Blue Wolf Reviews

Tag: happy

  • Be Kind, Be Cool, Be You: Inspiring Words to Live Your Life By

    Be Kind, Be Cool, Be You: Inspiring Words to Live Your Life By

    Be Kind, Be Cool, Be You is a little BIG book packed to the very edges with wonderful, colourful affirmations to be used on a daily basis to cheer up, to inspire and comes with a huge dose of happy to be injected into what can sometimes be dull, drab, grey kind of days.

    Nikki Miles loves to spread kindness through her artwork; bold, bright, cheerful pieces that she hopes will offer a sense of positivity and colour to the day. One Hundred and fifty pieces of her work have been gathered together to be used as required or desired, which are short but succinct on words, but big, bright and beautiful in colour.

    Some offer a reminder such as ‘Be kind on line’, the basic but lovely ‘Love yourself’, often the hardest thing to do; ‘Say yes to things that make you happy’, which is a prefect reminder to accept joy into your life.  Perfect for gifting to yourself firstly as an essential component of waking up every morning, and then to friends who you believe could use a spark of joy in their day, Be Kind, Be Cool, Be You makes the perfect pick-me-up in your day.

    In this increasingly complex world in which we find ourselves as 2020 draws to a somewhat cataclysmic close, a bright minute in a day is an incredibly welcome, feel good moment in time so remember, ‘You are a ray of sunshine’, so be kind, be cool and most importantly, be you!

  • Meesha Makes Friends A Big Bright Feelings Book

    Meesha Makes Friends A Big Bright Feelings Book

    Meesha Makes Friends tackles the time old problem of making friends, which is always a challenging issue regardless of how old you may be, or whatever the reason is that sees you looking for new friends. Perhaps you have moved countries, towns or schools.

    With his usual flair and aplomb Tom Percival, along with his new friend Meesha, take a look at this really, really difficult thing to do: make friends.

    Poor Meesha does not seem to be able to make friends at her new school. She really doesn’t seem to know how to go about saying the right things, or even doing the right thing; somehow it always seems to go wrong.

    But the one thing she is very good at is making things. Meesha loves to make pictures out of numbers, or pictures out of sounds, sometimes even both, but making friends, well that is really hard, until she gets a great idea, to make her own friends; friends she can take everywhere with her an never feel lonely.

    One day she is invited to a party, which she does not want to go to, and there on the stairs she meets another little boy, who also finds it hard to make friends. All of a sudden she does not feel sad or lonely and a lovely friendship is begun.

    As always Percival’s stories are accompanied with bold illustrations which show, often far better than the words, the emotional issues he is discussing in his delightful Big Bright Feelings series.

    Meesha makes Friends is the  perfect book for classroom use to open a discussion on making friends, a great book to help children who are finding making friends difficult and the perfect medium to remind everyone that if you see someone sitting outside the group looking on, spend a little time to make them feel welcome.

  • Charlie’s Shell The tale of a little snail and the greatest shell there ever was

    Charlie’s Shell The tale of a little snail and the greatest shell there ever was

    Charlie is a happy little snail going about his snail business, as snails do, until he meets a group of slugs who are not nice, in fact they are downright nasty. They start mocking Charlie for having a lovely, big, roomy shell, that needs to be carried everywhere he goes.

    Charlie is so sad, so unhappy and down he finally decides that the very best thing he can do is get rid of his terrible, large, humiliating shell. He holds his breath and puffs right up and, POP, off falls his shell.

    Freedom, he thinks, happiness; he is overjoyed to think that at last he looks like those slugs that made him so miserable. That is until Charlie begins to have so much trouble it makes him begin to realise that perhaps life with his lovely, roomy shell after all, is not such a bad thing, in fact it is pretty terrific.

    Marina Zlatanova has, with lovely rhyming text captured perfectly, the conflict that can be a challenge when bullies decide to make fun out of others, a sad fact and one that can cause a great deal of unhappiness.

    In this delicately crafted time old tale, Charlie begins to understand that life as a snail is pretty good, and that life as a slug is perhaps not so terrific, and is most definitely far more dangerous. He learns along his difficult journey, to appreciate that his great, big, cumbersome shell really does make a lovely warm, protective, home.

