The novel My Side of the Mountain, by Jean Craighead George, is a story of survival and intelligence that takes place in the Catskill Mountains of New York.  When the story begins, Sam runs away so he can get away from crowded New York City and get closer to nature.  He has to rely on his knowledge of nature and hunting skills to survive, such as knowing which plants he can eat.  He must keep his house a secret by not letting people see him, or they'll try to take him back to the city.  Do you think you could do all that?

    This is where Sam Gribley lives.  It's a burnt out hemlock with some stuff made out of unexpected materials like a bed made of ash slats with deer skin covers, a fire place made of clay and stones, ventilation comes from three holes in the roof, and a lantern of deer fat poured into a turtle shell with a strip of his old city pants for a wick.  Next to his house he has an aspen pole calendar and a separate storage tree. This is important because this is Sam's house, and it shows he really wants the best house he can get.

    I think that my most original use of material is an oatmeal canister for the body of the tree.  I used strapping tape as hinges so the tree opens and closes.  I spray painted the oatmeal box brown and used black oil based paint to make the bark.  For the bed I used two halves of a chopstick, cut up popsicle sticks, and leather for a blanket.  It was difficult to make the fireplace.  I used a little jewelry box and glued little pebbles on it.  My diorama even has a special feature.  The fireplace has some really loose cotton in it with some baby powder in it.  If you squeeze the little bulb on the outside of the box, it puffs like smoke.

    The novel My Side of the Mountain, by Jean Craighead George, is a story of courage and survival that takes place in the Catskill Mountains of New York.  Sam Gribley is a creative and brave 12-year-old boy from New York City who goes out to the woods to live despite the fact that his father had many times said, "The land is no place for a Gribley."  Sam is a boy who just wants to get away from the noisy and smelly city to live in the woods in peace.  As the story begins, Sam is leaving New York City with only a pen knife, a ball of cord, an ax, $40, some flint and steel, and knowledge of the woods he got from the books in the library.   Once he leaves, he finds it may be hard to live in the woods and dangerous.

    In this scene, Sam sees a falcon fly overhead and sees her hunt.  He wants one to help him hunt.  He sees him carry his prey into a cliff, then saw the bird wing out empty-footed.  So he climbs the cliff now that he knows where the nest is.  He finally reaches the spot where the nest is.  He knows that he's there because he gets bird poop on his hand and sees that right where his hand had been there is a nest with three baby falcons in it.  Then he reaches for the biggest of the babies and WHAM!  The mother falcon hits his shoulder with her beak at 50 to 60 m.p.h.  It pains.  He steps up, grabs the biggest of the nestlings (which he names Frightful because he has a frightful time getting her), then turns around and faces the mother bird, who is coming in for another strike.  Sam throws out his foot and the sole of his tennis shoe takes the blow instead!  Then Sam jumps down to the ledge below and slides off it on his pants seat and cuddles up in the grass below with Frightful who is very important to him for company and helping him hunt.

    I think my most creative use of materials was for the bird.  I cut a small bird shaped piece of cardboard and glued on feathers from my grandma's old hat.  And when I made the cliff, I took a piece of Styrofoam and spray painted it after making it rough with a knife.  For the background I painted trees and tied a branch from a bush in with fishing line.  It was difficult to make the lean-to.  I used pine needles from outside and clothespin wood.

    The novel, My Side of the Mountain, by Jean Craighead George, is a story about a boy named Sam Gribbley, who left his home to survive in the Catskill mountains.  As the story begins, Sam has found the Gribbley farm and starts making a house out of a tree in the hemlock grove.  When he has finished, he starts making a bed.  Later, Sam climbs a cliff to get a baby falcon, and calls it Frightful.   Finally, Sam has finished and is ready for fall.

    In this scene, Sam has found Bando, man who helps by getting sugar for Sam so that he can make jam.  He makes a raft for Sam and visits him.  Bando stays with Sam until the school year starts because he is a college English teacher and has to get back to work.  Sam calls him Bando because he heard police cars before he found Bando.

    One of my most original ideas was making Bando's legs out of popsicle sticks that were cut up to show that his legs and arms are bent.  I made the head and arms out of the same things for him.  I made Bando's body by taking a little piece of cardboard and gluing the head, legs, and arms to it after coloring them with pens.  I made his hair with a little dog hair from my dog and taped it to his head.  I made the tree with a cut branch.  It was really hard to get the tree to the right length.  We had to cut it three times.

