Small World: All The World by Liz Garton Scanlon

Moat to dig, a shell to keep.
All the world is wide and deep.

Deep in winter, it's good to remember the days of last summer, now slipping into the haze of times past. Days of digging on the beach and washing the perfect shell in the sea and taking it home to keep forever. Days of farmers' markets, of picking just the right tomatoes and corn displayed for us like jewels, wrought from the dark earth and the golden sun. Days of dodging cool raindrops that spoil our afternoon plans and send us clattering, scattering our treasures as we scoot for sudden shelter.

Better luck another day.
All the world goes round this way.

Days of playing with cousins, hugging grandparents, having supper under warm lights while the windows fade into dusky rectangles around the table.

Spreading shadows, setting sun.
Crickets, curtains. Day is done.

Winner of a 2010 Caldecott Honor Award, Liz Scanlon's little world of sand buckets, red wagons, and summer play, All the World (Simon & Schuster, 2009) focuses in closely on the children of one summer's day, as the family visits the beach, the market, a cafe, and comes home again for a sleepy snuggle and good night. The child's world may seem small to the worldly wise, but in it is everything that is for that child--all the world.

All the world is here, it is there.
All the world is right where you are.

To Scanlon's simple, soothing text Marla Frazee, winner of a 2009 Caldecott for A Couple of Boys Have the Best Week Ever,) puts her vacationing family into simple landscapes, like summery seaside Grandma Moses scenes, as cousins tussle and grownups move the kids through the day's rain and shine, in a cheerful tumble of activity from sand castle to bedtime story. All the World is a good book for remembering last summer and dreaming warmly of the next with your favorite child.