    Glorious illustrations offer a smile and more, as Charlie learns the hard way to appreciate what he has in life. Charlie’s Shell is perfect for young and beginner readers, with the illustrations adding a charm that will appeal to all little people, regardless of age, who love a really good story.

  • Go Be Kind: 28 1/2 Adventures Guaranteed to Make You Happier

    Go Be Kind: 28 1/2 Adventures Guaranteed to Make You Happier

    Leon Logothetis is all about spreading kindness as far as he can throughout the sad, sad world in which we live, which is a truly delightful, wonderful thing, as kindness is something there is never enough off in everyday life.

    The real magic of kindness, which is free by the way, is that the giver feels a great sense of happiness in their lives and the receiver, well, that can mean so many things to many people, from a simple thanks, I needed that smile, to just about anything.

    Go be Kind is presented in a style which is pure Logothetis, zany, slightly bonkers and of course very, very kind, as he has created 28 1/2 adventures that he guarantees will make you happier. After having read through the book, I would have to agree, because even if you only read the introduction, then the ‘rules’ and then only do one of the 28 1/2adventures, you have already made a difference in your life as well as someone else’s: Pretty powerful, is it not!

    Of course, the adventures span a month, more or less, as it is a well-known and researched fact, that it takes 21 days to make and 21 days to break a habit. In this case there are a few extra days built in to make sure the new habit of kindness is there to stay.

    As a ‘journal’ into happiness and kindness, Go Be Kind is one book where you are encouraged to write on the pages, colour them in or even tear them out, but it also encourages you to take a look into yourself, your happiness levels and do something about improving them. Call it a health check for happiness which costs nothing and can be seriously life changing, for the better.

    The other side of the adventure is reaching out to people who are lonely, isolated and yet surrounded by everything life has to offer, a condition that is on the increase, which in today’s world of electronic everything, is so very important.

    Kindness is something that needs to be practiced, preferably on a daily basis but anytime will do, until it becomes a habit that is catching: a warm, happy feeling that once rediscovered becomes an intimate and wonderful part of the person we are, as we continue on our journey through the years of our lives.

    How to describe kindness, you can’t, as it is an ethereal something that comes from within, but when practiced, no holds barred, it is pure magic. So, in the words of the master himself, Leon Logothetes, ‘I created this journal for anyone who has ever felt alone. I see you’ which is of course, everyone!

    Give like the sun and the whole world grows tall. – Atticus

  • Be Happy 35 Powerful Methods for Personal Growth & Well being

    Be Happy 35 Powerful Methods for Personal Growth & Well being

    Like many things in life, information comes to you when it is often most needed; to advise, encourage or inform as will this lovely little guide to happiness, Be Happy created by Dr Rebecca Ray and presented in a manner that will help to better understand what happiness is truly all about.

    As is already known, happiness can and is a transient state of emotion and mind, frequently bought about by momentary satisfaction, such as the purchase of that stunning new dress, a win on the lotto or a perfect smile from your beloved child.

    But as it is a fleeting thing, in many instances moving on as rapidly as it arrived, it raises the question, surely there must be more to this happiness thing than just a temporary fix, or a fleeting feeling.

    Perhaps it could be a matter of choosing how life is lived, the elements allowed in to make a difference, the effort that may be required to train the brain to accept that happiness is all around us, we simply need to look for it and cultivate it, each and every day,

    This lovely journey into happiness is divided into four very constructive components, Choosing, Cultivating, Practicing and Making Space for…………. which is the best structure to begin any new venture. Each section is broken down into small components to be read, enjoyed, discovered and mastered. At the end of each component there is a page titled making A Habit of…… to help embed the learned information.

    Gratitude, mindfulness, relationships, along with that wonderful thing procrastination, are some of the many aspects of daily life that are discussed, with tips offered to help focus and guide towards a more positive and happier outcome.

    35 little words, along with 35 methods of increasing your happiness quota have been delightfully presented, all backed up with sound advice, tried and true methodology and quirky little quotes that underpin the words under discussion.

    Be Happy is the perfect size for tucking into the bag for that reassuring dip into the goal for the day, or sharing a point with a friend.

  • Grey-glasses-itis

    Grey-glasses-itis

    The wonderfully colourful and hugely popular Loppy the LAC is back in his very distinctive red and white stripes, to bring another perspective to those terribly grey days we all have from time to time.

