becoming Real.

Read the second sentence from each photo.

Valenteen is my teacher favrit book.

Yes, that is one of my little guys. Try to ignore the spelling and focus on the meaning. "velveteen" was the spelling word.

earlier in the week, i mentioned to my class that The Velveteen Rabbit was my very favorite book of all time. mentioned it just once. it's funny how the students who don't usually listen the first time, heard that. Three quarters of the kids used this idea as their context clue sentence for homework.

This book has a special home in my heart.

The illustrations and lyrical artistic way in which it is written.

without fail, i tear up every time i read it.

it seems just a simple story

the tale of how a little boy's love turns a velveteen rabbit into a real animal.

but it's not just a story about silly bunny with worn whiskers and ears.

it's the story of each of us

and how love awakens us.

makes us feel alive.

opens our eyes

and our souls

'Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but really loves you, then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."

"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real, you can't be ugly, except to the people who don't understand."

..........................

That night, and for many nights after, the Velveteen Rabbit slept in the Boy's bed. At first he found it rather uncomfortable, for the Boy hugged him very tight, and sometimes rolled over on him, and sometimes he pushed him so far under the pillow that the Rabbit could scarcely breathe. And he missed too, those long moonlight hours in the nursery, when all the house was silent, and his talks with the Skin Horse. But very soon he grew to like it, for the Boy used to talk to him, and made nice tunnels for him, under the bedclothes, that he said were like the burrows the real rabbits lived in.. . And when the Boy dropped off to sleep, the Rabbit would snuggle down close under his little warm chin and dream, with the Boy's hands clasped close round him all night long.

And so time went on, and the little Rabbit was very happy - so happy that he never noticed how his beautiful velveteen fur was getting shabbier and shabbier, and his tail coming unsewn, and all the pink rubbed off his nose where the Boy had kissed him.

...................................

Weeks passed and the little Rabbit grew very old and shabby, but the Boy loved him just as much. He loved him so hard that he loved all his whiskers off, and the pink lining to his ears turned grey, and his brown spots faded. He even began to lost his shape, and he scarcely looked like a rabbit any more, except to the Boy. To him he was always beautiful, and that was all that the little Rabbit cared about. He didn't mind how he looked to other people, because the nursery magic had made him Real, and when you are Real shabbiness doesn't matter.