What's Outside Your Window? The Day is Waiting Book Review & Craft

"What do you see when you look outside?" This is the opening line for the children's book The Day is Waiting by Don Freeman, words by Linda Zuckerman. These words begin an adventure of imagination in the pages of this lovely storybook and inspired us to do a fun window themed craft.

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The Day is Waiting has an interesting backstory. When Don Freeman, creator of the classic (and one of my all time favorites) Corduroy, passed away in 1978, he left behind a treasury of unpublished artwork. His wife and colleagues collected these illustrations and added text by Freeman’s friend Linda Zuckerman to create The Day is Waiting.

Knowing this background, I expected the book to be disjointed, as the drawings were never intended to be a complete story. This was not at all the case. The book invites children to imagine the world beyond their windows, and to dream of where they may go and who they may find. The illustrations are charming and rich, evoking far away places and silly animal friends. Linda Zuckerman’s text brings the pictures together, with a simple line on each page. The text has an easy rhythm and rhyme which make it fun to read aloud (and my kids want to read it over and over again).

My boys and I loved The Day is Waiting. I appreciated the book’s message that encourages exploring the world outside of your window, but knowing that home is always waiting for you. My boys loved the colorful illustrations, fun characters, and simple text. 

Since we enjoyed the book so much, I decided to expand on its theme with a fun "what's outside your window?" craft.

To make your own window, you will need:

• Card stock or heavy paper in 3 colors - I used light blue for the sky, cream for the window panes, and yellow for the curtains.
• Scissors
• Glue
• Black Marker

To make the window, cut out 2 strips of card stock - one equal to the length of your paper and one equal to the width. Cut out 2 curtain shapes (Tip: draw a large capital R on the edge of your paper and cut out the outline to make the curtain shape).

Glue your 2 strips of card stock in a + shape in the middle of your background paper. Glue the curtain shapes to either side. Add in fold details on your curtains with the marker. Allow everything to dry.

All done! Now you can invite your children to imagine what is outside their window. You can ask older kids to draw what they see (or what they would like to see), or you can use stickers for very little kids.

My boys love stickers so I set out their windows with an assortment of their favorites and asked them what they see outside their windows.

They are very into monsters right now (thanks Monsters, Inc) so they went for the monster stickers first.

They loved telling me about all the silly monsters outside their windows.

And our finished product! We had so much fun with these and I loved that we were able to tie in our new book to a craft that really sparked some imaginative thinking. And stickers are great for fine motor practice too. We'll definitely do this project again!

 I received my copy of The Day is Waiting free from the publisher through the BookLook Bloggers book review program. I was not required to write a positive review. All opinions and ideas in this post are my own.