Hi everyone! Welcome back to the Storytime Family. How are you doing today? Did you have a fun day at school? Maybe you played outside with your friends, or perhaps you stayed inside because it was rainy. Either way, I hope you had a great time!
Today, we’re going to read a book called “Summertime” by Antonia Picenti and Hilary Bell. Let’s dive into the world of “Summertime” together!
Summertime is my favorite time of the year! Is it yours too? The water looks so shiny and blue, calling us to play. But first, we have to wait after lunch before we can jump in. It feels like forever!
Watch out for the magpie! It’s a black and white bird that swoops down, but don’t worry, it won’t hurt you. Waiting for the fan to cool you down can feel like a long time, but soon it will be spinning and making your hair fly!
Can you smell the delicious sausage rolls cooking? They start pink and turn black if left too long. Time flies when you’re having fun, and before you know it, an hour has passed!
After swimming, your fingers and toes look like wrinkly prunes, and your lips might turn a little blue from the cold water. You might even hear a ship’s horn in the distance!
As the sun sets, the stars and moon start to twinkle in the sky. But watch out for mosquito bites—they can be itchy! Spiders like the golden orb weaver make sticky webs that shine in the sunlight.
In the morning, your shadow is long and tall, but as the day goes on, it gets smaller and smaller until it disappears at noon.
Trays full of sweet mangoes fill the air with their yummy smell. You have to eat them quickly before they get too soft. Playing games like scrabble and hide and seek in a cozy cottage is so much fun!
After a month of swimming, your swimsuit might get a little saggy, and your hair might turn green from the pool water. But that’s all part of the summer adventure!
Ice cream is a summer favorite! Chocolate and vanilla are eaten first, but sometimes strawberry is left behind. I love strawberry ice cream!
As summer ends, new leaves start to grow on trees, and the cicadas sing their loud songs. The bush will soon be green and golden again.
Summer is over now, and the stars twinkle in the night sky. But don’t worry, summer will come again, bringing more fun and adventures!
Thank you for joining us for “Summertime.” I hope you enjoyed the story and that summer is just around the corner for you. If you liked this book, you can find a copy to enjoy anytime. Don’t forget to like and subscribe to our channel, and tell us your favorite summer activities in the comments!
Thanks for reading with us! See you next time. Take care! Bye!
Shadow Play: On a sunny day, go outside and observe your shadow. Notice how it changes size throughout the day. In the morning, your shadow is long and tall, but as the day goes on, it gets smaller. Try tracing your shadow with chalk at different times to see the changes. Can you guess why your shadow changes size?
Summer Senses: Create a “Summer Senses” journal. Write down or draw things you see, hear, smell, taste, and feel during summer. For example, you might draw the shiny blue water or write about the smell of mangoes. Share your journal with a friend or family member and ask them what their favorite summer senses are.
Ice Cream Experiment: Make your own simple ice cream using a plastic bag. Mix milk, sugar, and vanilla in a small bag, then place it in a larger bag filled with ice and salt. Shake it for about 5 minutes until it turns into ice cream. Enjoy your treat and think about why the ice and salt helped freeze the milk mixture. What other flavors could you try?
Sure! Here’s a sanitized version of the transcript:
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[Music]
Hi everyone! Welcome back to the Storytime Family. How are you doing today? Did you have a good day at school? Did you get to play outside with all your friends, or did you stay in because it was gloomy outside? That’s okay too, as long as you’re having fun!
Now that you’re sitting down and reading with us, we have this book called “Summertime” by Antonia Picenti and Hilary Bell. Let’s get into “Summertime.”
Summertime—my favorite time of the year! Is it yours too? The water is beckoning, glossy and blue. It’s lunchtime, and you’re not allowed in. It seems like an eternity while you digest, longingly counting each minute. A magpie prepares for her last swoop of spring.
A moment that fills you with dread—a black and white blur and the clack of a beak. She narrowly misses your head. Eight seconds waiting for the fan to rotate feels like forever until it’s whirring and stirring your damp, sticky hair. Don’t put your hand through the grill!
The smell of sausage rolls fills the air, stretching away on the hot concrete. In an instant, you dry, leaving a patch damp and gray, freckled and squishy like an old lady’s arms. Sausages, twenty per pack. Ten minutes later, from hissing pink, they turn to charcoally black. Somehow, an hour has paddled away, but it feels like just a minute or two.
Fingers and toes are as wrinkled as prunes. Lips are a shivery blue. On the horizon, a ship sounds its horn. The ocean is windless and wide. When you look up in the late afternoon, it’s crawled to the opposite side. Light filters through the breeze blocks, and the smell of shampoo goggles that someone forgot fills the air. It always takes ages to figure it out—the water will never get hot.
Warm summer evenings with the moon and distant stars twinkling and winking until everyone is covered from eyebrow to heel in mosquito bites—itchy and pink. Golden orb weavers love hot summer days. Look what’s happened overnight! Strong, sticky filaments cross and connect, the gilded sheen catching the light.
Wake the sun, and your shadow is long, spindly, and tall as a tree. All through the morning, it hardens and shrinks. By noon, there’s nothing to see. Over a weekend, the bush turns to black, hazy with cinders and soot, scarred ashen sandstone and charred spotted gums. Burnt seed pods crunch underfoot.
Trays full of mangoes, all golden and pink, with sweet musky fragrances wafting through the air. Three days to eat them all before they turn squashy and soft. Calypso mangoes are my favorite! Dusty old bunk beds and musty old bugs, scrabble, charades, hide and seek in a self-contained cottage of peppermint greens. Sand’s been collecting all week during a long, dreamy month at the pool—sunlight, pink zinc, and chlorine.
Your swimmers turn saggy, then baggy and thin. Hair that was yellow turns green. Bump and chunk over riveted joints. Wedgies on wet fiberglass as your friend disappears around the bin. Let’s go again!
Season pass— all of the chocolate gets eaten up first, then vanilla with sprinkles and such, but the strawberry stays in the freezer for ages. Nobody likes it that much. I love strawberry, though!
Here comes the man with a middle foot measure, bringing a single limp sock, taking forever to lace up a school shoe—clumpy as hard as a rock. Tender new leaves shoot from black hollow trees. The cicada’s song pierces in high notes. Next year, the bush will be golden and green under a hot summer sky.
Summer is over now. Umi returns as surely as night follows day to fly for eternity, dark among stars high in a vast milky way. And that was summertime!
That was very poetic and quite beautiful, actually. I hope you liked “Summertime,” and I hope summer is just around the corner for you. If you enjoyed this book and would like your own copy, the links to purchase it are in our description below.
Give us a like and do subscribe if you haven’t. Leave us a comment and tell us about your favorite things to do in summer. Thanks so much for reading with us! We’ll see you back here soon. You take care! Bye!
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