Snowflake Bentley by Jacqueline Briggs Martin

Curious to know about snow? Thanks to Snowflake Bentley, a farmer from Jericho, VT, we are now able to see individual snowflakes. A Caldecott Award winner, this biography tell about the snowflake man’s quest to immortalize these fleeting moments. Catch your own flakes using a “chilled” (less than 32 degree F) black paper.

Read more at the author's Web site at: http://www.jacquelinebriggsmartin.com/

Take a Winter Nature Walk by Jane Kirkland

While we snuggle in our houses, keeping warm, nature is busy outside regardless of the temperature. Use Kirkland’s book to take a winter nature walk. See if you can find a squirrels’ nest, a leaf fall, rotted log, leaf with holes, a bird singing, earthworm casings, bird next, mall hole in a tree for a red-squirrel, feather, chewed nuts, stream, hollow fallen log. Go tracking after a newly fallen snow. Use the tracking guide to help you identify some outdoor friends. Take a picture and bring it to school. We’ll put what you find up on the blog.

Read more at the author's Web site at: http://www.takeawalk.com/

Owl Moon by Jane Yolen

What a classic! What a treat to live in NH and be able to have this experience yourself. Living in California, one could only use the richness of Yolen’s text to TRY to imagine an Owl Moon night. You know, it is one of those rare nights where the sky is clear, the moon is so full that the trees cast their own shadows on the untouched snow. Watch for that next full moon and have yourself an OWL MOON experience.

Stranger in the Woods by Carl R. Sams and Jean Stoick

Have you seen one? A stranger in the woods? Cause a ruckus for your forest friends and make your own. This photographic journal is an inspirational book about something so simple. Get out and take your own pictures, put them together and write your own story about nature and the friends that live in your woods. In the back of the book, you’ll find this great recipe…..ingredients are easy to come by, here in NH.

Recipe for a Snowman borrowed from Stranger in the Woods

Ingredients:
1 Generous Helping of Wet Packing Snow
¼ C of Round Nuts in the Shell
2 Larger Nuts
1 Large Carrot
2 Old Gloves or Mittens
1 Old Hat
3 Fallen Branches
1-4 Well-Bundled Children
2 Scoops of Imagination (VERY IMPORTANT)
1 Dash of Good Humor
Preheat a winter’s day to 32 degrees F or 0 degrees C.

Firmly pack a ball of snow between your two hands and place upon the ground. Continue to roll on snow covered ground until the ball gathers enough snow to measure about three feet. This will form the base of your snowman.

Roll and shape two additional snowballs. The first will be approximately one foot in diameter and the second will be two feet. Place the second largest ball on top of the base. The smallest is the head and goes on top.