Today, most advent calendars are made for children. Many take the form of a large rectangular card with many “windows”, one of which is opened every day during Advent. In less elaborate calendars, each window opens to reveal an image, a poem, or part of a story such as the Nativity story itself.

The origins of the Advent calendar come from German Lutherans who, at least as early as the beginning of the 19th century, would count down the 24 days of Advent physically. Often this meant simply drawing a chalk line on the door each day, beginning on December 1. Some families had more elaborate means of marking the days, such as lighting a new candle (perhaps the genesis of today’s Advent wreath) or hanging a little religious picture on the wall each day.

At Fragile Earth Stuffed Animals we are currently having a sale on our two remaining styles of eeBoo Advent calendars.  Stop by and grab one before they all sell out!

eeBoo Santa's Flight Advent Calendar - $3.99

eeBoo Caroling Mice Advent Calendar - $3.99

If you are a practicing Christian, how do you celebrate Advent? Do you have an Advent Calendar? Do you move pieces of the creche closer each day, culminating in placing the baby in the manger? Do you light a candle in the Advent wreath that your child made in Sunday School?

I remember the chocolate advent calendars my grandmother used to give us each year. With 6 kids, you sometimes had to wait quite a while for your turn to come around again:) It’s funny, but all I recall about those calendars is the chocolate – nothing about what the doors looked like or what the overall picture was. The chocolate was good, though. Then there was one that we had that was illustrated by Tasha Tudor. There was nothing edible about it – just the pictures. And that calendar I can see as clear as day.

If you, or your kids, are fans of Leonardo, we’ve got a treat for you. Newly arrived at the Fragile Earth Orphanage, may we present (drum roll please …..)

Mo Willems Leonard the Terrible Monster Hand Puppet - $24.99

our very own Leonardo monster hand puppet! He’s soft and cuddly and desperate to go home with a good friend!

Posted by Rupert

Welcome to the Kids Paper Air Plane Book by Ken Blackburn and Jeff Lammers, published by Workman Publishing. This book has all sorts of great information about how to fly paper (and regular) airplanes -

including the forces of dynamics such as lift.

It features games to play inside,

instructions on making an airplane mobile,

and how to hold airplane flying contests, amongst lots of other projects.

But best of all, there are instructions on making lots of different airplanes, like the butterfly plane

AND the book also provides colored copies of the plane.

For the hungry among us, there’s the pizza plane

and for the truly adventurous, there’s the count plane

That’s just three examples – the book is full of different types of paper airplanes, gliders, etc.  And  they give you three (count them 3) copies of each plane. Not only that, in a stroke of genius for those of us that routinely tear the pages as we try to remove them from the book, the pages are all PERFORATED!

Removal made easy, baby!

This book could be the perfect gift for the aviator in your family, covering all manner of information about paper and real airplanes.

And don’t let the word kids in the title fool you – I know folks of all ages who would love this book. As a matter of fact, there are a few that are a little upset that we’re giving it away. Know someone who’d like this for the holidays? All you have to do is leave a comment. You have til Friday night and we’ll pick a winner on Saturday morning. Everyone is eligible so comment away!

Many thanks to Workman Publishing for sending us this book to peruse.

Many moons ago, the Inuit people lived far to the north in complete darkness all the time. They did not even know about daylight until Crow, who had traveled all around the world, told them about the people to the south who had light to let them see. The Inuit persuaded Crow to fly to these lands to the south and bring back some of the daylight, so they too could see.

Crow flew for many, many days until he saw light in the sky. There he saw a village and followed a girl back to her home. Her father was chief of the village and kept daylight in a box in his lodge. Crow turned into a speck of dust and landed in the ear of the chief’s grandson. Crow convinced the little boy that he wanted to play with one of the balls of light. His doting grandfather, the chief, gave him one of the balls of daylight with which to take outside and play. Once outside, crow turned back into his normal shape, grabbed the ball of daylight, and flew back to the land of the Inuit people.

