Posted on by TracyC

Amelia Bedelia and the Baby

Amelia Bedelia and the Baby by Peggy Parish, pictures by Lynn Sweat, 1981.

A friend of Mrs. Rogers, Mrs. Lane, asks Amelia Bedelia to babysit her baby. Amelia Bedelia says she doesn’t know anything about babies, but Mrs. Rogers says that Amelia Bedelia is good with children and points out that babies are also children. When she puts it that way, Amelia Bedelia agrees to babysit. Fortunately, she doesn’t have the idea that babysitting involves sitting on the baby, but being Amelia Bedelia, she finds plenty of ways to misinterpret the list of instructions that Mrs. Lane gives her for taking care of the baby.

When the baby starts to cry, Amelia Bedelia consults the list and sees that she’s supposed to give the baby a bottle. She worries that a baby might break a bottle, though. She tries giving the baby a box and a can instead, but of course, that doesn’t work. Fortunately, Mrs. Carter stops by to drop off some strawberries and helps to fix the baby a bottle.

Amelia Bedelia successfully manages to give the baby a bath but thinks that the instruction to use baby powder means that she should use it on herself and that putting on the baby’s bib means that she should wear it herself. Similarly, Amelia Bedelia thinks that the instruction for naptime mean that she should take a nap herself, and she refuses to do it because she hates naps. Instead, she decides to make strawberry tarts while the baby takes a nap in her play pen.

Amelia Bedelia has some misinterpretations about what the baby is supposed to eat, and when Mr. and Mrs. Lane arrive home, the baby is a mess. Mrs. Lane is upset, realizing that Amelia Bedelia doesn’t understand anything about babies and baby food, but her husband gives her one of Amelia Bedelia’s amazing strawberry tarts. That, and realizing that the baby likes Amelia Bedelia makes Mrs. Lane change her mind.

The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive (multiple copies).

My Reaction

Amelia Bedelia books aren’t supposed to be taken seriously. They’re just funny stories about the ways Amelia Bedelia misinterprets instructions people give her. She gets things wrong because she doesn’t understand certain expressions and words with multiple meanings.

In real life, putting someone like Amelia Bedelia in charge of a baby would be a complete disaster, and it could even be dangerous to the baby. Although things work out with the food Amelia Bedelia gives the baby, a real baby could choke on food they’re not old enough to handle. I couldn’t really blame Mrs. Lane for being upset when she realizes that she put someone who didn’t know what they were doing in charge of her small child. No real parents would be willing to let the matter go or invite her to come back in those circumstances just because they liked her strawberry tarts. However, because this is just meant to be a humorous story, everything works out okay in the end.

I did think it was kind of funny, in hindsight, that they never made any jokes about a babysitter sitting on the baby, which would be the kind of literal interpretation that Amelia Bedelia does. They probably couldn’t make that joke because, if Amelia Bedelia made any comment about that, nobody, not even Mr. and Mrs. Rogers, would dare leave Amelia Bedelia in charge of an infant. They also probably wouldn’t want kids to think that might be a funny thing to do. They also never made any jokes about “changing” the baby or having Amelia Bedelia wonder in what way she was supposed to be changed. That’s probably all for the best.

Posted on by TracyC

Amelia Bedelia Goes Camping

Amelia Bedelia Goes Camping by Peggy Parish, 1985.

Mr. and Mrs. Rogers are going camping, and they take along their maid/housekeeper, Amelia Bedelia. Amelia Bedelia has never been camping before, and she brings along her unique habit of taking things too literally or misinterpreting instructions as Mr. and Mrs. Rogers explain to her what she needs to do while camping.

When Mr. Rogers tries to teach her how to catch a fish, he doesn’t tell her right away that they need to use fishing poles, so Amelia Bedelia just jumps right into the stream and grabs a fish right out of the water. It’s actually kind of an amazing accomplishment, but Mr. Rogers is stunned when Amelia Bedelia lets the fish go, not realizing that they were supposed to keep what they catch. She thought the activity was only about catching.

When Amelia Bedelia is sent to “pitch the tent”, she meets some boys, who say that they’ve heard of Amelia Bedelia. Even knowing that she’s pitching the tent wrong, by simply throwing it and letting it come down wherever it lands, the boys happily participate. When they suggest to Amelia Bedelia that maybe they should move the tent or throw it again when it lands in the bushes, Amelia Bedelia says that isn’t necessary because the tent is conveniently out of the way there.

Amelia Bedelia also gets confused about starting a fire with pine cones because Mr. Rogers didn’t say to use a match, and she thinks “rowing a boat” means to put all the boats in a row. She also doesn’t understand that tent stakes aren’t the same as meat steaks and thinks that sleeping bags are bags that are asleep. The only order that I know that Amelia Bedelia refuses to obey is Mr. Rogers’s order to “go jump in the lake”, and that’s only because she is out of dry clothes! Fortunately, where Amelia shines is preparing a picnic feast for Mr. Rogers’s birthday!

