Our SuperMom children's book is not weird - or is it?

Two little girls about seven years old made me laugh out loud this weekend. They came to our booth at the craft fair in Lloydminster, Saskatchewan/Alberta running ahead of their moms and enthusiastically grabbing our SuperMom and the Big Baby book (written by Dave Driver and illustrated by Guy Laird).

One girl called it 'Superhero Mom'. Then they walked away.

Then they came back and grabbed it again.

I told them the book is about a little boy who has a temper and the madder he gets, the bigger he grows.


I showed them the picture of the boy becoming a giant baby who runs down the street, which scares everyone.

I told them that his mom grabs a mask and cape and becomes SuperMom to the rescue.

One of the girls looked at me solemnly and said, "That's just weird."

I burst out laughing.

I didn't ask which part she thought was weird. It didn't matter.

They walked away again, then came back a few minutes later and looked at the book again - this time, with their mothers. 

They showed the book to their moms, one of whom corrected them on the book's title. Then the girls and I had a discussion about which of Robert Munsch's books are weird and which are silly.

"This book is Robert Munsch-like in its style of humour and it is silly," I said. I asked, "Have you read The Paper Bag Princess ?"

"Yes," said one girl. We have that one at home!"

"That's pretty silly, isn't it?"

"Yes. And Mortimer ," she said

"That's a silly one, too," I agreed.

"Yes. We read that at school!"

"Well, this SuperMom book is a silly one," I suggested.

The second girl looked at me and repeated her friend's initial pronouncement, "That's just weird."

"It's not weird! It's called imagination, silly," I protested.

They and their moms all laughed.

I love the honesty of children and their openness to new ideas.

The moms didn't buy our 'weird' book right then but, by the looks on their faces as they left, I had a feeling that SuperMom and the Big Baby just might be under their Christmas trees this year.

That will be a weird Christmas, won't it?