Ivy and Bean One Big Happy Family

  MORE THAN 5 MILLION COPIES SOLD!

  * An ALA Notable Children’s Book

  * A Booklist Editors’ Choice

  * A Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the Year

  * A Book Links Best New Book for the Classroom

  * A New York Public Library Title for Reading and Sharing

  * A People magazine’s “Summer’s Hottest Reads” selection

  For Sara Gillingham, without whom this would be a pile of scribbles.

  —A. B. + S. B.

  Text © 2018 by Annie Barrows.

  Illustrations © 2018 by Sophie Blackall.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:

  Names: Barrows, Annie, author. | Blackall, Sophie, illustrator. | Barrows, Annie. Ivy + Bean (Series) ; bk. 11.

  Title: Ivy + Bean : one big happy family / written by Annie Barrows ; illustrated by Sophie Blackall.

  Other titles: One big happy family

  Description: San Francisco : Chronicle Books, [2018] | Series: Ivy + Bean ; book 11 | Summary: When classmate Vanessa insists that all single children are spoiled, Ivy wonders whether she can become “unspoiled” by giving away all her clothes at school (which does not go over well with her teacher or parents)—but ultimately decides that all she needs to accomplish her goal is a little sister.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2017046554 | ISBN 9781452164007 (alk. paper)

  Subjects: LCSH: Ivy (Fictitious character : Barrows)—Juvenile fiction. | Bean (Fictitious character : Barrows)—Juvenile fiction. | Only child—Juvenile fiction. | Sisters—Juvenile fiction. | Best friends—Juvenile fiction. | CYAC: Family life—Fiction. | Only child—Fiction. | Sisters—Fiction. | Best friends—Fiction. | Friendship—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.B27576 Iwbgh 2018 | DDC 813.6 [Fic] —dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017046554

  ISBN 978-1-4521-6400-7 (Hardcover)

  ISBN 978-1-4521-6927-9 (epub)

  Book design by Sara Gillingham Studio.

  Typeset in Blockhead and Candida.

  The illustrations in this book were rendered in Chinese ink.

  Chronicle Books LLC

  680 Second Street, San Francisco, California 94107

  Chronicle Books—we see things differently.

  Become part of our community at www.chroniclekids.com.

  CONTENTS

  IMPORTANT PEOPLE, IMPORTANT GORILLAS

  TOO CLOTHES FOR COMFORT

  HELP MUH!

  THE ROAD TO DISASTERVILLE

  IN A PIGGLE

  ASKING FOR TROUBLE

  MIRACLE IN MONKEY PARK

  NOT TOO BIG, NOT TOO LITTLE

  A KNOTTY PROBLEM

  BLOOP, BLOOP, BLOOP

  IMPORTANT PEOPLE, IMPORTANT GORILLAS

  “My Important People,” wrote Bean at the top of her paper. Whew! Seventeen letters! Time for a break.

  “Bean,” said Ms. Aruba-Tate. “Do you need help?”

  “I’m resting,” explained Bean.

  “Nobody else is resting,” Vanessa said. Her table was next-door to Bean’s. She was already drawing pictures of her Important People.

  “Thank you, Vanessa,” said Ms. Aruba-Tate, in a way that really meant, Stop talking. Then she said “Bean” in a way that really meant, Get to work.

  Bean sighed and picked up her pencil. My Important People. Okie-dokie, line ’em up. She drew her mom. She drew her mom eating a whole cake by herself. Her mom liked cake.

  “Mom,” she wrote. Then she drew her dad, with a wooden spoon. He was making more cake for her mom. “Dad,” she wrote. Bean scrunched her older sister, Nancy, down in a corner. She drew some flies buzzing around her head. “Nancy,” she wrote.

  Bean looked around the classroom. Everyone was drawing like crazy. Eric was drawing so hard his tongue was hanging out. Marga-Lee had made frames around each of her Important People. Bean wished she’d thought of that.

  She went back to drawing. Grandma. Grandpa. Other Grandpa. Two uncles. Three aunts. Four cousins. One cousin who wasn’t a real cousin, but Bean liked him a lot anyway. He had a pet alligator. Bean put the alligator in there, too. Cool! Now Ivy.

