Retellings & Rules - Singing Frogs and Fairy Tales

The endpapers of The Frog Who Wanted to Be a Singer feature
bass clef and treble clef boogies. So I thought my son might like 
to try them out on the piano. He did, but then he turned the page
and narrated and played music for the entire book.
I should not have been surprised. He sits in his room and creates a
music score to a book sometimes, but I'd never heard him do it
from beginning to end. Wow. Weird and Wonderful*
Another girl about my boy's age asked for
My Treasury of Five Minute Tales at the store.

"She is really interested in fairy tales. She began
changing her voice for different characters in the story.
She asked me how I liked the way she 'disguised'
her voice. She also takes various pieces of fairy tales to
weave her own story. In one, she has her mother (me)
pricking her finger on a spinning wheel and dying and her
father marrying, which means she gets a stepmother.
Another begins, 'Once upon a time, there was the
R- family with a daughter named A- and her family
loved her very much.' And then she gets UPSET because
we LOVE her. What's up with that?"
My wild guess is that there's no fairy tale with a living 
mother who loves the heroine very much. If you want
a story, get rid of the mom. Just ask Walt Disney.
Kids with autism often pick up rules we don't even
notice.
Wishing you a happily ever after life,
-Spectrum Mom
Featured Books: The Frog Who Wanted to Be a Singer

by Linda Goss illustrated by Cynthia Jabar
My Treasury of Five Minute Tales (Hinkler Editors)
*Also the title of a song by Blythe Corbett from her musical Bridges.