Once there, Crow dropped the ball of light on the ground where it shattered, letting light fill every corner of the land. The Inuit people were very excited and thankful to Crow, but he warned them that every six months, the light would have to rest and recharge and they would be in darkness again. The Inuit were happy to have six months of daylight since before all they had known was darkness. And to this day, they spend half the year in darkness and half the year in daylight, and they are always kind to Crow for bringing them the light first.

Full story can be found here

Posted by Mary Beth

Let’s start with a legend from the Brule Sioux describing how Crow became black. Originally crows were white and good friends with the buffalo. Whenever the hunters came to capture the buffalo, the crows would fly among the animals and let them know that hunters were coming. Then the buffalo would stampede and be gone by the time man arrived. The people decided they had to capture the leader of the crows and teach him a lesson. One of the warriors pretended to be a buffalo and tricked the bird. While the people were trying to decide how to punish Crow, one angry hunter decided to throw him into the fire and burn him. The crow did escape but before he flew away, his wings got singed and from then on, crows have been black.

posted by Mary Beth

The techies didn’t let being under the weather stop them from welcoming some new friends to the Fragile Earth Orphanage. Let me introduce you to the Cordy Roys clan – brand new from the land of JellyCat.

First, we have the kitten – sporting a lovely raspberry coat and coming in at a respectable 10″.

Jellycat Cordy Roy Small Cat - $11.99

Next we have Gator who’s soft green coloring allows him to hide in the marshes or wherever his little heart desires. And hiding that 15″ body is not always easy, let him tell you!

Jellycat Cordy Roy Gator - $21.99

The aardvark is near and dear to one of the techie’s hearts just because of her love of all things orange! And, as with all the Cordy Roys, his soft coat makes him perfect to cuddle-up with. Another 15 incher means there’s all the more to love!

Jellycat Cordy Roy Aardvark - $21.99

A companion to the kitten, this soft blue puppy is 10 inches of love, trust me!

Jellycat Cordy Roy Small Dog - $11.99

Jellycat Cordy Roy Dachsund - $21.99

For all you dachshund lovers out there – here he is! Slightly darker than the kitten, he’s the perfect addition to your life. And believe me, he’s ready to go home with everyone. 

All our Cordy Roys are just waiting to be adopted and taken home for the holidays. You can get all their particulars by clicking on the links or by going to Fragile Earth Stuffed Animals and searching Cordy Roys.

Spider is worried about finding the right costume because nothing changes him drastically enough to hide who is behind the costume. This book was published in 1973 – look at these costumes. No Halloween or Scream masks, no blood or guts. I miss 1973. Not the clothes, just the … innocence.

Spider goes to his friend Ladybug’s house to see if she can help him.

Ladybug and fly show him their costumes – see isn’t that a great witch?

Spider is still trying to think of a good costume for himself when they hear a smashing sound and laughter coming from outside.

Bullies have destroyed Ladybug’s jack-o-lantern. Maybe it wasn’t such an innocent time after all. Ladybug is terribly upset because what is Halloween without a jack-o-lantern? And that’s when Spider gets the idea for the perfect costume. He has his friends color him orange and he cuts out a green stem and voila!

He’s the perfect jack-o-lantern.  The three friends go out trick-or-treating and are having a wonderful time until they hear the bullies coming down the street with cans of shaving cream. (Even though they are bullies, they still are pretty tame.)

But Spider knows how to get back at them. Hiding behind a bush until they are right near him, he then jumps out and scares them. And that is how Spider saved Halloween.

Robert Kraus wrote several other Spider/Ladybug/Fly books, some of which are still available through Amazon, etc. In 1965, Kraus started his own publishing company, Windmill Books which published some of his NY artist friends’ books, including, among others, The Chas. Addams Mother Goose, (which I need to find immediately!) and several by William Steig, including Sylvester and the Magic Pebble, another huge favorite here at Fragile Earth Stuffed Animals. They also were the first to produce board books and bathtub books for very young kids.

