Mr. Sneaky Pants, Version 6.5

Mr. Sneaky Pants celebrated his half birthday last Tuesday.  There was a special trip to the bread store to pick out a caramel roll for an after lunch treat.  Mr. SP was very excited to not have to do any cleaning on his half birthday . . . the absence of chores on half birthdays is an extremely important part of the day.  It was a teaching day for me, so there wasn’t a lot of extra time to do special things, but before bed we all sat down with a dish of special ice cream, and The Banana, YaYa and I gave Mr. SP the very special gift we had been working on.

One of our favorite chapter books around here is Sara Pennypacker’s Stuart’s Cape.  This book isn’t as well known as her Clementine books, but I think it’s one of the very best books out there for younger readers in the 5-10 age group.  It is the hilarious tale of Stuart, who creates a magical cape by stapling neck ties together.  His cape takes him on some amazing outlandish adventures, like the day he manages  grow gigantic pieces of toast from toast seeds.  All the characters in the book and it’s sequel are over the top and incredibly funny.  We own the audio book (and the print version) of Stuart’s Cape, and we listen to it on every single long car ride, enjoying it in new ways each time.

On the way back from our last car trip, I got the idea to make Mr. SP a cape made out of neckties like Stuart’s.  I told YaYa and The Banana, and they thought it was an excellent idea.  YaYa came up with the idea of putting in a secret pocket in the cape just like Stuart had, and then she made some cardboard toast and toast seeds to fit into the pocket.  The Banana had a great time picking out all the neckties at the thrift store.  I did the sewing.  This was the perfect sewing job for me, because the end product could be messy and crazy, just like Stuart’s stapled cape.  Things did not have to line up:  the crazier the better.

Mr. SP was pleased.  He took the book and the cape to school today for sharing day.