2nd June Doughnut Day

June 2 is World Doughnut Day, not only Fish and Chip Day, two favourite foods of many. Doughnut Day has been celebrated since 1938, starting off as a fundraiser for The Salvation Army in Chicago during the Great Depression. Even now many doughnut drives raise money for charities, so you can eat all you like for a good cause. 

During World War I a group of Salvation Army volunteers was dispatched to the frontlines with the mission of providing comforting meals for the troops. They soon found out that donuts were an effective way to provide food while navigating the difficulties of cooking in very dire circumstances. These brave volunteers would later be known as “donut lassies”. They would even use war helmets as a utensil to fry up seven donuts at a time.

Doughnuts or the shorter form donuts have become a very popular feature of children's books, probably because this sugary snack tastes wonderful. The Mr Panda books by Steve Antony are always on loan especially with the preschoolers and the doughnuts in these books certainly look appealing. They even feature on clothing.

If you would like to read about the history of the donut try these books:

• Doughnuts: The Hole Story by Julie Knutson

• Doughnuts: Our Favourite Food  by Joanne Mattern

• The Hole Story of the Doughnut by Pat Miller and Vincent Kirsch

Now just read for fun:

• Donuts the Hole Story  by David W. Miles

• Daisy the Donut Fairy by Tim Bugbird. 

• If You Give a Dog a Donut by Laura Numeroff 

• The Donut Chef by Bob Staarke.

• Detective Donut and the Wild Goose Chase by Bruce Whatley.

• Arnie, the Doughnut by Laurie Keller

• The Case of the Missing Donut by Alison McGhee and Isabel Roxas

• The Doughnut of Doom  by Elis Dolan

• Doughnuts for a Dragon  by Adam and Charlotte Guillain and Lee Wildish

• Dozens of Doughnuts  by Carrie Finison and Brianne Farley

• Norman the Slug with a Silly Shell by Sue Hendra and Paul Linnet

• Agent Lion  by Jacky Davis and David Roman

There's some short chapter books:

• The Doughnut Ring  by Alexander McCall Smith
• Doughnut Danger by Anthony Masters

• Freddie's Amazing Bakery:Dancing with Doughnuts  by Harriet Whitehorn

• Donut Feed the Squirrels  by Mika Song

• Stick Dog Tries to Take the Donuts  by Tim Watson

• Max Meow Donuts and Danger by John Gallagher

• The Very Best Doughnut  by Randa Abdel-Fattah and Amani Haydar

• Percy Pigeon Donut Detective  by Tracy Gunaratnam

• Shark and Bot: Zombie Donut Attack  by Brian Yanish

• Frank and Bean: Food Truck Fiasco by Jamie Michalak  and Bob Kolar 

And a whole series by Gianna Pollero and Sarah Horne

• Monster Doughnuts

• Monster Donughts: Cyclops on a Mission

• Monster Doughnuts:Beastly Breakout!

6th June Doughnut Day

In the United States the first Friday in June is National Doughnut Day and in England there was a whole week from 10th to 17th May designated as National Doughnut Week, yet here in Australia we haven't gone to those lengths to celebrate doughnuts. Children here certainly like them and eat them, but should we celebrate  a very sugary, deep-fried, doughy 'ring' ? I don't know. I did go looking in the library for doughnut books though, and found just as many with the 'donut' spelling. I wondered why there were two spellings and found an explanation here.

We only had five books that feature doughnuts/donuts:
• Daisy the Donut Fairy by Tim Bugbird. This is by far the most popular and you can see why when you look at the cover. The 'fairy/pink-loving' girls make sure it is always borrowed.
• If You Give a Dog a Donut by Laura Numeroff is part of the popular 'If You Give a Mouse a Cookie' series.
• The Donut Chef by Bob Staarke.
• The Doughnut Ring a short chapter book by Alexander McCall Smith
• Doughnut Danger by Anthony Masters, a reader from the I Am Reading series.
And a picture book where the word 'doughnut' is used as a name
• Detective Donut and the Wild Goose Chase  by Bruce Whatley.

After a bit of research I think that probably the ones I should have are:
• Arnie the Doughnut by Laurie Keller
• The Case of the Missing Donut  by Alison McGhee

Oh well, maybe by next year I will have enough titles to put together a display!

15th September Choose Your Favourite Colour Day

What a wonderful day to celebrate with very young children. (You don't need to mention Crayola.) This question elicits so much passion and fervour, everyone championing their own favourite colour and certainly not listening to what other children are saying. Last week I was reading Mozzie and Midgie to a kindergarten class and there are many colours mentioned as the two spoonbills try many disguises in a quest to make themselves 'more special', but they are not colours that children hear often. There was emerald, russet, aqua and crimson. We had fun defining them and then trying to think of other things that were that colour. Next children thought of other colours that were less common like maroon, mauve, violet and lemon.

This inspired me to put together a display of books about colour. There were so many and I was surprised how many were quick to leave the library. Of course there are old favourites like Ella Doran's Colour, Leo Lionni's Little Blue and Little Yellow and Ellen Walsh's Mouse Paint but there have been so many books more recently with a colour in their title. See:

* The Sun is Yellow by Kveta Pacovska (Amazing. Full of hidden treasures and very different)

* Green by Laura Vaccaro Seeger (How many shades of green did you pick?)

* Grandpa Green by Lane Smith

* Blue Chicken by Deborah Freeman (The children are fascinated by the way the colour is absorbed by the chicken)

* Baby Bear Sees Blue by Ashley Wolff

* The Artist Who Painted a Blue Horse by Eric Carle

* Red Cat, Blue Cat by Jenni Desmond

* The Red Lemon by Bob Staake