Owl at Home (I Can Read, Level 2) (2024)

Even though this book was published in 1975, it is still very beloved and a classic for children nowadays. I always read children this book and children continue to talk about and love this book. Not only was Lobel a great author, but his illustrations are on point.

Some people adore Frog and Toad Are Friends and the other Frog and Toad books - I agree. They are great. Some people love Mouse Soup. But for me, the best Lobel book will always be Owl At Home.

1.) The first story, THE GUEST, is about the time Owl heard a banging and pounding on the door.

Owl was just trying to sit in front of the fire and eat his buttered toast and hot pea soup when he hears someone knocking on the door.
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It is winter. Winter is knocking at the door.

Owl decides to be kind and let Winter into the house.

But Winter is a terrible houseguest.
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It freezes the soup and puts out the fire. It covers the inside of Owl's house in snow.

Finally, Owl kicks Winter out of the house.
Owl made a new fire in the fireplace. The room became warm again. The snow melted away. The hard, green ice turned back into soft pea soup. Owl sat down in his chair and quietly finished his supper.

This story is amazing. Wintery and spooky.

2.) STRANGE BUMPS

This is one of my favorite stories in life.

Owl is going to bed when he sees two strange lumps under the blanket.

Owl lifted up the blanket.
He looked down into the bed.
All he could see was darkness.
Owl tried to sleep, but he could not.

This scary, frightening tale is a precursor to the Grudge. The little ones will be reading this book, and then when they are teenagers looking for a scary movie they will pop in THE GRUDGE or maybe JU-ON and the will get the sh*t scared out of them and they will remember this little story.

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"What if those two strange bumps grow bigger and bigger while I am asleep?" said Owl.

"That would not be pleasant."

No, it would not be pleasant. It would be scary as f*ck.

Of course, the "joke" is that Owl is lying in bed terrified of his own feet.

Children will find this scary, yet ridiculous, in a way you swear no one could pull off, but Lobel does.

Amazing story, A+

3.) TEAR WATER TEA

Owl thinks of things that are sad in order to cry. Then he boils his tears for tea and drinks it.

Again, just the exact right combination of 'fun' and 'creepy as f*ck.' Children will be delighted.

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4.) UPSTAIRS AND DOWNSTAIRS

Owl always wonders about the parts of his house he is not in. When he is upstairs, he wonders how things are going downstairs. When he is downstairs, he always wonders how things are going upstairs.

"There must be a way," said Owl, "to be upstairs and to be downstairs at the same time."

He runs very fast up and down the stairs. Eventually he despairs. The book ends with

"When I am up," said Owl, "I am not down. When I am down, I am not up. All I am is very tired!"

Owl sat down to rest. He sat on the tenth step because it was a place that was right in the middle.

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5.) OWL AND THE MOON

Okay, last story.

Owl goes to the beach at night. He watches the moon for a long time.

"If I am looking at you, moon, then you must be looking back at me. We must be very good friends."

But when he leaves the beach, the moon starts following Owl home. No matter how many times Owl tells moon that moon shouldn't do this, moon keeps following him.
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Eventually,

The moon went behind some clouds.

Owl looked and looked.

The moon was gone.

"It is always a little sad to say good-bye to a friend," said Owl.

Owl came home. He put on his pajamas and went to bed.

The room was very dark.

Owl was still feeling sad.

But when he looks out his window, he sees that moon has followed him all the way home. Then he is not as sad, sleeping in the moon's glowing light coming through his window.
...

Tl;dr - This book has been and always will be a classic for young children. Not only are children delighted in a (smart, amazingly-written) book that they can read ALL ON THEIR OWN, but Lobel's stories and illustrations brilliantly combine spooky images and concepts with a foolish owl that the children can laugh at. Wonderful, amazing, and also serving as "baby's first scary book" (which has the safety catch of not being too scary), Lobel brings us a true marvel.

Another amazing thing I've noticed is that children will remember these stories (especially STRANGE LUMPS) for their entire lives and even adults' faces light up when you remind them of this book. Wintery and scary. A true classic from 1975.

Ages 0-6

Don't be fooled by the cheery, bright-eyed owl merrily beaming at you on the cover. That candle is the only thing keeping our poor Owl from plunging into the darkness of his paranoid solitude.

