Frog and Toad

Um, not to spoil anything, but it's basically, like...

I don't know if you guys have ever read the story about in Frog and Toad where, uh, Toad gets a bunch of ice cream and then it all melts on him and then he's, like, running around and can't see and he's, like, gets a bunch of sticks and stones and branches and brambles get attached to him and he's, like, looks like a monster and, uh, it turns out it's just Toad in, covered in ice cream and stuff.

That's basically the plot of Shaun the Sheep's, uh-

Yeah, it's great

...

the Halloween movie.

It's basically the Frog and Toad story.

Great story.

[laughs]

Nah, I know what you're talking about, Frog and Toad.

Frog and Toad.

Yeah.

Mm.

... were, like, actually kid sized.

I feel like Frog and Toad is also a classic.

Hmm.

It's just so, like, simple.

Oh, Frog and Toad.

But the, [laughs] the artwork is still also beautiful-

Yeah

[laughs]

Um, the second thing is, uh, we were read- You, you know Frog and Toad, right?

Yeah.

Frog and Toad-

Yeah, yeah

... book series.

Um, so Frog and Toad are, uh, uh, those books are, like, pretty mundane.

But, uh, we have a compilation book of Frog and Toad, and the last story in this compilation book, Toad is performing on a stage, and he performs on the piano, and he's answering to a voice.

Uh, 10:00 AM is the very beginning, and it sort of opens up with some kid-friendly activities.

There's a musi- musical st- storytelling hour where there's gonna be a reading of stories from Frog and Toad, and they're gonna be accompanied by fiddle and banjo, uh, you know, some, some tunes in the background.

And then there's gonna be a brief opportunity for kids and people to, you know, uh, play the instruments for the first time and experiment strumming a banjo and a guitar.

Uh, and that's gonna move on into, uh, the sort of the, the main part of the day, starting around maybe 10:30 or 11:00, which has lots of different, uh, uh, bands and workshops playing.

The, technically, you know, for that.

But I'm also working on props at the moment for a West Texas A&M University for their production of the children's show Frog and Toad, which is a ton of fun.

I got to design and build a plant box that Frog plants the seeds, you know, and makes a wish or whatever, and then goes to sleep.

And then when he wakes up, the plants have grown, you know, all on the, you know, overnight.

And what I then had to do was to basically become a graduate student, become a psychologist, but also essentially grow into motherhood all at the same time.

And it was around the time that they were in preschool that towards the middle or end of my PhD, that I would read them stories from Frog and Toad.

And Frog and Toad is, I think, the most psychologically wise children's series that there could ever be.

Like every single... story could be its own academic publication.

And they were written by the incomparable Arnold Lobel.

And in particular, Amanda Lucey really liked the cookies story.

Frog and Toad, who are best friends, are baking a big batch of cookies.

And they're eating them, you know, fin over fin.

And and can't attend during the day.

But the topic of the class was picture book duos, like Frog and Toad, Elephant and Piggy, Stick and Stone.

And at the end of the class, the instructor, Carmen Oliver, told us we had to write a new manuscript for the next week.

Well, I'd had mac and cheese to eat for dinner during class.