Frog Wars

Aria has a Veggie Tales Treasury book with eight different stories in it.  Aria is very much the kind of kid who likes to read the same story over and over and over and over and over and over.  And over.  So I don't think we've actually read all eight of the stories in the book, yet.  Yesterday she finally picked a new one, Frog Wars.  I can't even tell you how many times I laughed out loud. 

Now, if you don't know much about Veggie Tales, they are walking, talking vegetables that tell Bible stories and give character trait lessons.  They are very humorous in their parodies.  We have a few of the movies and they are good for a chuckle, even for moms and dads.  The main characters are Bob the Tomato and Larry the Cucumber.  There is also Junior Asparagus, who happens to be the main veggie in all eight of the stories in Aria's Treasury book.

Back to Frog Wars.  As you might have guessed, Frog Wars is a parody of Star Wars and also of Moses and the Exodus from Egypt.  For starters, let me just list the characters:

Dark Visor
Cuke Sandwalker
Princess Hair-Spraya (who has cinnamon buns on her ears)
Sweet-Pea-3-Oh
Achoo Bless-U (Aria's favorite and mine, too, I think)
Mo

Every time a new character was introduced, I laughed out loud.  I mean, Achoo Bless-U, that is hilarious!  Not only are the character names funny, but the "plagues" God places on Dark Visor are:

days and days of doing the Hokey Pokey
swarms of dust bunnies
a drought of pizza and ice cream
and the invasion of frogs

Oh my.  There is also some more humor in the story that I know is related to Star Wars, but I'm not a big enough fan to know the connection for sure.  On a side note, my favorite Star Wars-type memory is when my laid back, quiet dad had to act out Darth Vader in a game we were playing with another family.  He ran into the kitchen, put a cooking pot on his head and breathed rather loudly like Darth.  One of the funniest things I've ever seen.

Besides Frog Wars being a hilarious read for Aria, Justin and me, Aria was also able to connect the Veggie Tales version to the real Bible story.  Today, I stopped reading when we got to the point where Mo was introduced and asked Aria if she knew which Bible story this was like.  She thought for a minute and said the mean king and Moses.  Spot on!  I was thrilled she could make the connection.  Immediately after reading the Veggie Tales version, I grabbed a book off our shelf that tells the story of Moses and the mean king and we compared the stories.  It was a great, unexpected lesson!  It feels great to know all our morning Bible reading is really helping Aria become very familiar with Bible stories.  And it is sure fun to laugh together as a family!