Picture Book: A Pocketful of Posies, A Treasury of Nursery Rhymes

It is Poetry Friday!  This week's host is Alphabet Soup. 

Amidst the dozens and dozens of collections of nursery rhymes available, illustrator Salley Mavor has created a remarkable, one-of-a-kind experience in Pocketful of Posies: A Treasury of Nursery Rhymes.   Beginning with morning rhymes and ending with bedtime ones, a whole gamut of daily experiences are explored.  Mavor masterfully weaves the well-known with the unfamiliar.  For instance, on one layout a town is pictured where the rhymes “Pat-a-cake,”  “Cobbler, cobbler, mend my shoe,” and “Polly, put the kettle on” are all intertwined.   In another instance, a rain scene fluidly depicts “Rain, rain go away,”  “There was an old woman lived under a hill,” and “Rain on the green grass.” 

Here are a couple of the lesser known rhymes:

I eat my peas with honey.

I’ve done it all my life.

They do taste kind of funny.

But it keeps them on my knife.

Molly, my sister,

And I fell out,

And what do you think

It was all about?

She loved coffee

And I loved tea,

And that was the reason

We couldn’t agree!

One of my favorites is a bit of a riddle describing the seasonal cycle of a tree:

In the spring I look gay

decked in comely array,

In summer more

clothing I wear.

When colder it grows,

I fling off my clothes,

And in winter

quite naked appear.

The BEST part of this collection is the illustrations!  Salley Mavor used great care and detail in her unique fabric relief technique.  The embroidered scenes use wool felt, hand-sewn dolls, and appealing embellishments to create brilliant multi-dimensional scenes.   The soft colors and rich textures make the pictures pop off the pages!   Each stunning layout is a treasured work of art.  

Reading and memorizing nursery rhymes build important literacy skills for later reading success.  I highly recommend Pocketful of Posies: A Treasury of Nursery Rhymes for ages infant to 6.