The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.

My Reaction

The Amelia Bedelia books all poke fun at words with multiple meanings and the literal ways that Amelia Bedelia misinterprets various expressions. As with some of the other Amelia Bedelia books, though, the whole premise of the book is based on Amelia Bedelia not only getting confused about the proper meanings of words but also having no knowledge of the subject at hand. Amelia Bedelia doesn’t know what tent stakes are or what pitching a tent involves because she’s never been camping before. In spite of that, even knowing that Amelia Bedelia has no experience in camping and how she usually interprets instructions she doesn’t fully understand, Mr. Rogers assigns her tasks which he should know that she has no idea how to do. Not only does Amelia Bedelia never learn to check her understanding of what other people mean, Mr. and Mrs. Rogers never really learn that they have to teach Amelia Bedelia what she needs to know to do a task and check to make sure that she understands.

As with other books in this series, though, Amelia Bedelia’s cooking skills save the day and her job with Mr. and Mrs. Rogers! Maybe Amelia Bedelia should have just gotten a job in a bakery or something, but then again, she also messes up cooking instructions whenever she tries to do what someone else told her rather than just doing things the way she’s accustomed to doing them.

Posted on by TracyC

Amelia Bedelia

Amelia Bedelia by Peggy Parish, 1963.

Amelia Bedelia is just starting her new job as a maid with Mr. and Mrs. Rogers! Mr. and Mrs. Rogers can’t be there to supervise her on her first day, but Mrs. Rogers leaves her a list of things to do and tells her to do exactly what the list says. Little does Mrs. Rogers know just how literal Amelia Bedelia can be!

When Amelia Bedelia reads that she’s suppose to “change the towels”, she thinks that she’s supposed to change the way they look instead of replacing them with new ones. To Amelia Bedelia “dust the furniture” means to add dust to the furniture instead of removing it. The instruction to “draw the drapes” sounds like she should draw a picture of them instead of closing them.

When Mr. and Mrs. Rogers return to see how Amelia Bedelia is doing, they are shocked at what she’s done!

There is only one thing that can save Amelia Bedelia’s job: her ability to make an amazing lemon meringue pie!

The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.

My Reaction

This is the very first book in the Amelia Bedelia series, and I remember reading it when I was a kid. The point of the Amelia Bedelia books is to introduce kids to expressions and words that have multiple meanings. They’re pretty funny to read, although even as a kid, I had trouble believing some of the phrases that Amelia Bedelia takes literally. For example, when she “dusts” the furniture, she thinks that Mrs. Rogers should have told her to “undust” the furniture instead. I see what the author is saying, that it’s funny that we say “dust” the furniture when we’re actually removing dust instead of adding it, but I’ve never heard anybody in real life use the term “undust” the furniture. Amelia Bedelia is funny, but sometimes, it seems like it’s reaching a little to find terms she can credibly misinterpret.

I also don’t think I fully understood the parts about trimming the fat on the steak and dressing the chicken as a kid because I wasn’t used to cooking. I think I got the concept that she was supposed to cut the fat off the steak rather than decorate it as one might trim a Christmas tree (a concept that Amelia Bedelia interprets the opposite way in her Christmas story). What she was supposed to do with the chicken she ended up “dressing” in clothes was a little more confusing. When I was a kid, I knew that people make stuffing or dressing to put in poultry, like chicken or turkey, when they cook it, or they can rub herbs and spices under the skin for flavoring, and I think that’s what Amelia Bedelia was supposed to do here. Even so, there are different types of stuffing or dressing to make and different mixtures of herbs and spices to use, and Mrs. Rogers doesn’t say what kind she wants. Of course, if she was more specific, Amelia Bedelia couldn’t have gotten so confused, and that’s really the point of the story.

I don’t know whether any teachers still use Amelia Bedelia books as examples of words and phrases with multiple meanings, but they are fun in that fashion. A good accompanying activity for these books is a project that I had when I was in school and that I’ve heard students still do – explain how to make a peanut butter sandwich (or any other kind of sandwich) to someone from another planet, who has no idea what a sandwich is or how to make one. Students doing this activity need to be as careful and detailed as they can because some phrases are easy to misinterpret if you assume that the person you’re talking to has no idea how anything works. I remember my old teacher would act out our instructions literally, almost like Amelia Bedelia. For example, if you said, “Put peanut butter on bread” without saying that you need to open the jar first and remove the peanut butter from the jar with a knife, the teacher would set the whole jar of peanut butter on top of the bread and just stare at it. If you explain the peanut butter sandwich instructions well enough that there’s no room for misinterpretation, you may have a future in technical writing!

