harold liked nine kinds of pie

So tonight I’m putting the kids to bed and the youngest picked Harold and the Purple Crayon from the shelf as the book she wanted read to her. You know the one, where Harold walks along and makes up the story with his crayon as he goes, ending as he “made his bed, got in it, and drew up the covers.” (The pun doesn’t escape the four year old.)

The iPhone was in the pocket, and I vaguely remembered an animated version of Harold. So about a minute later we were watching this.

I’m old enough to think the book’s still better (the kids preferred the animated version), but if there was any remaining doubt that we’re living in the future, let that doubt be cast aside.

This magical family moment was brought to you by the letter H and the color purple.

Comments

[Edward Vielmetti]

very nice.

in the other part of living in the future, I reserved this book from the library while listening to this, so hopefully I can repeat this with my kid of the same age (sans iphone).

[Michael Sippey]

That's awesome. The book really is great; the animation doesn't capture the really magical transitions from page to page. It tries a couple of times, but it just feels awkward on screen v. natural and elegant on the page.

[Edward Vielmetti]

It made me think that I should try to improvise this by myself as well with a crayon and a big piece of paper (after all how hard can it be, to make up a story; I hear made up stories all the time these days).

My other foray into mobile phone as kid book was reading some Hans Christen Anderson to the 3 y/o when it was dark and quiet in the bedroom. About 4000 words into a 5000 word story on my Blackberry he fell asleep. There's some considerable bonus to reading a book on a phone in the dark - no need to turn out the lights - but I need to find or build the kid-book pictures suitable for the format.

[Michael Sippey]

It made me think that I should try to improvise this by myself as well with a crayon and a big piece of paper (after all how hard can it be, to make up a story; I hear made up stories all the time these days).

Wait a minute. I resemble that comment...

[btrott]

We just watched this exact episode this weekend!