Because they are best buddies, Buddy the bear is anxious to draw a special picture for Grandpa for his birthday.

Do children really need over-the-top birthday parties with pony rides, bounce houses, corporate movie characters, food trucks, and themed decorations? Or destination parties that require renting nail salons, skating rinks, restaurants, and video arcades? Over-the-top parties can lead to more stress, despite parents urge to outsource party planning. In Best Buddies Birthdays, mother-daughter authors Sally Butzin and Charlotte Beal offer a detailed and specific guide on how to plan and host a fabulous party--without all the craziness--that will bring joy and satisfaction to the five- to ten-year-old child. It covers planning, sending invitations, buying prizes, offering refreshments, and writing thank-you notes. But its centerpiece is 50 clearly explained, child-tested party games and activities to choose from. This guide emphasizes the important life lessons children learn through Best Buddies Birthdays, including empathy, hospitality, graciousness, appreciation, sportsmanship, and kindness. Field-tested with real kids, Best Buddies Birthdays can bring back the joy and innocence of childhood, while instilling positive values and saving money. It takes a step away from the norm of over-the-top parties and embraces a more down-to-earth approach to giving children a special day.

What Really Makes a Birthday Extra Special? Natalie's birthday party is on Saturday, and she invites all her friends. But Not-So-Nice Sasha's birthday party is on the same day. Sasha's party has horsey rides and more games. Which party will her friends choose?

First Published in 2001. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This book provides opportunities for older and younger children in different grades to work together on standards-based activities. It contains over 40 lessons in which elementary school students of different ages can learn together. Each activity can be assigned as a special project or as part of an organized program in which teachers work together on a regular basis. For each activity, you will be provided with: standards -- reading, writing, or mathematics, and assessment rubrics, student handouts, ready for photocopying. To help you assess your students objectively and confidently, about a quarter of the lessons are accompanied by samples of student work along with its score and an explanation of why the work deserved that score.

The New York Times bestseller that makes scientific subjects both understandable and fun: “Every sentence sparkles with wit and charm.” —Richard Dawkins From the Pulitzer Prize–winning New York Times science journalist and bestselling author of Woman, this is a playful, passionate guide to the science all around us (and inside us)—from physics to chemistry, biology, geology, astronomy, and more. Drawing on conversations with hundreds of the world’s top scientists, Natalie Angier creates a thoroughly entertaining guide to scientific literacy. For those who want a fuller understanding of some of the great issues of our time, The Canon offers insights on stem cells, bird flu, evolution, and global warming. For students—or parents whose kids ask a lot of questions about how the world works—it brings to life such topics as how the earth was formed, or what electricity is. Also included are clear, fascinating explanations of how to think scientifically and grasp the tricky subject of probability. The Canon is a joyride through the major scientific disciplines that reignites our childhood delight and sense of wonder—and along the way, tells us what is actually happening when our ice cream melts or our coffee gets cold, what our liver cells do when we eat a caramel, why the horse is an example of evolution at work, and how we’re all really made of stardust.

Return to the Magical Land of Birthdays in Book #2 of this sugary-sweet series! It’s been almost six months since Amirah visited the Magical Land of Birthdays, which means it’s almost time for her half birthday! As that special day approaches, Amirah realizes something is not right in the birthday universe. Party invitations are going missing, people don’t feel like celebrating, and stores are sold out of birthday cake ingredients. When Amirah notices that the pages of The Power of Sprinkles are fading away before her eyes, she knows something is terribly wrong. That’s when she and her B-Buds, new and old, travel back to the Magical Land of Birthdays, where they discover that someone is determined to rid the world of birthday magic—by destroying the Magical Land of Birthdays! Can Amirah and her B-Buds restore the magic before it’s too late?

Author Murdered at Cozy Camping RV Park, Lexie Starr Investigates in Cozy Camping by Jeanne Glidewell On their first wedding anniversary, Lexie Starr is surprised by her husband, Stone, with a family RV'ing vacation to Cheyenne, Wyoming, during the annual Frontier Days celebration. While there, Lexie and her daughter, Wendy, overhear a heated conversation between the park's owner and the egotistical Fanny Finch, a bestselling author penning an unauthorized tell-all book. When Fanny is discovered dead, Lexie launches her own impromptu investigation. As every question proves that more than one Cozy Camping RV'er has it in for Fanny, one point becomes clear: the sarcastic and patronizing detective leading the investigation has his eye on the wrong person. REVIEWS: ". . . has you laughing, crying, and wondering who did it." ~Pam Barker, Amazon Reviewer "Just finished the Lexie Starr Mystery Series and it was one of my all-time favorites. Can't wait until her next series comes out . . ." Nancy Morton, Verified Amazon Reviewer "Glidewell maintains a rapidly paced story line that dramatically builds tension, while her narrator Lexie's sly, tongue-in-cheek sense of humor provides plenty of laugh-out-loud moments." ~Booklist THE LEXIE STARR MYSTERIES, in series order Leave No Stone Unturned The Extinguished Guest Haunted With This Ring Just Ducky The Spirit of the Season (A Holiday Novella) Cozy Camping Marriage and Mayhem THE RIPPLE EFFECT MYSTERIES, in series order A Rip Roaring Good Time Rip Tide Ripped to Shreds Rip Your Heart Out Ripped Apart Ripped Off No Big Rip The Grim Ripper

Lydia Netzer, the award-winning author of Shine Shine Shine, weaves a mind-bending, heart-shattering love story that asks, "Can true love exist if it's been planned from birth?" Like a jewel shimmering in a Midwest skyline, the Toledo Institute of Astronomy is the nation's premier center of astronomical discovery and a beacon of scientific learning for astronomers far and wide. Here, dreamy cosmologist George Dermont mines the stars to prove the existence of God. Here, Irene Sparks, an unsentimental scientist, creates black holes in captivity. George and Irene are on a collision course with love, destiny and fate. They have everything in common: both are ambitious, both passionate about science, both lonely and yearning for connection. The air seems to hum when they're together. But George and Irene's attraction was not written in the stars. In fact their mothers, friends since childhood, raised them separately to become each other's soulmates. When that long-secret plan triggers unintended consequences, the two astronomers must discover the truth about their destinies, and unravel the mystery of what Toledo holds for them—together or, perhaps, apart. Lydia Netzer combines a gift for character and big-hearted storytelling, with a sure hand for science and a vision of a city transformed by its unique celestial position, exploring the conflicts of fate and determinism, and asking how much of life is under our control and what is pre-ordained in the heavens in her novel How to Tell Toledo from the Night Sky.