It’s the third year of Booking Across the USA, and this year we are featuring one author for each of the fifty states! I picked Massachusetts author Jan Brett as our picture book author to feature. Jan Brett’s picture books are favorites in our house, and her website is full of wonderful activities that my kids enjoy! Last November I wrote a post about how we used activities from her site after reading The Three Snow Bears*, and how we paired this book with photos from my mother’s childhood in Alaska. Back in 2012, I participated in a blog hop full of activities that go along with books by Jan Brett. I was introduced to this author via her book Berlioz the Bear*, which my mom bought for my younger siblings when I was in high school. Since then I have collected many of her books. The Mitten* and The Wild Christmas Reindeer* are other favorites in our home.
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Booking Across the USA: Massachusetts Author Jan Brett
Jan Brett’s site is incredible, so I tend to stick to resources she provides when we read her books. We read Gingerbread Baby* this week, and I printed out her gingerbread house mural pages for the kids to color. Besides the basic gingerbread house shape that Anna is coloring below, there three pages of various decorations for the roof and walls.
Jan Brett’s picture books are always full of delightful details, and her coloring pages are no exception. I never would have thought to put lions and elephants on a gingerbread house, but she makes it work:
And a lion and elephant were exactly the types of gingerbread details that seven-year-old Johnny was drawn to!
We used these coloring pages with Gingerbread Baby, but they were actually created for her newer book, Gingerbread Friends*, which we have not read. Have you? Do you have a favorite Jan Brett book, or a favorite feature from her site?
Booking Across the USA
This post is part of the 2015 edition of Booking Across the USA. In 2013 we picked a favorite book for each state (I represented Massachusetts), and in 2014 we wrote about a state (I represented Vermont). This year we are featuring authors that are strongly associated with each state.
You can find the direct links to the authors for each state by clicking on the image below:
Do you have a favorite picture book author for your state?
MaryAnne lives is a craft loving educator, musician, photographer, and writer who lives in Silicon Valley with her husband Mike and their four children.
I am always intrigues by the level of detail in Jan Brett’s books – they are truly a feast for visual learners.
Yes! There are so many details that I feel like I find something new every time I read.
I love to access resources from Jan Brett’s site. She is an amazing author and has a fun Facebook page to follow too. Thank you so much for being part of Booking Across the USA!
Thank you so much for organizing this!
I love Jan Brett! Glad you took MA; it makes me feel like you are still here!
I miss Massachusetts, although there are a lot of things I love in California (especially the weather!)
That’s so great that she provides coloring pages to go along with her books!
Jan Brett is an amazing illustrator and author, but I get her books for the drawings. What a great reading adventure!
I love when authors have websites with great book extensions.
My daughter always loved reading Jan Brett books. They have so much charm. Thanks for the links to her book activities.
You are so lucky to have such a fabulous author and illustrator to represent your state. What fun your children must have had working on such lovely activities. Pinned! Thanks for the inspiration. Carolyn
Yes, Jan Brett is amazing. Thank you for pinning!
Jan Brett’s resource pages are wonderful. Gingerbread Baby is still one of our first snow “must reads” – now more for the illustrations and comfort of tradition than for the actual story. My teens still like to page through it.
The illustrations are my favorite part. So many details!
Jan Brett books make me happy.
How neat! What a talented and generous author!
Is Johnny testing marker colours below the picture before he colours it in so he csn get it just right! Really admiring both his and Anna’s attention to detail here!
Yes, he is – you have a good eye!
We like ‘The Mitten’ and my five-year-old’s teacher had lots of activities for them when they read this book. I wonder if she got it from the author’s website too!