    In this wonderful new story Lynne Jenkins and Kirrili Lonergan, with the help of Loppy, teach little ones the difference which can be made in their lives by simply doing something very small to change the way they feel, and how that feeling is bound up in how they think.

     Loppy the LAC is having a wonderful day. He is painting a lovely, actually a wonderful picture, full of colours. He is thinking about how the colours all around him and the ones he is using in his picture, are making him feel.  Blue makes him feel peaceful and red makes him excited. Yellow makes him cheerful.

    That is until his friend Curley Calmster comes along with a bag full of glasses, which he gets Loppy to try on. Loppy and Curly are having such fun until Loppy tries on the grey glasses. All of a sudden, his fun day is grey, gloomy; he feels miserable, sad and not wanting to go out to the concert that night, at all.

    The big, bold illustrations are wonderful to show the effect colours of the day have on how people feel with the change in emotion felt and seen with the grey glasses; the rapid rise in the emotions are duly recorded when the grey is removed from Loppy’s world. Almost immediately he feels so much better, so much so he will go to the concert, after all.

    Once again Lynne Jenkins and Kirrili Lonergan have combined their talent to create a wonderful medium to enchant, entertain and teach about emotions and resilience, with two characters who are beginning to became rather famous in the world of children’s literature; that of Loopy the LAC and his great friend Curley Calmster in the Lessons of a LAC series.

    Great reading and sharing fun are to be had while teaching children to identify how they are feeling and how they can choose to change those grey feelings, as well as thoughts, into good feelings, simply by changing their glasses!

  • Out of the Blue

    Out of the Blue

    Gloriously free and easy, this debut album from pianist Cory Lavine is an absolute pleasure to enjoy as the music is easy, sensitive and relaxing.

    Songs on Out of the Blue are played in the higher registers, which is a lovely change as the music takes on a life of its own, one that feels the notes dancing over the ether, full of enjoyment and pleasure.

    The entire work is light, delicate, pleasurable and as Lavine offers when describing the birth of this collection, ‘many of the pieces, particularly the title track, came out of the blue’, when he sat down at his piano and hit the record button, not knowing what magic would come through his fingers on the keys.

    Tracks titles always hint at the backstories that provide the inspirations for pieces such as Riding the Wind, a free and easy composition that really needs no descriptors, but presents the wonderful feeling of freedom that comes with doing just this, riding the wind!

    A Child’s Wish is a piece everyone will relate to as it is something special, something asked for only once and enjoyed should the wish be fulfilled. There is poignancy to this piece which makes it rather special. Flitting along is New Day followed by the short but catchy Little Dance which has captured the joy and freshness of a brand new day with the dance that can live in everyone hearts.

    Reminiscing completes this lively, snappy, nine track collection which will, without a doubt, bring lightness to your day. Although Out of the Blue was released in 2015 it is still as fresh now as it was then, which is the  signature of a timeless, evergreen album which will bring a smile and a light heart each time it is enjoyed.

     

  • Finn and Puss

    Finn and Puss

    The front cover of this book shows a smiling boy and a smiling cat, ensuring that we know that all will be well. The tone of the story is set here and on the first few pages. The first double page spread shows a boy cutting out a paper aeroplane, and has the words “This is Finn.” The following double page shows a cat in a basket. The text says “This is Puss,” At first it seems the simplistic text is not telling a story, but merely labelling characters, but then we see in the following double page that the pattern is set for a minimalist story, ably supported by many illustrations.

     The illustrations are quite striking. Gentle pastel colours show a world from a cat’s perspective which is many feet; with each change of the story, the perspective changes. We learn that Finn is lonely and he finds the cat. In the street, just above his head is a poster showing a lost cat, exactly the same as puss. After Finn has fed the cat and she has played with him, Finn notices the poster. “Finn does the right thing.” He returns the cat to her owner, and trudges home.

     As promised by the front cover and the optimistic tone to the book, there is a happy ending, and a reward for someone who does do the right thing. The illustrations are childlike and show the focus of the story to be Finn. This leaves room for pondering what the child is thinking and what inner voices prompted his actions.

     This is a gentle story, simply told and quietly complete. The hardback presentation is attractive and solid for small hands