Flannel Friday Chick Week! Cheep, Cheep, Cheep!

Here a chick, there a chick...

Chicks, listen up! Shake a tail feather!  It's chick week.  We're loud! And plentiful!  Birds of a feather...and all that!!

Lucy Cousins book, Count with Maisy, Cheep, Cheep, Cheep! inspired chickens in every story time this week.  

My plan: a white hen with blue dots, like Maisy has!
My flannel supply: green or pink with white dots. Bummer. Balk! Balk! Balk!  I really wanted a blue and white mama hen named Dottie!

Plan B:
Pull out the flannels in all the colors I "was feelin" and start from there.  And that's how I have a blue hen with paisley patterning. The baby chicks are rather traditional.  They probably get fancy feathers later!

Count with Maisy has flaps to lift and chicks to place on the flannel board now.  Participation heaven.  A chick week "must have" is Chicken Little.  I adore telling this story

 

And we added the book The Cow who Clucked from one of my most favorite author/illustrators, Denise Fleming.  I love reading aloud the moment when the cow is ultimately defeated and ..."and she headed for the barn" I hold that page for a few extra beats.  Drama!  You gotta know when to hold 'em!  The next page is equally as dramatic...don't say a word for about 8 seconds!

Our Yoga for 2 attendees had time to make their very own Chicken Little.  I have this saying...color like you mean it...and using the oil pastels surely gets a lot of pigment on the paper.  Satisfying color, much more fun than markers.  One of the little Yoga chicks wanted to make her Chicken Little ((((crazy))))  I think she succeeded!  This is my "kinda" art!

P.S. (Piper Script): Jane's Chicken Little story telling rendition is pretty shout-out ((((Crazy)))).  "Oh my goodness, oh my gracious...the sky is falling....run for your lives!!!"  

Drama....chick!

Maisy! Maisy! Maisy!

Off We Go!

     And yes...I'm talking heads.  If you caught last week's post - you'll get it!  Maisy's friends have heads that come off!  That's the only way they could get on the bus!  So here they are looking cute.  I generally back my pieces with black flannel, so once I thought about it ...I realized I could take their heads off.  Lucy Cousins creates her characters with bold black lines which lend themselves perfectly to this stained glass style I use in flannel.

To be clear, I didn't cut off their heads, rather, I never glued them on.  This means the heads are removable!  Pretty cool, huh? 

headless friends

And now take a look at the heads rolling along on the bus! 

...the heads on the bus go bump bump bump!

Here's the whole gang!  Note: removable bus door

                                              removable heads

                                              removable numbers for the bus stop post

I used these flannels three times this week and only once did someone say, "why did you do that?" I was placing Tallulah's head on the bus while quickly moving her body out of sight when a front row little guy, who was paying very close attention, caught the trick!  Busted!  So, I showed everyone, (kids and parents), how I created the pieces to fit on the bus.  It was genius.  It was perfect!

I tell this story with the bus in a hill-filled town!  I move the bus stop up or down on the flannel board when I change the number of the stop.  And then we... brrmm brmmm... the bus or eeek, eeek the breaks!  Oh, you may have noticed that Maisy's tail gets caught in the door - I decided to let that happen and see if it played out as funny.  Shall I say...daring creative risk here?!!  Just so you know - it was hysterical!  They loved saying "Ouch, my tail!" each time Maisy closed the bus door.  

P.S. (Piper Script): Since there's a Little Black Cat...maybe we can add a  Little Black Dog to the story?  

Maisy Drives the Bus!

                                 Oh Maisy!

It's Flannel Friday and Maisy is making her first appearance here at Piper Loves the Library.  So much fun!  Lucy Cousin's Maisy and all of her pals maintain their popularity with the preschoolers in the library.  It always helps that Piper is a fangirl!  

This week I ordered lots of Maisy books.  I had to replace the worn, torn and loved-to-death copies plus buy new titles because....big announcement here....tah-dah.... Maisy is on our summer reading list for the pre-k kids! *squee*

Right now...Maisy is on the coffee table and the cozy couch.  Look!

Maisy makes things fun.  Her pals are easy to remember ...Cyril, Tallulah and Little Black Cat! 

I'm taking my time with this project...I think the friends will have detachable heads!  Sounds awful but they'll look really cute in the bus!  Stay tuned! 

P.S. (Piper Script): Maisy has her own Fun Club with interactive games and coloring pages.  This link will take you there...I'm sending you to the page with all her books.  It's incredible!  Have fun!

Update on Maisy:  click here to see the removable heads!