Vintage Kid's: Art Seiden Rules.

Gather round kiddies! It's time to read a story with Aunty Alex [cue applaus and laugh track]. This week we have the brilliant Art Seiden and a book called, Never Pat a Bear: A Book About Signs. This little story has everything I love about vintage kid's books: a slightly wacky story and colorful amazing illustrations. I especially love how kid's are dressed in books from the 60s and 70s. They're always wearing something fun. Ever noticed that kid's are wearing in today's book? Probably not, because most are dressed in very innocuous Gap-like duds. Take a gander at this fun story!












Never Pat a Bear, A Little Golden Book.
Written by Mabel Watts
Illustrated by Art Seiden, 1971

Vintage Kids: Animals' in Cute Christmas Scarves

This sweet book is called The Animals' Merry Christmas and has adorable illustrations by Richard Scarry. It was written by Kathryn B. Jackson in 1950. Something about animals in little scarves that gets me every time.


"The Animals' Merry Christmas is as bright and gay as a Christmas tree. All the animals have a happy holiday in this charming collection of stories and poems, delightfully illustrated by the ever-popular Richard Scarry."


As they went they sang:
"Rabbits in the snow,
Off to Grandma's house we go -
Holly, pudding, popcorn, toys,
Shining candles, lots of noise:
Off to Grandma's house we go -
Sing for Christmas, sing for snow!"



Santa Claus said he simply could NOT be everywhere at once. He said it was no use trying. Mrs. Santa Claus thought very hard.
"Your helpers will be glad to go to the stores and ring the bells for you," she said. "I'll fit them all out in your old Santa Claus suits!



Then arm in arm, the Hedgehog family hurried through the snowy twilight, heading for the lights of London town, and the wonderful Christmas sights they would see.


The puppy grabbed the Christmas ribbon and began jumping towards the door of the house.


When he saw some boys throwing snowballs, he ran right up to them. "Who wants a puppy for Christmas?" he barked.


"And Donner and Blitzen sang a sort of song:
"Through the snow,
Bringing toys
To the good
Girls and boys!"
But Prancer shook his head in the naughtiest way.
"Not me!" he said. "I'm not going this year."

[What's with ol cranky pants Prancer!?]


Before long the sleigh stopped with a jerk. It stopped on the roof of Tommy's house.
MERRY CHRISTMAS!


I own this book and scanned it before I left for Michigan, but I cribbed the text from the lovely Pipnstuff's Flickr set.

Vintage Kids: Beware of the Dog

An awesome little book from 1968. Written by Christine Woyke and illustrated by Stina Nagel. As usual I really love the clothes the kidlets are wearing. Some hip duds!

Vintage Kids: Numbers & the Seasons

I'm working on a little Marie Antoinette inspired project at work and have been playing lots of classical to get me in the mood. Vivaldi's Four Seasons is playing right now and it reminded me of these cute pics for Storytime Tuesday. This is from yet another of my Encyclopedia Britannica books. So simple yet so charming. The sweater on that little dog kills me. Hilarious!

Vintage Kids: Groovy ABCs

OOPSY, I forgot to post this on Tuesday! DOH! All that obsessing over which handbag to get I guess it slipped my mind!! This week we have a super cool little ABC book. I only picked a few letters of the alphabet, but you get the idea. "O" and "U" are particularly cute. I mean, who can resist an Owl in Overalls??







This lil cutie printed in 1951, illustrations by Cornelius Witt. I love the name Cornelius, by the way....so Planet of the Apes.

Vintage Kids: All About Shapes

Ah, another one of my favorites from the Encyclopedia Britannica Kids collection, "Discovering Shapes." The illustrations in this series of books are all done by different artists, but they are really great. I especially lerve the saucy monkey tour guide featured in this book. So cute!

Discover Shapes, by Tina Thoburn
Pictures by James Caraway