It's a birthday!

The birthday of the creator of a special little bear named Pooh. Yes! It is A.A. Milne's birthday today. He was born in 1882 and had a son named Christopher Robin for whom he created the bedtime stories about a bear named Winnie-The-Pooh. And where would most children be without the joy of these wonderful tales? So many children grew up with them.


My childhood memories of Pooh were the excitement of watching an evening television special. You see, then it was only on a couple of nights in a year. My mother would have my little brother and I get bathed and in our pajamas early. You never minded at all as you were so happy that Pooh would be on. She would let us lay down in front on the television...you know that old fashioned large ones that sat on floor as a piece of furniture in itself back in the 60s/70s? We would get a large bowl of freshly popped popcorn to eat. It was put in my mother's large yellow mixing bowl and we still love those bowls to this day as she still has them. I can still smell the freshly popped corn and us just being out of the bathtub. And laying on the carpet, chin resting on your hands as you watched the antics of this funny little bear.

I sometimes wonder if my little brother has these same memories with him too?

Do you have a Pooh memory?

So for A.A. Milne's birthday, I decided it would be fun to get out my book The Complete Winnie-the-Pooh and read the tales again. Who can resist reading a chapter titled 'In which We are introduced to Winnie-the-Pooh and some Bees, and the Stories begin'. You are never too old to read them. It being such a rainy day, they are a perfect way to while away the afternoon. Of course, perhaps it was Christopher Robin walking up and down under Pooh hanging to his balloon saying 'Tut-tut, it looks like rain' that brought it on. What do you think? Well, just in case, here is a little Eeyore wisdom about rain...

'The nicest thing about the rain is

that it always stops.

Eventually.'

- Eeyore