Rosie, Lily, and Tess, three cousins who are living together with their aunt, decide to make a miniature flower shop just like Aunt Lucy's real shop, and give it to her as a gift.
The author describes Christmas at his grandmother's apartment in Spanish Harlem the year she introduced him to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Diego Velazquez's portrait of Juan de Pareja, which has had a profound and lasting effect on him.
When Dan accidentally brings an earthworm to school, he gets a homework assignment that helps him solve a nagging problem--what to give his mother for her birthday.
Martha just can't seem to do the right thing around Grandma Lucille, but she is determined to find something extra humanly special for Grandma's birthday. Unfortunately, a dog doesn't know what humans really want but Martha soon learns that it isn't the gift, it's the thought that counts.
Mr. Cat and Mr. Rat enjoy playing tricks on one another, but they discover true friendship after one receives a tasty gift that he believes is from the other.
Travelers along the National Road help make sure that the birthday gift that Lucy's great aunt has sent makes it all the way from Maryland to her family's farm in Illinois.