I love it when ghosts get together for dinner.

Want to know why? They become the color of whatever they eat/drink.

Green for spinach juice?

What other kind of juices did they have? Blueberry? Strawberry? It just boggles the mind!

I always turn orange when I eat Pumpkin soup. I love that the ones that had seconds are a darker orange.

How funny is it that they look like the lettuce and the cheese? Who can tell me what type of cheese they’re eating:D

There are times when I could really use this magic dessert recipe.

Good friends are the ones that help you clean up at the end of a dinner party.

This surprises me a little (although maybe not that much knowing my penchants for chocolate), but I love the color brown they turn after drinking hot chocolate. And I usually don’t like brown at all. But this is such a warm, rich color. I’m thinking the ghost in the middle is overdoing his chocolate to milk ratio, just a bit!

Oh, and the bowls they are using for their milk? They would make AWESOME ice cream dishes. I’m just saying!

Posted by Mary Beth

Chocolate pudding – we prefer the cooked variety in our household; milk, whipped cream, Oreo cookies, Milano cookies, candy corn, decorating gel, and little chocolate candies for eyes (more about that later.)

We’re going to take a quick break now while I run get milk, since I just noticed that this carton expired on the 9th … of SEPTEMBER! Obviously, we’re not big milk drinkers in this household. We get our vitamin D and calcium from other sources – like cheese & ice cream!

Take three cups of milk (from the new carton, if you please) and dump it into a pot.

Add the pudding powder and mix well.

Heat the milk/pudding mixture over a medium high heat, stirring constantly, until it comes to a full boil.

We’re almost there – just a little bit longer! If you’re doing the non-cook kind of pudding, just mix the milk & pudding together until it thickens, then put it in the fridge for a little bit to let it set.

While the pudding is thickening, take the Oreos and put them in a food grinder. Chop those suckers up into tiny little crumbs. Don’t worry about the cream filling – you want that mixed in. Hey you! Put down the Oreo! No licking of the frosting!

What does that remind you of?

Dirt, maybe? Well, let’s just pretend it does, okay? Spread a layer of crumbs dirt over the pudding.

Add the candy corn for embellishment’s sake. There’s no correlation between them and graveyards. I just like candy corn, okay! I try to use it in as many halloween recipes as possible. Don’t judge me!

The Milano cookies are your gravestones. Use the gel to write epitaphs on the grave markers. If you’re spastic the way I am, limit it to initials or RIP.

Stick the graves  into your pudding graveyard.

*** IMPORTANT NOTE – DO NOT PUT COOKIES INTO PUDDING UNTIL JUST BEFORE YOU’RE READY TO SERVE IT, OTHERWISE THE COOKIES WILL GET MUSHY! VERY QUICKLY!!***

Final step – add whipped cream ghosts. I just used the can to add a little swirl of whipped cream and stuck two chocolate candies in for eyes. This would have been more impressive with the marshmallow Peep ghosts I originally planned on using. However, just so you know, looking for those marshmallow ghosts in the week before Halloween is like looking for the proverbial needle (in the haystack). It ain’t happening, baby. So, I got creative. I didn’t say I did it well, just that I got creative!

The first Georgie book was published in 1944 and 11 more followed. They all involved Mr & Mrs. Whittaker, the owners of the house that Georgie haunts, Miss Oliver the owl, Herman the cat, and of course Georgie, the friendly ghost.

In Georgie and the Noisy Ghost, written in 1971, Georgie & crew move out to a house on the beach that the Whittakers have rented for the summer. Everyone knows that houses should only have one ghost haunting them. So what happens when a family with a ghost moves into a house that is already occupied by another spirit?

First they travel by car,

then by boat. What? Don’t you arrive at your new house in the middle of the night?

But wait, who’s that!

You’ll just have to read it yourself:)

One thing to keep in mind with these books – they do tend to be a bit wordy so if you’ve got avid listeners, you’re good. Otherwise, you might want to paraphrase or plan to read it in stages.