No More Llama Drama
Jul 07, 2026
This is another in my series of Picture Books for the Grown-up Soul. We’re looking beneath the surface of picture books and seeing how they speak to us.
📌follow the Journal Prompt Board
Hello July!
This month, we’re going to talk about communication. Last month was about conversations. Conversation and communication are closely related, but I want to give each its time in the spotlight. We’re headed toward compassionate communication, which is becoming more aware of what our words are doing in the room.
I’m going to let Llama Llama help us get started.
Llama Llama is the main character of a series of children’s books by Anna Dewdney. I love that she chose the name because she liked the sound of the word llama. I support that kind of decision-making. (I have a whole series on the topic. 😉)
Let’s review Llama Llama Mad at Mama (affiliate link) where little Llama is at the Shop-O-Rama with his mother, and things are not going well.
Llama Llama’s playtime has been interrupted so he can run errands with Mama. The inside of Shop-O-Rama overwhelms him. The aisles, the signs, the lines, the racks of clothes, the groceries, and not very good music. There is waiting, trying on clothes, and lots of adults.
Poor Llama has had enough.
He doesn’t fold his hooves together and calmly say, “Mother, this environment is bothering me and I would like to return to playing with blocks.”
Of course he does not.
He’s too full of feelings.
So, he lets those feelings loose and starts tossing things out of the grocery cart.
Mama calls it llama drama, but we know this is not limited to llamas.
I sympathize with Llama Llama. He’s tired and overstimulated. He has been pulled away from something he liked and dropped into something he doesn’t enjoy. He doesn’t have the capacity to name what is happening to him. He just knows it doesn’t feel good.
I also understand Mama. She needs to buy those groceries. She needs to finish the errand. If she can get those clothes on sale, she can stretch the budget. She probably has a list in her head and is watching the time to calculate if they can get home in time to get dinner started.
Everybody is stretched.
It’s not exactly the setup for positive communication. It’s a setup for feelings overload. You know, the ones that make you toss things out of a grocery cart, use a sharp tone, mutter, sigh, snap at someone, or maybe even stomp? Amazing how many words we have for letting our emotions loose and not using our words.
We’re going to be gentle here, because we’ve all done it. Compassion allows us to take a closer look at what we are doing.
Big feelings often come out the wrong way.
You may have a Llama Llama moment coming to mind right now, a time in your own life when you’ve tossed the groceries out of the grocery cart. Me, too.
Over the next few weeks, we’ll look at what is happening underneath moments like this and practice a kinder way to say what we need to say, especially to the people we love most. We’ll look at a book that has changed how I look at my own words with a title I really wanted to water down.
In the meantime, I’ll be cheering you on,