  “You should be finishing up, friends,” said Ms. Aruba-Tate.

  “I haven’t put in my cousins yet!” yelled Emma.

  “I haven’t even finished my brothers and sisters!” yelled Vanessa.

  Everyone scribble-scrabbled as fast as they could. Bean peeked over at Ivy’s paper to see if she had included Bean. She had! Bean peeked some more. Ivy had drawn her mom, her grandma, her aunt, Bean, Abraham Lincoln, Mary Anning, Boudicca, and a gorilla. Wow, thought Bean. Abraham Lincoln! Bean wanted to copycat, but she didn’t. She drew Ms. Aruba-Tate instead. Ms. Aruba-Tate was as good as Abraham Lincoln any day!

  When they were done, Ms. Aruba-Tate pinned their Important People on the art wall. She was decorating for Open House. Open House was when the grown-ups came to school to see what their kids had been doing all year, and Ms. Aruba-Tate said she wanted the classroom to look fantabulous. Everyone helped. Dusit and Drew picked fuzz-balls out of the carpet. Ivy turned all the books the right way on the bookshelf.

  Emma and Marga-Lee swept the floor. Bean blew the extra glitter down the heater vent. Eric made sure there was no yucky old food in the lunchbox cubbies. Zuzu scraped glue off the tables with her fingernails. Vanessa said she was cleaning pencil boxes, but really, she was standing at the art wall, checking out everyone’s Important People.

  “Ivy,” she called. “You can’t have a gorilla be one of your Important People.”

  Ivy sat back on her heels. “Why not?”

  “Because a gorilla isn’t a person!” said Vanessa. “You’re supposed to draw people. People in your family!”

  “Gorillas are in our family,” said Ivy. “People and gorillas are related.”

  “Yeah!” said Bean. “Look at Tarzan.”

  “But that’s not what it’s supposed to be,” Vanessa argued. “You’re supposed to draw people like your brothers and sisters. Look at mine!” She pointed to her Important People. There were two brothers and three sisters, arranged in order of importance. “You’re not supposed to draw gorillas! Or Abraham Lincoln!”

  If there was one thing Bean couldn’t stand, it was a bossy-buttons. “You’re just jealous because you didn’t think of Abraham Lincoln! Or a gorilla!”

  “I am not!” snapped Vanessa. “I already have lots of Important People, right in my real family.”

  “Vanessa and Bean,” said Ms. Aruba-Tate. “Why don’t you agree to disagree and move away from each other? Ivy’s Important People can be anyone—or any gorilla—she chooses.” “See?” said Bean to Vanessa.

  “Bean,” said Ms. Aruba-Tate, “will you help me make a sign that says ‘Our Art Gallery’? I’ll write out the words for you to copy.”

  “Sure, Ms. Aruba-Tate,” said Bean. She tried not to smile ha-ha at Vanessa, but she couldn’t help it.

  Vanessa stomped away.

  By the time the bell rang, the second-graders were worn to a nubbin. “Good work, friends,” said Ms. Aruba-Tate, looking around. “This classroom looks fantabulous!” It did, too.

  “I’m beat,” said Eric as he came out into the breezeway. He fell onto a bench.

  “I’m bushed,” said Dusit. He fell on the bench, too.

  “I’m fainting,” said Zuzu. She fainted into a planter.

  “I’m pooped!” said Bean. She crumpled to her knees in the middle of the breezeway. “I have to crawl home.”

  “Me too,” said Ivy, crumpling alongside Bean. “I’ve nev
er cleaned that hard in my whole life.”

  “That’s because you’re an only child,” said Vanessa’s voice, high above them. “I have to clean all the time at home. And cook, too. And take care of my brothers and sisters. So I’m used to it.” She gave a big sigh. “Only children never do any work. That’s why they’re usually spoiled.”

  Bean could have bitten Vanessa on the ankle, but she didn’t. She just said, “Ivy’s not spoiled.”

  “I know this kid who’s totally spoiled,” said Eric. “If you don’t do what he says, he screams.”