I don't know why I find this so amusing (and seriously, it's one of the funniest books to read to your kids), but each of the five stories in this collection shows our protagonist suffering some level of dementia. And I'm not trying to put some sinister spin on this book unnecessarily. All of these stories find Owl completely alone, usually just trying to find comfort in the solitude of his little house, and usually, he fails. Owl just wants to go to sleep. But something always gets in the way. SPOILER ALERT (is this really necessary for a kids' book?) These stories include the following insights into Owl's fragile mental state: He addresses, at various points, the winter wind as a friend of his, the moon as a tormenter, his own self (a genius stroke by Lobel - he yells up the stairs in an attempt to discover where he actually is - soon afterwards, he is rushing upstairs, feathers flying off of his tail, in pursuit of himself) and his bedsheets. He smashes his bed to pieces in fear of his own legs, and he cries into a teapot by imagining the sad emotions of things such as a pile of mashed potatoes and some misplaced silverware. He then drinks his own tears joyously. There are touches of this kind of mania in Lobel's Frog & Toad stories (Toad screaming at his garden, for instance) but in the end, those stories end up being about the power of friendship. Owl is all alone.

Again, I'm not sure why I enjoy reading stories like this (similarly, seeing Grover lose his wits in "The Monster at the End of This Book" - it's hilarious to me) but this book is ... wait for it ... a hoot.

My kids and I loved reading this book at bedtime when they were small. The stories and warm illustrations gave me a cozy, homey feeling, though I remember my daughter being a little spooked by the bumps in owl's bed. One of my favorite children's classics.

{Olathe Public Schools Core Literature List, Grade 1}

I came to Owl at Home rather late in life. I had a friend when I was 15/16/17/18 that lived in a different state, she and I were constantly picking up owl things to send to each other.

I found this at a library sale one day and bought it for a quarter to include in the next package I sent her.

I read it when I got home, and - oh my. I never actually ended up putting it in the post.

Owl's Tear-water Tea was (and is) my favourite story in the book. It still appeals to me in a strangely wistful and melancholy way.

Owl took the kettle out of the cupboard.

“Tonight I will make tear-water tea,” he said.

He put the kettle on his lap. “Now,” said Owl, “I will begin.”

Owl sat very still. He began to think of things that were sad. “Chairs with broken legs,” said Owl. His eyes began to water.

“Songs that cannot be sung,” said Owl, “because the words have been forgotten.”

Owl began to cry. A large tear rolled down and dropped into the kettle.

“Spoons that have fallen behind the stove and are never seen again,” said Owl.

More tears dropped down into the kettle. “Books that cannot be read,” said Owl, “because some of the pages have been torn out.”

“Clocks that have stopped,” said Owl, “with no one near to wind them up.”

Owl was crying. Many large tears dropped into the kettle. “Mornings nobody saw because everybody was sleeping,” sobbed Owl.

“Mashed potatoes left on a plate,” he cried, “because no one wanted to eat them. And pencils that are too short to use.”

Owl thought about many other sad things. He cried and cried.

Soon the kettle was all filled up with tears.

“There,” said Owl. “That does it!” Owl stopped crying.

He put the kettle on the stove to boil for tea. Owl felt happy as he filled his cup.

“It tastes a little bit salty,” he said, “but tear-water tea is always very good.”

(of course, it's better with the illustrations, so you should find a copy of this for yourself.)

I relate to Owl on so many levels.

I think I've said this before on a review of another of his books, but Arnold Lobel is a treasure. This was fun to read aloud to my five year old daughter.

So cute and funny. I love the illustrations. Owl is (forgive me) a hoot!

2023 - ‘70’s Immersion Reading Challenge

Owl At Home by Arnold Lobel (1973; 1975 ed), Paperback, 64 pages.

READING LEVEL: 2.7 AR POINTS: 0.5

Super, super cute short stories for beginner readers about owl’s adventures at home.

(1) As he sits by a warm fire, he feels sorry for winter stuck outside in the cold. So, he invites winter into his home.

(2) When he goes to bed, Owl sees two strange bumps near the end of the bed that keep moving when he moves, scaring him all night long.

(3) One day he makes tear-water soup by thinking of sad, sad things and making himself cry. (But they made me giggle.)

(4) Owl wonders what’s going on downstairs when he’s upstairs, and vice versa. So, he tries to be both upstairs and downstairs at the same time by running up and down as fast as he could all day long until he finally gives up.

