The Big Freeze by Pippa Curnick

 

Llamas are not fans of Summer it is way too hot especially since they are already wearing warm coats but luckily after Summer comes Winter. Winter is the perfect season for llamas. Winter also means the Winter Woolly Party where everyone wears their fabulous, patterned sweaters. Granny Brock's shop is the very best place to buy a wonderful new sweater. This year this is especially urgent once Sharma and Bahama have discovered the moths have chomped right through their old woollies. The problem is the weather has now turned nasty and the shop is far away. The roads are covered in ice and snow and inevitably there is a terrible crash. 

Sharma and Bahama to the rescue. They just need to convince all the other animals that, with teamwork, they can build a new vehicle using pieces of the broken cars, ice cream truck and bicycles. 

"One little push and the snowmobile swept down the hill towards Granny Brock's shop." 

But oh no when they arrive, they see there is a huge line of others also waiting for new sweaters and by the time the friends reach the front of the queue Granny Brock has run out of stock. Time for another round of teamwork!

This is an inexpensive paperback book which you could add to your library. Fans of all those llama and alpaca books by Matt Cosgrove are sure to enjoy this book too. 

The Big Freeze is the perfect companion book to read before or after Frank's Red Hat.

Pippa Curnick is the author of this series:

And the illustrator of this series:

The leaping Llama carpet by Marian and Ruth Waller

Sadly this book is long out of print but I do have a copy and there is one in my school library.  This is such a great story packed into a colourful and energetic picture book.

Our narrator lives above her grandmother's carpet store.  She likes to play there on Sundays when the store is closed.  "I roll up in the runners and hide under huge, hairy kilims."  Her favourite of all the carpets is the one covered in leaping llamas.  Grandma loves to tell the story of the how the carpet weavers wove this rug with magic, dreams and mystery.

One day two shady characters arrive in the store demanding to buy the Leaping Llama carpet.  It is not for sale even though they offer all manner of things from bicycles to dogs, new teeth, a white Christmas and even 'all the tea in China'.    The next Saturday while Grandma and the little girl are away at the movies the gangsters break into the store and steal the carpet and so the chase is on.

Here is the fun.  When the thieves unroll the carpet, as a celebration, every one of the llamas is gone.  They have left the carpet and run to the four corners of the room.  Spooked, the thieves run of, allowing Grandma and her grand daughter retrieve them.  Luckily Grandma has bought an esky to transport the llamas after she cools them down in the 'fridge.  "She said the cold reminded them of their early days on the mountain top and sent them into a deep sleep."  This is of course not the end and you need to be ready for a little twist - yes this is a circle story and it might all begin again with a new carpet.

After you read The Leaping Llama carpet take a look in the library for books about llamas and their relations the alpaca and vicuna - very fascinating animals.