Rocket boys

When 7-year-old S becomes 8-year-old S later this month, we're going to celebrate in Houston at NASA's Johnson Space Center. To help get him and 3-year-old F fired up for the trip, we've rented Apollo 13 and loaded up on books about the history (mostly) of the U.S. space program.

Our shelves are currently sagging with these titles:

• Blasting Off: Rockets Then and Now by Steven Otfinoski
• Liftoff: A Photobiography of John Glenn by Don Mitchell
• One Giant Leap: The Story of Neil Armstrong by Don Brown
• The Man Who Went to the Far Side of the Moon: The Story of Apollo 11 Astronaut Michael Collins by Bea Uusma Schyffert
• Spacebusters: The Race to the Moon by Philip Wilkinson
• Apollo: The Epic Journey to the Moon by David West Reynolds
• To Space & Back by Sally Ride with Susan Okie
• Adventure in Space: The Flight to Fix the Hubble by Elaine Scott and Margaret Miller
• Floating in Space and Mission to Mars by Franklin M. Branley and illustrated by True Kelly
• The Adventures of Sojourner: The Mission to Mars That Thrilled the World by Susi Trautmann Wunsch

And where, you may ask, is Catherine Thimmesh's Sibert winner and Cybils shortlister, Team Moon? Well, not in either of my local public libraries, but if they've got it in the NASA gift shop, I have a feeling we'll be bringing it home. It beats freeze-dried ice cream any day.