  “My cousin Ryanne is so spoiled,” said Zuzu, “she won’t let you play with anything. She’ll bring out one old toy and that’s all you can play with. She hides everything else and says she lost it.”

  “My brother knows this guy who’s so spoiled, he yells at his mom,” said Dusit. “He yells, ‘Go get me a pizza! Right now!’”

  “And she does?” asked Eric.

  Dusit nodded.

  “Wow,” said Eric. “I’d get sent to my room for a hundred years.”

  “Sometimes,” said Dusit, “he yells so much his mom lets him drive the car.”

  “No way!” said Bean.

  “Yes way!” Dusit nodded.

  “That’s nutso,” said Bean. She looked up at Vanessa. “Ivy isn’t like that.”

  “I didn’t say she was!” Vanessa argued. “I just said that only children are usually spoiled.”

  “Well, Ivy’s not,” said Bean. “Are you, Ivy?”

  Ivy rolled over on her back and looked up at Vanessa. “Well . . .” Suddenly, her arms shivered.

  Bean frowned.

  “I think I might be,” Ivy said in a squeaky voice. Now her legs quivered. “I feel it coming on. Right now!”

  Bean started smiling. “Oh no! She’s spoiling!”

  “It’s happening! Here it comes!” Ivy wiggled all over. “I can’t help it!”

  “Try to hold it in!” called Eric.

  But it was too late.

  “GET ME A PIZZA!” yelled Ivy. “OR ELSE!”

  TOO CLOTHES FOR COMFORT

  Luckily, Ivy recovered quickly. All they had to do was sprinkle a little water on her face. At first it didn’t help, but after Rose the Yard Duty told them to stop pouring water all over the breezeway, Ivy said she felt normal enough to walk home.

  “That was a close call,” she said. “I still feel a little spoiled.”

  “We have to cure you,” Bean agreed. “Of your terrible spoilment.”

  “We’d better do it soon,” said Ivy.

  But when they got to Bean’s house, it was more fun to play spoiled child. Of course, they didn’t yell at Bean’s dad. They just yelled at each other. First Bean was spoiled, and Ivy was the mom. Then Ivy was spoiled, and Bean was the mom. In the end, they were both spoiled, and they put Bean’s old toy car on top of her trampoline and jumped inside it, until Bean’s dad came outside and told them to stop acting like crazy people. Then Ivy went home, and Bean drew six pictures with frames around them, and, with one thing and another, she forgot all about Ivy being spoiled. Even Ivy forgot about it, until the next morning.

  Ivy and Bean almost always walked to school together. Ivy was almost always ready before Bean, so she almost always waited for Bean on the sidewalk.

  Bean ran out her front door. “Forgot my lunch!” she hollered and ran back inside.

  Bean ran out her front door. “Just a sec!” she hollered and ran back inside.

  Bean ran out her front door. This time she got to the sidewalk. She stopped and stared at Ivy. “Are you cold?”

  “No,” said Ivy. “I’m hot.” “Why are you wearing two coats?” asked Bean.

  “And three sweaters. And two dresses,” added Ivy. “Because I’m going to give them away. So I won’t be spoiled. You want a coat?”

  “No thank you,” said Bean. She already had a coat. “You’re walking really slow.”

  “I can’t bend my knees,” Ivy explained. “I’m wearing three pairs of tights.”

  They were a little late to school.

  By the end of lunch, Ivy had given away both coats, all three sweaters, one of the dresses, one of the pairs of tights, and her headband.

  “That was my best headband,” she said sadly, watching Emma walk away with it.

  When the bell rang, the second-graders swarmed into Ms. Aruba-Tate’s classroom. They were happy because it was time for Measuring. Measuring was a blast. Every kid got a plastic tape measure and a partner, and then they ran around like crazy, trying to measure things faster than everyone else. Ivy and Bean measured their heads and their fingers and their feet and their eyeballs and their necks and their chair-legs and their pencils and the distance between the rug and the wall. Then they ran to their table and plopped themselves down in their chairs. “We finished first!” yelled Bean. “We win!”

  Dusit and Drew plopped themselves down, too. “We finished second!”

  “This is not a contest, friends,” said Ms. Aruba-Tate. Sure it was! And Ivy and Bean had won! They smiled at each other.

