The Ordinary Princess

I decided to also start doing storytime with Hannah in the afternoons during her quiet time while Carter naps.  I choose girlier books and we read for about 45 minutes and then she does letter games, plays quietly, or looks at books for the remainder of naptime.  Our first book we read together was The Ordinary Princess.  

Really loved this story, and it was a fast read.  It's about a princess, Amy, who at her christening is "cursed" by a fairy with the gift of being just ordinary.  She then loses her blonde hair and curls and bright blue eyes and as she continues to grow up becomes increasingly ordinary. She has freckles and stringy brown hair and loves to just play freely out in the forest instead of doing pretty princess things in the palace.  Her parents, the King and Queen, happily marry off Amy's six older, and beautiful, sisters, but then comes Amy and every man that comes to pursue her immediately decides to leave as soon as they've met her.  Knowing a prince must be found, the King and Queen devise a plan to trick the boy into marrying Amy, but when Amy hears of the plan she escapes the palace and runs away to live in the forest.  A series of events leads her to meeting a boy just as ordinary as her, and they become fast friends.  He discovers she's actually a princess, and she ends up discovering he's actually a prince and they find a way to marry and live happily just as they are, ordinary.

Such a sweet story and it very much reminded me of the movie Penelope where the rich girl is cursed with a pig snout for a nose. It's believed that marriage would break the curse but every boy that comes to meet her instantly runs away.  In the end she meets someone who appreciates who she is snout and all, and it's not his love after all that breaks the spell.

So when we finished reading The Ordinary Princess we spent the next afternoon watching the movie Penelope and comparing the two with follow-up questions:

1. What things were the same between the two stories?

2. What things were different between the two stories?

3. Did Princess Amy like being ordinary?
4. What did Penelope finally come realize?

5. What things are good about being ordinary?

6. Read 1 Peter 3:3-5 and talk about what REALLY makes a girl/woman beautiful.