Me at 1 year old, in 1976.

What is your name?

Annalie.

How old are you?

Seven and a half years old.

Where do you live?

Washington, D.C.

Do you have any pets?

Yes. They are two cats. One’s Katy, and one’s Lily.

Who do you like to play with?

My little sister.

What’s your favorite cereal?

Uh…Lucky Charms. I also like Reese’s Puffs.

What’s your favorite vegetable?

I don’t really know. No, wait—it’s corn. That’s my favorite vegetable.

You know corn is actually a grain.

Oh. Heh. Whoops.

Do you have a favorite vegetable?

I especially like broccoli cheese soup. I know what fruit is my favorite, though. It is an APPLE.

I’d say you probably eat at least one apple every day, don’t you?

Uh-huh. Maybe more!

What’s your favorite drink?

My favorite drink is…fruit punch. Because it’s combined with a few fruits and berries. It’s really good. But I also like root beer. I actually have quite a few favorite drinks, like apple juice, Diet Rite, Sierra Mist, ginger ale.

What’s your favorite snack?

I have to say my favorite snack is perhaps maybe apples and peanut butter. No, just apples. I also really like Lunchables! I guess I have quite a few snacks I like.

What’s your favorite toy?

My Little Ponies.

What’s your favorite book?

Right now, my favorite books are the Gladiators book and the Underwear book.

What’s your favorite TV Show?

Pokemon.

What’s your favorite movie?

Have I ever seen Mr. Popper’s Penguins?

No, we read the book.

Oh yeah. My favorite movie is…I like that movie about Pompeii we watched on Netflix. Also, Dolphin Tale.

What’s your favorite game?

Animal Adoption. It’s a game where you can play with two people or more. You see, each person takes a turn being the person who’s going to adopt an animal. And the other person pretends to be a dog or cat or something. And you adopt them! Each person has to get a turn being a pet and the person. Usually I play this game with Bug.

What’s your favorite restaurant?

Wheatfields, because I love their cheese fondue, a doodle-a-doo!

What’s your favorite holiday?

Valentine’s Day, because you can make crafts and you get to make cookies, and it’s just fun.

What’s your favorite animal?

Cheetah and whale shark. I also like certain species of turtles, and dolphins.

If you could change your name, what name would you choose?

Grace. It’s majestic and beautiful.

What do you love about each person in our family?

I love Katy because she is very strong-willed and she can take Elliora grabbing at her. I like Lily because she’s very calm and like a queen.

I love Elliora because she’s so cute and she’s FEARLESS, not afraid of anything.

I love Mama because she can make me blankets and other stuff, and I love to bake with her and her cooking’s really good. I love Dad because he does stuff a lot with me and he plays video games with me and he’s silly and makes me laugh. That’s it.

I love that I am very good at dancing and my sense of humor.

Where would you like to go on vacation this year?

Hawaii.

Guess what. We ARE going to Hawaii this summer, to meet up with Lauren.

Yay!

What are some of your wishes for this year?

I wanna learn how to swim and dive better.

Thanks for the interview, Annalie!

Uh-huh. Bye!

Annalie’s happy self-portrait, age 7

Inspiration for this interview originally came from New Year’s Interview for Kids at Blissfully Domestic (via The Crafty Crow).

I did this interview in 2009, 2010, and 2011 too.

What was your favorite children’s book? —Niki

I could easily make a list of my favorite hundred children’s books. But instead I’m going with the first one that leapt to mind.

The Saturdays, by Elizabeth Enright.

This book was so important to me as a kid that I can still remember coming across it on the shelf in my elementary-school library. I remember which bookcase it was on, and that I had to reach up to pull the book down. I remember reading the copy on the book jacket and having my interest piqued by the idea of a family of four kids—aspiring actress Mona, 13; mischeivous, piano-playing Rush, 12; dreamy artist and dancer Randy, 10; and solid, unflappable Oliver, 6—forming their own club. (I only have one brother, and although we love each other, we’re different enough that as kids we spent more time bickering and annoying each other than playing together. I could only barely imagine a family where your best friends were your siblings.) Then I opened the book and read the first page, and was immediately charmed by the description of these kids sitting in their attic, listening to the rain hissing and sizzling as it came down the chimney and complaining about how bored they were. I could relate to that! Also, I loved rain even back then, so that was guaranteed to pull me in.

Then I kept reading, as they discussed and rejected ways to relieve their boredom. They decided, at Randy’s suggestion, to pool their weekly allowances and take turns using the whole amount to have an adventure each Saturday afternoon. They came up with a clever name for their club: the Independent Saturday Afternoon Adventure Club, which they could airily refer to as “I.S.A.A.C.” around others. I goggled even back then in 1982 at the amount: adding up each of the older kids’ allowance of fifty cents each and Oliver’s ten cents, they would “have an adventure” every Saturday with the grand sum of $1.60. One dollar. And sixty cents. I don’t think any economics lesson could have taught me more memorably and clearly about inflation since 1941 (the year the book was published).

The adventures they had were fantastic to my seven-year-old Midwestern self, too. Randy went to the art museum and wound up having tea and petit fours (the first time I’d heard of those) at the cafe with a slightly mysterious old lady who’d known their father as a boy, and hearing all about the time she ran away with the circus when she was a girl in Paris. Rush took the bus to the Met to see an opera (a 12-year-old boy, voluntarily going to an opera!?) and ended up rescuing a bedraggled stray dog whom they adopted and named (natch) Isaac. Mona went to a beauty salon and recklessly decided to cut off her waist-length braids, accidentally winding up with a scandalous blood-red manicure which eventually had to be removed at home with perfume (you better believe I tried that a time or two). Oliver hoarded up the dimes the other kids gave him and calmly went to the circus all by himself one day, causing a panic at home when they realized it. After that they decided to go on their adventures as a group, for safety.

This book used to make me long to live in New York in 1941, when I would have been allowed to go operas and museums by myself at the age of 10 or 11. I still re-read The Saturdays and the other Melendy family books every year or so, and they still kind of make me feel that way. What strikes me most about them now, though, are two things in particular: (1) these children in 1941 aren’t really that different from kids now—they bickered and played with their siblings, complained about eating vegetables and doing their chores, swam in the summer and ate ice cream till their stomachs ached; and (2) they didn’t have a television. Sometimes I think my slight disdain for television might stem from reading these books about all the amazing things they did back when they didn’t have TV. I doubt I.S.A.A.C. would ever have been invented if there had been a little black-and-white television in their attic playroom that first rainy Saturday.

I’ve been waiting for seven and a half years for Annalie to be old enough for me to read The Saturdays out loud to her. I think 2012 might be the year. I can hardly wait.

I’m taking part in a blogging group called Reverb Broads that will be suggesting daily blogging prompts this December. I won’t do it every day, but I’ll be using them occasionally throughout the month as they tickle my fancy. If you want to join in, feel free! Go here or here to learn more.