    The novel My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George is a story of survival and knowledge of the wilderness that takes place in the Catskill Mountains of New York. Twelve year old Sam Gribley has run away from his crowded apartment in New York City because he wants to go out on his own to explore the world and to be less crowded.  His goal is to learn as much as he can about nature. He burns out a tree in the Catskills and makes it his home. He catches a peregrine falcon for a pet and to help him survive. He names her "Frightful". Sam is eager to learn new things and smart. When he was back home in New York City, he dreamed of finding his great-grandfather's farm (Gribbley Farm). He decides to make his dream come true. He goes to the library to find some maps for finding Gribbley Farm. He makes friends with the librarian, Miss Turner, and heads to find Gribbley Farm. He finds it. He discovered a hollow tree and decides to live there.

    In this scene, animals are eating the Halloween feast that Sam prepared for them.  He does this because Sam is lonesome and misses trick- or- treating with his friends.  He put out piles of crayfish, smoked rabbit, and cracked nuts. He even puts out two of his apples.  He learns that messages take a long time to spread.  Sam goes to bed, leaving the animals to eating.  Suddenly, he hears a noise and wakes up.  The animals were still there.  The animals had messed up the tree.  He tries to shoo them away, but he slips on hundreds of nuts. He smells a smell. It was a skunk!  He gets sprayed.  He's had enough and decides to show them who is boss.  He growls, snarls, hisses, and snorts. It works.  Sam learns that with animals, you have to show them who is boss.

    Look at my diorama and what do you see?  The aluminum foil fire?  Painted pebble stones?  What?  My diorama actually has lots of little features that you might notice.  If you look inside my clay jars, you will see blueberry jam (blue paint).  Be sure to check out the turtle shell lamp made of a pistachio colored with a green marker at the bottom and filled with yellow paint in the shell.  My most creative feature is the bandage bed held up with toothpicks.  It can actually hold up Sam (Mickey)!

    My Side of the Mountain is a story of courage and nature that takes place in the Catskill Mountains of New York.  Sam Gribley is a teenage boy who doesn't like the city, so he runs away from his crowded apartment.  He left with only a penknife, a ball of cord, an ax, $40, and some flint, steel and tinder.  He left in May, and very shortly, he went toward the road and finds a house.  An old man called Bill lives there and teaches him how to cook fish and make fire.  At last, Sam sets out to live on his own.

    In this scene, Sam has just poked his head out of the snow after a two-day snowstorm shouting, "I did it!" He said that because he thought that it would be terrible, and now he realized it wasn't so bad after all.  After that, he was sliding around in the snow, fearless.  He also ice fished, and gathered teaberry leaves and wintergreen.  He tried some moss that the deer ate, but he didn't like it.  Sometimes "Frightful," his Peregrine falcon, would catch a rabbit or sometimes a pheasant.  Sam is also kind of embarrassed because he was scared of the storm at first, and after it was over he just poked his head out of the snow.  He also was worrying before the storm, wondering "Where will I put the snow after I dig it?"  Almost everything was safe outside.  There was about nothing to worry about after the snowstorm.

    I think my most original use of materials is using marshmallows for a frame for Sam.  For the snow I used cotton and my dad's old socks, which I ripped up.  It was hard to make Sam's deerskin suit because the tape wouldn't stay and it was hard making everything fit.  Notice that I put in the deer hide door on the tree.  It was kind of hard to put the branches on the tree because they kept falling off.  They were both too heavy.  You can see the white spots where I tried to put them.  The leaves are made of green yarn.

    In this scene, Sam meets Matt.  Matt is a reporter for the Poughkeepsie, New York, newspaper.  Sam wants to tell Matt all about himself and how he is living with Bando, the Baron weasel, and the animals, but Sam doesn't want the city and all the readers of the Poughkeepsie newspaper to know about him.  Sam tells Matt that he knows the wild boy who is living in the Catskills.  Sam says everything that he knows about the wild boy and everything Sam says is true for him because Sam is the wild boy.  Matt knows that Sam is the wild boy all along because of what Sam does and everything that Sam does is exactly what the newspaper said he did.  Also, Sam was giving away that he's the wild boy by lighting the fire with flint and steel.  The newspaper had said that the wild boy lights his fire with flint and steel.  Then, Sam sends Frightful out to catch some rabbit for Matt. That gives away that he is "living off the land", and that is what the woman who was picking strawberries who met him said.

    I think my most creative use of material is when I used some of my dog's tail hair for the fur on Sam's deerskin suit.  It was very difficult to make Matt sit on a log because it was hard to make his legs bend.  That's why I had to make Matt leaning against the log and not sitting on it.  The fire is made out of rocks put in a circle with twigs glued on the bottom and red cloth wrapped inside orange cellophane.  Notice the little bird on Sam's hand that is Sam's pet Frightful.  He uses her for hunting rabbit, fowl, game and other animals.  He also has her for company and a friend.