Sugarbush Spring Book

In the month of the Maple Sugar Moon, the snow's too wet for angel making, icicles rain from Grandpa's porch roof, and something is stirring in the woods. It's sugarbush spring—time to tap the trees, prepare the bottles, then gather round the cook fire to eat chicken and dumplings, roast marshmallows, and tell stories while the cold sap heats through, thickens, and boils to make syrup.

Chall's timeless story and Daly's glowing paintings invite children to share in the pleasure of making maple syrup—a process that's the same today as it was two hundred years ago.In the month of the Maple Sugar Moon, icicles rain from Grandpa's porch roof and something is stirring in the woods. It's sugarbush spring-time to tap the trees, then gather round the cook fire to roast marshmallows and tell stories while the cold sap thickens and boils to make maple syrup.In the month of the Maple Sugar Moon, icicles rain from Grandpa's porch roof and something is stirring in the woods. It's sugarbush spring-time to tap the trees, then gather round the cook fire to roast marshmallows and tell stories while the cold sap thickens and boils to make maple syrup.

Publishers Weekly

This evocative tale illuminates life on a northern farm in early spring, when "the snow's too wet for angel making" and the sap's on the rise. The girl narrator rides with her grandfather on a horse-drawn sleigh filled with pails to hang on the taps they will soon place in the sugar maples. As the two search for prospects, Grandpa explains how to pick them: one tree is too old to tap ("She's given and given till she's nearly given out") and another is too young ("She needs all the sugar she makes this year. She'll be ready when she fills up your arms"). Chall (Up North at the Cabin) maintains this folksy yet informative tone throughout her account, marrying concrete information, such as the 219-degree boiling point of the sap, with more atmospheric descriptions of the sugarhouse itself. Rendered in oil on board, Daly's (Mother, I Love You) nearly photographic paintings endow the picturesque interior and outdoor settings with a feeling of timelessness. The artist's devotion to detail--the gleam of light on freshly washed glass jars that will be filled with syrup and the distinct grain of the wood on the sugarhouse walls--contributes to the tactile quality of the volume. Ages 6-up. (Jan.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.|