A review by backonthealex
Once Upon a Winter Day by Liza Woodruff

4.0

It' s a snowy day and Milo wants a story, but mom is busy working. Instead, she suggests he go out and play in the snow. Grudgingly, Milo bundles up and leave the house. And the first thing he notices in the snow are little footprints around the bird feeder. A mouse was here, he thinks to himself. Milo decides to follow the tracks which lead to a winterberry bush with all it's berries gone and only a feather left behind. What happened, he wonders. Continuing to follow the mouse tracks into the woods, Milo discovers all kinds the other things to wonder about - branches from the hemlock tree that have fallen to the ground, dirt scattered in the snow, smooth ruts in the snow leading down to the creek, something that brushed the snow causing the mouse tracks to stop. As he continues following where the mouse tracks pick up again, Milo hears his mom calling him home for dinner. Darn, time to go home already. When mom offers to read him a story after dinner, Milo shakes his head no, as he pulls lays out all the souvenirs of his day in the snow: "This time," he said. "I have stories for you." This is such a lovely story about a young boy's explorations and observations of the natural world around him by simply following mouse tracks. Each page presents its own mystery about what happened at each of Milo's stops. Turn the page and discover the answer to the mystery before going on to the next one. Woodruff's mixed media illustrations done in a wintery palette offer a detailed colorful picture surrounding Milo's finds against simple mostly white background. Woodruff ends Milo's tale with labeled spot illustrations of all the creatures who are part of the story he will tell his mother. I've read this story over and over to my young readers and they never tire of it, though at this point they can readily name the creature associated with each of Milo's stops.

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