Many parents delight in their child's imaginary companion as evidence of a lively imagination and creative mind. At the same time, parents sometimes wonder if the imaginary companion might be a sign that something is wrong. Does having a pretend friend mean that the child is in emotional distress? That he or she has difficulty communicating with other children? In this fascinating book, Marjorie Taylor provides an informed look at current thinking about pretend friends, dispelling many myths about them. In the past a child with an imaginary companion might have been considered peculiar, shy, or even troubled, but according to Taylor the reality is much more positive--and interesting. Not only are imaginary companions surprisingly common, the children who have them tend to be less shy than other children. They also are better able to focus their attention and to see things from another person's perspective. In addition to describing imaginary companions and the reasons children create them, Taylor discusses other aspects of children's fantasy lives, such as their belief in Santa, their dreams, and their uncertainty about the reality of TV characters. Adults who remember their own childhood pretend friends will be interested in the chapter on the relationship between imaginary companions in childhood and adult forms of fantasy. Taylor also addresses practical concerns, providing many useful suggestions for parents. For example, she describes how children often express their own feelings by attributing them to their imaginary companion. If you have a child who creates imaginary creatures, or if you work with pre-schoolers, you will find this book very helpful in understanding the roles that imaginary companions play in children's emotional lives.

An IACP Cookbook Award winner for Design and for Food Photography & Styling, the debut cookbook from The Cook’s Atelier—the international culinary destination and cooking school in Burgundy—is a beautifully photographed resource on classic French cuisine and an atmospheric chronicle of a family’s life in a charming French village.

Mother and daughter American expats Marjorie Taylor and Kendall Smith Franchini always dreamed of living in France. With a lot of hard work and a dash of fate, they realized this dream and cofounded The Cook’s Atelier, a celebrated French cooking school in the storybook town of Beaune, located in the heart of the Burgundy wine region.

Combining their professional backgrounds in food and wine, they attract visitors from near and far with their approachable, convivial style of cooking.

Featuring more than 100 market-inspired recipes and 300 exceptional photographs by Anson Smart, this comprehensive reference is an extension of their cooking school, providing a refreshingly simple take on French techniques and recipes that every cook should know: basic butchery, essential stocks and sauces, pastry, dessert creams and sauces, and preserving, to name a few.

Seasonal menus build on this foundation, collecting recipes that showcase their fresh, vegetable-focused versions of timeless French dishes, such as:

• Green Garlic Soufflé
• Watermelon and Vineyard Peach Salad
• Little Croques Madames
• Sole Meunière with Beurre Blanc and Parsleyed Potatoes
• Seared Duck Breast with Celery Root Puree and Chanterelles
• Madeleines
• Plum Tarte Tatin
• Almond-Cherry Galette

Stories of food and life in the village and the unique atmosphere of the atelier accent this personal cookbook. We can almost hear the clanking of the copper pots, the hiss of the vintage espresso machine, and the merriment around the table, as we meet some of the region’s best small farmers and artisanal producers and experience how Taylor and Smith Franchini’s family work together to create this special place.

More than a practical introduction to classic French cooking, this richly illustrated volume is also a distinctively designed celebration of the French art of joie de vivre and an inspirational primer on adopting elements of the French lifestyle, no matter where you live.

Children are widely celebrated for their imaginations, but developmental research on this topic has often been fragmented or narrowly focused on fantasy. However, there is growing appreciation for the role that imagination plays in cognitive and emotional development, as well as its link with children's understanding of the real world. With their imaginations, children mentally transcend time, place, and/or circumstance to think about what might have been, plan and anticipate the future, create fictional relationships and worlds, and consider alternatives to the actual experiences of their lives. The Oxford Handbook of the Development of Imagination provides a comprehensive overview of this broad new perspective by bringing together leading researchers whose findings are moving the study of imagination from the margins of mainstream psychology to a central role in current efforts to understand human thought. The topics covered include fantasy-reality distinctions, pretend play, magical thinking, narrative, anthropomorphism, counterfactual reasoning, mental time travel, creativity, paracosms, imaginary companions, imagination in non-human animals, the evolution of imagination, autism, dissociation, and the capacity to derive real life resilience from imaginative experiences. Many of the chapters include discussions of the educational, clinical, and legal implications of the research findings and special attention is given to suggestions for future research.