The pattern established in this first book continues through other books in the series. In many other Amelia Bedelia stories, Amelia Bedelia misinterprets instructions she’s given by taking things too literally or misunderstanding words with multiple meanings, but she always manages to keep her job because she’s really good at baking and makes cakes, pies, and other treats that Mr. and Mrs. Rogers love.

If you read the 50th Anniversary edition of the book, there’s a section in the back about the Amelia Bedelia series and how it’s changed over the years!

Posted on by TracyC

Happy Haunting, Amelia Bedelia

Amelia Bedelia

Happy Haunting, Amelia Bedelia by Herman Parish, pictures by Lynn Sweat, 2004.

When Amelia Bedelia arrives at the Rogers’s house just before Halloween, she is appalled by all the cobwebs. The house looks like a run-down haunted house, and Amelia Bedelia thinks someone wrecked it. Mr. and Mrs. Rogers reassure her that the house is just decorated for the Halloween party they are having that night. Amelia Bedelia almost forgot what day it was because she’s been busy, helping the local children make their costumes.

When Amelia Bedelia tries to help the Rogers get ready for the party, she demonstrates that she still takes everything way too literally. When Mr. Rogers asks her to both get the hammer and to crack a window, Amelia Bedelia assumes that he means her to use the hammer on the window and actually breaks it. When they ask Amelia to add an extra leaf to the table for the guests, she assumes they mean a tree leaf, and when Mr. Rogers asks her to hand him a witch, she asks him “Which what?”

Amelia Bedelia is enough to drive anyone batty, but she really does her best work in the kitchen. She is a good cook, and she and Mrs. Rogers have fun making a bunch of traditional Halloween goodies. Then Cousin Alcolu arrives with a bunch of pumpkins and a scarecrow for the party. They ask Amelia Bedelia what costume she will wear for the party that night, but she doesn’t have one. Mrs. Rogers says that she has an idea for her and for Cousin Alcolu.

The Rogers’s party that night is a success, and Amelia’s influence is obvious in the literal nature of some of the treats and the costumes she helped the children make. However, nobody can figure out where Amelia Bedelia is. At first, Mr. Rogers thinks that maybe Amelia is offended because he mistakenly called her normal outfit a costume, but then, he is sure that he recognizes Amelia Bedelia in her Halloween costume. Is he right? It certain seems something strange is going on! But, then again, Amelia Bedelia is there.

The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive (multiple copies).

My Reaction

This is one of the newer Amelia Bedelia books, written after the death of the original author. Parts seemed a little cheesy to me, like Amelia Bedelia seeming confused about the Halloween decorations after helping the children make Halloween costumes. Amelia Bedelia is often a little mixed-up, but getting confused about the nature of the holiday just seemed to be overdoing it. Then again, even in the original books, she was confused about ordinary things associated with holidays, like what kind of “star” goes on top of a Christmas tree. It might be more in character than I thought at first, and it just seemed like overdoing it in this book because I read the original books when I was a kid wasn’t thinking that deeply about it back then.

I did like it that Amelia Bedelia’s tendency to be overly literal is going strong in this book. Besides the mistakes she makes while helping Mr. and Mrs. Rogers get ready for their party, I enjoyed seeing the costumes that Amelia helped the children make. They’re all puns and literal interpretations of common expressions. Amelia Bedelia’s own costume is a fun twist!

Posted on by TracyC · 2 Comments

Merry Christmas, Amelia Bedelia

Merry Christmas Amelia Bedelia

Merry Christmas, Amelia Bedelia by Peggy Parish, 1986.

Christmas is coming, and once again, Mrs. Rogers has left a list of things for Amelia Bedelia to do while she goes to pick up her Aunt Myra, who is visiting for the holiday.

Leaving Amelia Bedelia unsupervised with a list of instructions can be dangerous at any time of the year, but this time, Amelia Bedelia is in the holiday spirit, determined to do her literal best to stuff stockings (with the same kind of stuffing you might use with a turkey), trim the tree (to the size that she thinks Mrs. Rogers would want it), deck it out with lights and balls (light bulbs and sports balls of all kinds), and find an appropriate star to put on top (and, you know, who wouldn’t want to be a star?).

Merry Christmas Amelia Bedelia Balls on Tree
Merry Christmas Amelia Bedelia Tree Star

So what will Aunt Myra think of Amelia’s special brand of literal kookiness? Fortunately, she loves the idea of being a star, too. Amelia Bedelia may be aggravating in the way she interprets the instructions given to her, but she’s also endearingly humorous . . . and she bakes a really good spice cake, too.

The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.

Merry Christmas Amelia Bedelia Aunt Myra