(5) He met a good friend, the moon, who kept trying to follow him home.

Available to read FREE at Internet Archive:

https://archive.org/search?query=owl+...

For the past few weeks, my almost-five-year-old little boy has been having nightmares about owls. The only way he will go to sleep is if our youngest cat, Molly Kitten, will curl up on his bed with him. She will stay awake until my son falls asleep. We thought these nightmares were imaginary because neither my husband nor I had seen an owl... until one night. My husband was just putting my son back into bed and telling him there are no owls when he heard, "Whooooo. Whoooo." He looked out the window and saw two glowing owl eyes. Molly jumped up to the window, tapped on the glass with her paw, and the owl flew away.

The other day, I took my son to the bookstore and let him pick out any book he wanted. He picked out Owl At Home, so we bought it and took it home and read it. Owl At Home is a very likable owl, as likable, in fact, as Frog and Toad. He just doesn't get the same attention that Frog and Toad do. It's a pity, really, because apparently owls do need a positive mascot when it comes to kids.

This book, like the Frog and Toad books, is written and illustrated with scads of charm that holds up well to repeated, and often very slow, readings. Sometimes the "classics" really are the best.

This is honestly one of my favourite books.
It has been since I first learned to read.

It still makes me wish and think and laugh and cry.
Such a short book and a quick read but it makes me remember...

...to be silly.
...to be sweet.
...to be kind.

It is a template for who I am and how I will always be.
It is my "Goodbye Moon" ; especially at the end.

I am one of the few people who simply does not get the Frog and Toad books. The illustrations are magical, but I feel pretty meh about the stories.

Owl at Home, however, nearly moved me to tears. I found both myself and loved ones in these short stories. And the stories so eerily resonated with my own feelings! How does an Early Reader book know me so well??? I know others feel the same way I do, because this book was a recommendation from a dear patron. She knew the "Tear-Water Tea" story by heart. That particular story is poetry at its finest.

"Upstairs and Downstairs" was both a metaphor for SO much and also like looking into the mind of my dog. "The Guest," which is the first story, gave me goosebumps because it so perfectly describes a situation I find myself mired in at this very moment. There was a flicker of peace for me when Owl said goodbye to the unwanted guest, Winter. "Owl made a new fire in the fireplace. The room became warm again. The snow melted away. The hard, green ice turned back into soft pea soup. Owl sat down in his chair and quietly finished his supper."

Wow, I am totally gobsmacked by this book. I will definitely be picking up more books by Arnold Lobel.

My second grade son struggles with reading, yet he loves Lobel's books. He's read about six of them. I appreciate that the language and phrasing are simple enough for him to read with confidence, but at the same time the books are not boring. They are cute, funny, and clever, and I can tolerate listening to him read them again and again. Most books that are written on a low enough level for him to read are horribly insipid and dull, but Lobel's books always make me smile. They are wonderful practice books that sure beat practicing site words on flash cards over and over. In this collection, his favorite story is "Tear Water Tea." There is something almost poetic about the language in that story, despite its simplicity. I have a special fondness for these books as well, not just because my son actually willingly reads them, but because I recall them from my own childhood - some of these stories really stuck with me.

Poignant, vivid, unpredictable - as if Elizabeth Strout wrote a Beginning Reader.

Great kids book! My siblings and I loved this book- truly a classic!

2018: Oh gosh. How have I never read this yet? I mean, welcoming winter and being scared of the two bumps near the bottom of your bed are bemusing enough, and I don't know if Lobel or Frank Asch did the moon as friend & follower better, and upstairs/ downstairs is classic... but, erm, "Tearwater Tea?!" Wtf? Deep, man.
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2023: Reread. Even better this time. Thank you.
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2024: Reread. I mean, we know right off the bat that this is a different sort of owl. Not so wise, you see. At night he's supposed to be hunting, and he is supposed to sleep during the day. Is he just foolish, or is he an iconoclast? Are these stories just funny, or are they surreal & philosophical? I dunno; I just know that I never get tired of them.

Was there ever a chapter book (well, this is more a collection of very short stories anyway) in which a character was so well-defined by his lonesomeness? The Winter is Owl's ill-mannered guest. The Moon is Owl's friend, following him home in silent contemplation. There are some amusing experiments (the impossibility of being in two places at the same time), there's also child-like fear, some light paranoia, concerning bedtime (the two bumps at the end of the bed). But the tear-water tea is what this is really all about; the piercing tenderness of it. Owl's somewhat fragile mental state made me wonder if he's fit for life... A sublime reading experience; one of the most melancholy books I've ever read. You can easily read this online.

