenable to everything I was going to try on her to make her temperature come down.

God clearly heard, because after the promise of a video (which bribe I hadn't been sure would work), she calmed down enough to drink up (I added Ribena to her new Winnie The Pooh water bottle), take her Ibuprofen, and allow me to stick a wet towel round her neck while she breezed through Richard Scarry and moved on to The Incredibles.

This morning, she even consented to trying out a fever patch despite initially kicking and screaming when I first attempted to stick one on her forehead. And she allowed me to put wet towels on her forehead and neck.

She is on to a 2nd round of The Incredibles. She could watch it 10 times for all I care, as long as she takes her medication and gets well.