  After Measuring came Graphing. Graphing was not a blast. Graphing was a bummer. Graphing was when you put all your measurements on a chart. You had to get all your numbers in the right place. You had to put the right-sized lines next to your numbers. You had to spell all your words right. You had to do everything right. Ivy was much better at things that had to be right than Bean was, so Bean let her be in charge of Graphing. Bean was in charge of keeping Ivy company and offering good suggestions, but that still gave her plenty of time to look around the room and think.

  First she thought that Eric was using the same color green for two different lines. She pointed this out. He changed greens.

  Then she thought that MacAdam couldn’t have a 20-inch finger. Nobody had a 20-inch finger. She pointed this out. He ignored her.

  Bean looked over at Zuzu and Vanessa’s Graphing chart. They had done it all in different shades of pink. Vanessa had drawn flowers around the word “Graphing.” It looked good.

  Bean remembered something.

  “Hey, Vanessa!” she hissed. “Ivy isn’t spoiled. She gave away all her clothes.”

  “She can still be spoiled,” said Vanessa.

  “No!” said Bean. “Giving stuff away is the opposite of being spoiled!”

  Vanessa shook her head.

  “Ms. Aruba-Tate!” cried Bean. “You can’t be spoiled if you give away all your clothes and your best headband, can you?”

  Ms. Aruba-Tate looked up from her whiteboard. She frowned. “Who has given away all her clothes and her best headband?”

  Nobody said anything. But they all looked at Ivy.

  Graphing was even more of a bummer after that.

  Ivy and Bean trailed slowly home. Bean was slow because she was carrying all the clothes that Ivy had had to take back. They were heavy. She was surprised Ivy had been able to walk at all that morning. Ivy was slow because she felt bad. Her face wasn’t red anymore, but she still felt bad.

  “I’m sorry I got you in trouble,” Bean said again. “I wish I hadn’t said anything.”

  “I know,” sighed Ivy. “But now Ms. Aruba-Tate is mad at me.”

  “I don’t get it. They tell you seven million times to share stuff,” Bean said. “And then they freak out when you do it.” She dropped a sweater. “Can you pick that up?”

  Ivy picked it up. “Yeah. Maybe she thought I was showing off.” She started blinking hard. “Spoiled kids show off.”

  “I don’t think you’re spoiled,” argued Bean.

  “But what if I am?” Ivy asked. She looked worried. “Ms. Aruba-Tate thinks I am.”

  “No, she doesn’t,” said Bean. She thought about Ms. Aruba-Tate’s frown. “I’m pretty sure she doesn’t.”

  Ivy blinked some more. “I need to get unspoiled,” she said. “For real.”

  “Okay,” said Bean. “Don’t worry. It’s Friday. We’ve got the whole weekend to unspoil you.”

  HELP MUH!<
br />
  On Saturday, Bean was unfortunately being swallowed by quicksand. First her feet—slurp!—and then her legs—slurp!—and then her middle—slurp! Inch by inch, she was sucked to her doom.

  It was a tragic scene.

  Nancy came into the living room and unrolled her yoga mat.

  Bean struggled for survival.

  Nancy held her leg behind her back.

  Oh no! The quicksand was up to Bean’s shoulders! It was just a matter of time.

  Nancy held her other leg behind her back.

  Bean was a goner.

  Nancy bent in half until her head touched her knees.

  But wait! Where there was life, there was hope! Bean used the last of her strength to leap to freedom.

  Good golly, what a leap! The tips of her fingers scraped the edge of a nearby raft. She would be saved, if only she could stretch just a little farther, like this: Eeeeeeep!

  Her fingers closed around the life-giving raft. She was saved!

  “Get your grubby hands off my yoga mat!” puffed Nancy, upside down.

  “Wa-tuh! Wa-tuh!” croaked Bean. Now she was dying of thirst. It was just one thing after another out here in the jungle. “Help muh!” Muh was the same thing as me, only sadder.

  “Go away!” Nancy huffed.

  Bean groaned.

  Nancy fell over. “Bean! That was a perfect downward-dog and you ruined it. Mom! Bean’s driving me bonkers!”