The Scraps Book: Notes from a Colorful Life (2014) and Rain Fish (2016)

When my husband asked our five-year-old grandson a few days ago, “What’s the difference between children and adults?” Connor didn’t pause before replying, “Children are funner.” Lois Ehlert was certainly fun—in every cell of her luminous being. When she died on May 25, 2021, the blow felt doubled because her departure happened only two days after the death of the beloved Eric Carle—two of the brightest glowing beacons of American children’s books for decades. Both Ehlert and Carle passionately loved nature and color, collage, and the magical fun possibilities of surprise on the page. She even received the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art Artist award for innovation in their happy field.

Ehlert was also a poet; in books such as Rain Fish, she explores the joys one may find in rearranged trash on the ground. With gorgeous images made from leaves, twigs, cardboard, socks, feathers, and bottlecaps, et cetera, readers are reminded to be observant: “But you better look fast, because rain fish don’t last.” Her autobiographical book Scraps is a gorgeous, colorful narrative of how she became an artist to begin with—her parents told her she could keep all her projects in process out on a little folding table as long as she kept working on them. She wrote, “I was lucky; I grew up with parents who made things with their hands.” Lois inherited their bits and pieces—scraps of fabric, sewing supplies, her father’s wood scraps—and learned that ideas, art, and dreamy images popped up everywhere. She reminds readers to stay vigilant and appreciate the pleasures of every day. In wondrous books such as Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, Nuts to You!, Growing Vegetable Soup, Moon Rope, In My World, and dozens of others, Ehlert documents and illuminates the poetry and wonder available to all. Now, in honor of her and her beautiful life, please do order a few more copies to give to babies or children or even adults the next time you need a gift for someone. You’ll feel like a more fun person. You can’t go wrong.