Potatoes, potatoes, do you like potatoes? This is a story about two old potatoes that were going to be thrown out. “They were so old sprouts were growing from their eyes.” The potatoes are rescued when a father suggests to his daughter that they plant them in the backyard. At the end of the growing season, the father and daughter team harvest 67 potatoes! “All this from two old potatoes.”
The story is told in fonts of different sizes, materials, and angles throughout the book. The illustrations are very unusual and stylized with bright colors. There are objects hidden in the illustrations. There is a caricature of Abraham Lincoln on a yellow potato on page 22. Can you find it?
The story is complete with a recipe for mashed potatoes at the end.
This would be a good story to share with Kindergartens through second grade. There is an underlying theme of divorce as it is apparent the girl stays in two houses— “Last spring she found two old potatoes while staying in her dad’s house.”
“Growing Good Kids: Excellence in Children’s Literature” awards are presented by the Junior Master Gardner Program and the American Horticultural Society to honor the best in fiction for children on plants and gardens. Two Old Potatoes and Me was chosen for the award in the first year it was presented.
Check the WRL catalog for Two Old Potatoes and Me.
