Susan Ouriou

"When Poppy and Sam go to visit their friend, Miss Mole, they find she isn't having a very good day because she can't find her pink reading glasses! As Poppy and Sam retrace Ms Mole's steps, they find all manner of objects (a pink hat, an umbrella, a blue fan, and a yellow flute, for starters), but none of these belong to Ms Mole. At last, they climb a tree where Ms Mole had been picking apples (to make her delicious apple pies), when they find Madame...

"Hibernation is hard when a craving comes! Case in point: Sam suddenly wakes up his pal Poppy in the middle of their winter slumber with a hankering to make rosehip jam. Full of determination, Sam sets out into find his friends in the snowy forest, and they help him assemble the ingredients and supplies he needs -- but on his way home, Sam gets trapped in a winter storm! He finds shelter in a cave, only to discover someone else is already hibernating...

During the summer holiday Louis and his younger brother spend two weeks with their dad, who appears to have stopped drinking, but a close call with a bee sting brings their mother and the quartet spend a few days together before everything starts back up again.