More wonderful stories from Lobel.

My favorite of these was when Owl couldn't decide whether to stay upstairs or downstairs, and finally found a clever solution. I also remember Owl's tear-drop tea, especially because I cried along with Owl for those poor pencil stumps that are too short to use and those poor lost spoons no one ever finds and those beautiful sunrises no one will ever see. I was a very sentimental child.

But besides all that, it's always delightful to read about your own species ;)

"Owl at Home" is strikingly beautiful children's literature. A perfect combination of melancholy and humor. I haven't seen another children's author deal with the theme of loneliness the way Lobel can. (See also, the Frog and Toad story "Alone.") My three year old girl loves Owl. (The first two stories are just slightly too scary for her, but she let me read all the way through them the first time.)

Oh silly little Owl! I particularly loved Tear-Water Tea, in which Owl makes himself cry into his tea kettle by thinking of sad things like "Mornings nobody saw because everybody was sleeping." <3 <3 <3

I loved this book. LOVED!!!
need to buy it. I was seven when I read it
and I have an obsession with owls.

I have never read this precious chapter book to a child who did not immediately fall in love with it and call it a favorite. Great bedtime story for littles.

A treasure, indeed, are Arnold Lobel's stories, a library of fine literature that could keep one occupied for much longer than the time required just to read them all. Like the Frog and Toad series, Owl at Home is a book of vignettes that mean more than their surface humor indicates, though they're also enjoyable purely as episodic jaunts into the everyday life of Owl, who resides by himself in his house in the woods and partakes in comedic adventures usually resulting from his own appealingly scatterbrained nature. You'll develop a fondness for Owl at the end of these five stories, I can almost guarantee it, as well as a vague feeling of wistfulness superseded by the reassurance of the final tale and the way it ends. Arnold Lobel is the undisputed master of books like Owl at Home.

It's wintertime at Owl's house in the first short story, The Guest. Owl is cozied up beside the fireplace appreciating his meal of warm buttered bread and hot pea soup, insulated indoors from the snowy cold. A windstorm is causing a clatter-some din outside, and Owl surmises that winter would like to come in and warm itself by the fire. But winter is no civilized guest, as Owl learns when he opens the door and invites the season in. Wild winds blow snow upstairs and down, knocking Owl rudely aside and racing around his house in an appalling display of disrespect. Owl wishes to be hospitable, but his unruly houseguest leaves little room for diplomacy, and he has no choice but to demand that winter vacate the premises immediately. Oh, how a houseguest without self-awareness can cause havoc, trampling on our kindness without intending to and creating chaos in our life. They blow in like a snowstorm and depart only when firmly ejected, as much as we wish such unpleasantness weren't necessary. In Strange Bumps, Owl is tucked in bed one night when he notices two odd little lumps protruding under the blankets at the end of his bed. When he removes the blankets the bumps are gone, but after he re-dresses his bed, there the bumps are again. Owl is frightened; what could these elusive little lumps be, and why do they move under there every time he shifts his feet? He may have to sleep elsewhere tonight if he can't solve the mystery of the bumps. And truly, do we not frequently scare ourselves with fantasies of terrors that do not exist, that are only figments of our overactive anxiety? We see this reality with new eyes while reading Owl's reaction in Strange Bumps.

