Tea & A Good Book Brewing- Installment 20, Mr. Putter & Tabby

I do not have a cat. Nor do I expect to have one anytime soon, if my husband's allergies have anything to say about it.

However, if I did own a cat, I would want it to be like Mr. Putter's good cat, Tabby.

You see, Tabby likes tea with lots of cream and warm English muffins. She likes morning naps and afternoon puddings. She likes funny stories and tulips.

She is also very fond of Mr. Putter.

And who wouldn't be?

Mr. Putter is an adorable older gentleman with some of the same great tastes as his cat! He just takes his tea with sugar instead of cream.

The Mr. Putter and Tabby books, written by Cynthia Rylant and illustrated by Arthur Howard, are so incredibly lovable and funny! This may come as a surprise, as the two main characters happen to be an old man and his cat, but the books are so well written that it's hard to find a nicer series for children and the parents who read them!

 We first meet this particular duo in Mr. Putter and Tabby Pour the Tea, when Mr. Putter goes in search of a cat and finds the perfect one at the shelter. The old yellow cat has bones that creak, fur that is thinning and he seems to be a little deaf, but Mr. Putter creaked, his hair was thinning and he was a little deaf, too. He took the old yellow cat home and named her Tabby, and that is how their life began.

From there, Mr. Tabby & Tabby go on to have many adventures and escapades! They walk the dog, bake the cake, pick the pears, fly the plane, row the boat, take the train, catch the cold, stir the soup and write the book, among others!

And that's not all! Mr. Putter has a good neighbor, Mrs. Teaberry, and she has a good dog, Zeke, and these two often factor largely into Mr. Putter's adventures. The two have a lot in common. They both like bingo. They both like free samples. They both like the rain. And they both liked music, albeit country for Mrs. Teaberry and opera for Mr. Putter.

Mrs. Teaberry is a very good neighbor and she especially enjoys making treats and then inviting Mr. Putter to share them with her by sending her good dog Zeke over with a note that always says, "Are you hungry?" And Mr. Putter always says, "Yes!"

Who would refuse a neighbor who made chocolate crunchies, raspberry roll-ups, and brown sugar bon-bons?

In Mr. Putter & Tabby Spin the Yarn, Mr. Putter wants to do something nice for Mrs. Teaberry since she is such a nice neighbor. When she tells him she is starting a knitting club, Mr, Putter refuses to join, but offers to serve tea to the club. When they arrive at Mrs, Teaberry's house, Tabby looks at all the needles and all the threads and all the balls of yarn and her teeth begin to chatter. To calm her, Mr. Putter and Tabby join Zeke in the kitchen, where he has been banned since he was stealing the fake vegetables from Gertrude's hat. Mr. Putter made the tea. He fixed a nice big tray with a teapot and tea cozy. He put sugar cubes and cream on the tray. And he filled a big bowl with chocolate bridge mix. When Mr. Putter tells Zeke that he can help if he is a good boy, the fun begins! Zeke went straight for the hat and then proceeded to fly through the house with a big plastic potato in his mouth. Tabby chattered herself into a frenzy and went for the nearest ball of yarn (which happened to be attached to a sweater Mrs. Fitzwater had been knitting for seven months.) As Mr. Putter stood in the doorway with his lovely tray of tea, Mrs. Fitzwater's sweater got smaller and smaller. Then it disappeared. Mr. Putter looked at the knitting club. He put on his best smile. "One lump or two, Ladies?" He asked.

Oh, but I love that book! And all of the other Mr. Putter & Tabby adventures (and thankfully there are many- I didn't list them all!)

Cynthia Rylant is a true genius in how she manages to keep her stories simple and short, and yet full of hilarity and fun. The books are on an easy-reader level, and usually have 4-5 very short chapters. The illustrations are superb and lend themselves perfectly to the whimsy and charm of the stories.
Elasa enjoys reading them, and both Gavin and Parker enjoy listening to them. In fact, Parker often requests Mr. Putter, and he is two, so the books service a wide age range. This evening when I was reading Mr. Putter and Tabby Toot the Horn, he got a case of giggles over one page, which of course made me laugh, too!

What more could you ask for from a children's book than a shared experience like laughter?

And these books hold the added bonus of showing us all that growing old has plenty of charms...

If you do it in the fashion of Mr. Putter & Tabby, that is!