WHERE'S WALDO? THE MIGHTY MAGICAL MIX-UP

WHERE'S WALDO? THE MIGHTY MAGICAL MIX-UP by Martin Handford

I think it's pretty obvious that one of the things I enjoy in life is connecting people with books. Every once in a while, I like to set out a book somewhere and see if people will pick it up versus pulling out their phones. When I saw that there was a brand new Where's Waldo book, I thought this would be a fun one to take on our extended family vacation trip. This is the trip we do with my parents, my siblings, their spouses, and kids. The good, old-fashioned kind of 20 people living in a lakehouse together for a week. Early in the week, I got the book out and sat down to look thorugh the first pages of it. I was happily hunting and little by little the kids came over and joined me. I found everything except the key. I could not find that crazy thing anywhere, and I knew it was just hanging out somewhere in plain site! I told the kids I'd give 50 cents to the person who found it first. (I'm a big spender!) It was game on! Those kids hunted and within just a few minutes, my nephew found it. He showed it to me (yes, it was completely in plain site!), and I happily paid up. After that, I left the book in the living room for the kids to enjoy. Several times, I would walk in to find different groups of them pouring over the pages. It was such a beautiful site!

I think Where's Waldo? belongs in the lineup of some of the greatest books ever. Why? They are patience builders, and that's a big thing in today's world. When I do a Where's Waldo book with my kids, we find every item! Some things we find quickly, others take a long time. Sometimes we move on to the next item on the list without having found the current one we were looking for, but you can bet as we are scouring for that next thing our eyes continue to look for the previous missing item. Sometimes we put the book down and come back to it with "fresh eyes" later. Often times when we do, the item we were looking for pops out pretty quickly, and we laugh at how we missed it. Is it necessary to find every item in the book? No! You might have kids that would burn out at that idea. The fact that they are still hunting is a win by itself.

One more reason Where's Waldo? belongs in the lineup of greatest books ever is it's the perfect book to keep in the car with you for long waits. Pull it out at the doctor's office, restaurants, while siblings wait for a brother or sister to finish practices or lessons. Set your phone aside and join in the fun of the hunt! It's truly fantastic!!

HEADS UP - This particular edition of Where's Waldo has to do with his friend Wizard Whitebeard who lost his wand and caused everything to "mix-up." If you don't want as much of a magic influence, there are books where you find the wizard, but they don't deal with any magic.