Tear-Water Tea is as poignant as any tale in this collection other than the finale. Owl sits down to brew his special homemade tea, but first must ponder a number of sad subjects to start his tears flowing. He thinks of forgotten songs, spoons lost forever behind the stove, and other valuable things that fall into disuse for one reason or another, and soon is quietly crying in his little home. Owl weeps until he has the tears for his tea, but feels a lot better once he's swilling the special concoction in restful quiet. Sometimes one does need to cry, to dwell awhile on sadness and let the tears flow unchecked, in order to feel well and balanced again. As Owl astutely puts it, "It tastes a little bit salty...but tea-water tea is always very good." May we never fear our own tear-water tea moments, and learn to appreciate how beneficial they can be for us. Owl's house is bi-level, and in Upstairs and Downstairs he becomes concerned that he's neglecting one level whenever he's inhabiting the other. So he hits on a plan to run up and down the stairs so quickly that he ends up both places at once, thus never giving either level of his house reason to feel forlorn. It doesn't quite work that way, however. No matter how speedily he dashes, Owl is never upstairs and downstairs simultaneously, so he strikes a compromise to put him as close as possible to both places at the same time. It is a conundrum when we want to be here and there, to not miss out on any good parts our life offers. Seeking a midway point as Owl does may be wise. The final tale is Owl and the Moon, in which Owl regards the full moon while sitting on a rocky high point gazing out over the sea. If he and the moon are spending this much time together then they must be rather good friends, Owl deduces, and as he leaves he looks forward to seeing the moon again next time. But Owl worries when the moon appears to follow him home across the sky; the moon's rightful place is over the sea, casting its alabaster glow to illuminate the night. Besides, Owl hasn't room in his house for the moon to stay there. The moon seems to heed Owl's final firm goodbye, but Owl feels a twinge of loneliness now that his friend has departed behind the clouds. "It is always a little sad to say good-bye to a friend," he says to himself. But the moon hasn't forsaken its feathered companion, as Owl soon discovers, and there's no reason to fear or feel lonesome with a friend nearby. Ultimately, this is the beauty of Arnold Lobel's stories: We Toads will eventually find our Frogs, and vice versa, if we hold onto hope and keep looking, and even an owl living in solitude has a unique friend out there waiting to be met. Life is a lot nicer when you're living it with a friend. To quote Arnold Lobel's 1981 Caldecott Medal-winning Fables, "All the miles of a hard road are worth a moment of true happiness." Arnold Lobel gives hope that such happiness is attainable for anyone.

The best of Frog and Toad yields greater reward than Owl at Home, in my opinion, but not by much. I would give Owl at Home two and a half stars, and I may well round that up rather than down. Arnold Lobel is a unique writing and illustrating talent whose work will shine no less valiantly a hundred, a thousand, or ten thousand years or more after it first entered the world, its themes are that relevant to every generation. Owl at Home is a dear read I unconditionally recommend, and I hope others get as much out of it as I did. As surely as any other precept I have discovered in literature, I espouse this great truth: one can never, ever have enough Arnold Lobel.

4,5 sterren - Nederlandse hardcover

Quote :Uil pakte de ketel uit de kast. "Vanavond ga ik tranenthee zetten,’ zei hij.
Hij zette de ketel op zijn schoot. "Zo," zei Uil, "ik ga beginnen."

Uil denkt aan allerlei verdrietige dingen: lepels die achter het fornuis zijn gevallen en die je nooit meer terugvindt, liedjes die niemand meer kan zingen omdat niemand de woorden meer weet, potloodjes die te klein zijn geworden om vast te houden...

Na een tijdje is de ketel vol tranenwater. Uil warmt het op en geniet van een kopje heerlijke tranenthee.-

Tijdloze verhalenbundel van Arnold Lobel, bestaande uit Bij Uil thuis, Sprinkhaan op stap, Muizenverhalen en Muizensoep.

Ook deze bundel bevat tijdloze verhalen!!
Geniet er zelf van. Blijft een aanrader!

Veoma anksiozna sova koja voli svoju udobnu kućicu – relatable ✔️
Vidim recenzije roditelja kako im se deca ludo zabavljaju uz ovu knjižicu, a možda bi ta ista deca trebalo da je pročitaju ponovo za trideset godina. 😅

My Daughter loves Owl. Hilarious book, especially if you view it as Owl quarantining from Covid and entertaining himself with nonsense.

A silly early reader. Owl, by himself, manages to get himself worked up of issues which aren't really issues.

What a silly little cinnamon roll

Illustrations are wholesome and cozy, stories are adorable. Good comfort read.

If I had to rank the 5 short stories it would be:
1. Tear-Water Tea
2. The Guest
3. Owl and Moon
4. Strange Bumps
5. Upstairs and Down

This is the story of an owl who lives alone and has adventures that mostly happen in his own house. Basically it's the story of my life, right down to the part where he makes himself cry by imagining all kinds of sad things, then has some tea. Was Lobel lurking outside my window? Because that's pretty much my average evening.

Jokes aside, this book is DELIGHTFUL. I would recommend it to any kid or adult, especially those who understand that the best adventures happen at home while wearing comfortable pajamas.