BONNIE'S NEW OLD OUTFIT

With the help of her resourceful family, Bonnie embellishes used clothing to create a perfect first-day-of-school outfit.

Whether from the attic, the thrift store, or her own closet, the clothes Bonnie assembles are stained, worn out, or too big or small. Her older sister, Emilia, sympathizes and leads her to her own closet to demonstrate how she’s revamped older clothes by patching, hemming, and dyeing them. She shows Bonnie how to dye clothing and old sneakers with blueberries and onion skins. Bonnie asks her grandfather, a knitter, for help, and after a couple of days of tutelage, the pair have two new patches, “one neat and tidy and one new and scraggly.” As Mom prepares to alter Bonnie’s “too-big and too-small” clothing, Bonnie notices Mom’s embroidered shirt and soon learns to thread a needle and stitch simple patterns on socks and T-shirts. Finally, Bonnie’s back-to-school wardrobe is ready, each piece enhanced with the help of her clever family members—and a few crafty, sparkly additions of her own. Bonnie and Emilia are brown-skinned, their mother presents as Black, and their grandfather is light-skinned. While facial expressions aren’t especially detailed, familial scenes of collaborative work cheerfully extend the story. Final pages briefly discuss natural dyes, embroidery, knitting, and accessorizing. By highlighting one child’s personal expression, Moore removes the stigma from secondhand clothing. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

With Earth awash in throwaway fashion, here’s a welcome focus on one family’s creative upcycling.