SUGARING TIME

SUGARING TIME by Kathryn Lasky. Photographs by Christopher G. Knight

Today we finished up our maple syrup making. The house smelled so delicious in a way a scented candle could never mimic. Recently, I had picked up another picture book on the syrup making process but had pretty well decided I was going to save it for next year. After all, Ohio has been seeing some warmer days, and it felt like the syrup season was passed, until today. Today our temps dipped down and snow flakes fell off and on. Then my husband did the final boil. It was too good an opportunity to pass up.

Sugaring Time by Kathryn Lasky won the Newberry Honor in 1984. A photo biography book of the Lacey family and their maple syrup season, Sugaring Time is set in Vermont in the month of March. The black and white pictures take us back to another time when the sap gathering was done by horse and sled. Making syrup is not an easy job especially when done the old fashioned way. It is time intensive, but despite all this it is very rewarding, and this book depicts that well!

Sugaring Time is what I refer to as a meaty picture book. There are pictures on every page, but there is a lot of text to go with the pictures.