Here’s my entry for Susanna Leonard Hill’s Perfect Picture Book Friday!
There is more tongue-in-cheek fact-stretching in Levi Strauss Gets a Bright Idea than you can shake a pair of Levis at, but it’s sooo much fun, you just don’t care. The author gives you the real low-down about the origins of Levi jeans in the back matter. The rest is pure, ah, fabrication. Take a look!
(FIRST SPREAD)
The voice SCREAMS at you from the first sentence. This is what makes agents and editors turn the page and keep reading:
“GOLD!” somebody yelled. Next thing anybody knew,
the whole world rushed to California and
started digging up the place. The trouble was,
they rushed so fast, they lost their pants.
(SECOND SPREAD)
Well, they didn’t exactly lose them. The pants
just disintegrated. They were that flimsy.
Corduroy, wool tweed, flannel, burlap, velvet, worsted,
serge: they didn’t last long in the gold fields. Right quick
they got worked down to the size of a handkerchief.
Soon, every miner was sluicing for color in his long johns—
or naked as a jaybird. Yessir, all of California was mining
in the vanilla.
Filled with juicy language like “gnashing their clashers” and “rattling and racketing and rolling,” and coupled with illustrations painted on old jeans, this book’s a sure fire winner! If you want to do a craft with the kiddos, I’d suggest painting those ol’ blue jeans. Just make sure they’re the original Levi’s, OK?
Title: Levi Strauss Gets a Bright Idea
Author: Tony Johnston
Illustrator: Stacy Innerst
Publisher: Harcourt/Houghton
Year: 2011 (Yes, I know it’s not new, but it’s new to me!)
Ages: 3-8 yrs
Jilanne Hoffmann 
No doubt this one gets the kids laughing. Looks like a lot of fun. But sorry to hear about your widgets! What a stink-fest. Hope you get them back.
My Happiness Engineer has not yet made me happy. This could prove fatal to the current blog and may accelerate the revamp I was planning. Sigh
Sorry to hear it.
I agree…being betrayed by all things W…is terrible! I’ve never heard of a Happiness Engineer…I want one of those!
Levi Strauss…woo hoo! Brings back memories. I used to take the kids to the factory for tours…until the Loma Prieta earthquake shut it down.
One of the stories in their readers was all about Levi jeans…san the fabrication. Believe it or not, the thrill of the trip was finding rivets on the floor as we passed the sewing factory. Rivets were gold as far as they were concerned!
It really was a great tour…too bad it is no more.
I wish I’d been able to take that tour! It sounds interesting and fun. And picking up rivets as if they were gold is quite fitting!
Sooo sorry about your “W” — This sounds like a great book!
I’m feeling naked without my widgets! And yes, the book will make kids want to read it over and over and over….
Ooh, look! Your widgets are back! I must admit the very term Happiness Engineer is enough to make me gnash my clashers and even on occasion clash my gnashers! I’m too scared to change themes – I preview and hover over the button but… nope, can’t do it!
Worms, Wellington boots, wrigglers, witches, wishlists… Ws are wicked things…
Yes, changing themes is the equivalent of a thousand Tuesday Terrors!
I love the language, the gold rush is something that I don;t know much about, I love it when kids books teach me things as well as amuse me.
Yes, this one is high on amusement. It’s not until you read the author’s note in the back matter that you get the “real” truth. But it’s fun getting there. 😀
I’m so pleased the Happiness Engineers managed to make you happy again. I’ve given up (almost) looking at new themes to see if there are any I like more, because losing what I have is too scary to contemplate. I have a private’sandbox’ other site, where I occasionally try out different themes, on some of my preexisting posts, but so far there is always SOMETHING which isn’t properly translating over. And I love my widgets. It’s all my complicated indexing which I found a way to work for me, very early on, on the theme I have, which would be an unbearable loss. So my BAD LETTER would be I
Yes, I understand. The letter “I” can be quite the roadblock. So true. I’m not sure I can count on the Happiness Engineers to save the day next time.
Well, if they can’t, they surely lose the accuracy of their title, in your case!
Thank goodness the widgets are back! Well I never saw them gone, so I must just take your word for it that they were.
The book sounds wacky and fun, hurrah for wacky and fun! Hey, that sounds like a kids book doesn’t it “Hurrah for Wacky and Fun!” I might write it…
Please do! I think you would write hilarious children’s books!
That book sure knows how to grab ya. I love it!
Yeah, pretty much by the collar and won’t let you go. Kinda like an entertaining uncle whose stories keep you laughing and begging for more.
You are one wickedly funny writer. I love this concept, and it is going to have the kiddies in stitches!
I think the writer of this book is wickedly funny. Me? I have good days, and I have bad ones. 😀
This looks like a funny book. The art even made me laugh. Looks like your Happiness Engineer helped retrieve your widgets — glad for that! Nothing worse than a half-naked blog!! 🙂
Yes, I was feeling so—exposed! 😀
As far as the artwork, it’s wonderful! Handpainted illustrations on jeans, how perfect! And when the illustrator makes the journey from having naked miners wear barrels and then replace the barrels with jeans, leaving the barrels to become the building blocks for the city of San Francisco, it’s a stroke of genius. Imagine The TransAmerica Pyramid made out of whisky barrels. Genius.
Fun!
For everyone! 😀
Happiness Engineers to the rescue, eh? LOL, glad everything turned out okay, hon.
I’ve been feeling the itch to change up my theme again, but then I remember it’s no quick thing. Drama is inevitable. I’ll wait for a while. 🙂
Yes, I vote for drama in small doses.
Great minds, Jilanne! I recently became fb-friends with Stacy, and took out all the books I could from the library. Great stuff!
Yes, my library pile is threatening to leave a divot in the floor. ReFoReMo is responsible. Not that I’m complaining, mind you.
I handed in a job app today, and was asked how many books I read last mth. I played it down, to 150PBs, but it was closer to twice that!
Awesome!!!!! Your library must LOVE you! I’m thinking we could use PBs to bail with, if the house ever starts to list. Either that or spread the books evenly throughout.
Lift? Do you live in KS? I thought you were in CA.
Lift? Not sure what you mean. I wrote “list” didn’t I? Gotta make the text on my PC bigger to make sure. “List” as in the boat is listing. I live in San Francisco. My husband loves sailing, so I often think in these terms. 😀
Yep, I thought you meant to write lift! Made more sense in that moment! Have fun, Dorothy!
Now that I think more about it, It get it. Toto, we’re not in Kansas, anymore. 😀