When Catalina is given a magical sewing kit that turns clothing into disguises, her inability to sew frustrates her. But a disguise comes in handy for solving a mystery—and soon she learns the value of patience and practice.
Catalina Incognito
Discuss the Book
A Magical Sewing Kit
Chapters 1–4
- Important Moment: Tía Abuela tells Catalina that she needs to learn to sew before making magical disguises, but Catalina gets frustrated because she wants to do things perfectly right away.
- Ask and Share: Why does Catalina get frustrated when Tía Abuela tells her she needs to learn sewing basics? How do you feel about practicing new things and not being perfect? If it’s hard, how can you handle that feeling?
A Missing Gem
Chapters 5–7
- Important Moment: When Catalina notices that a ruby is missing from Tía Abuela’s famous Dragon Dress, she uses her magical sweatshirt—which disguises her as a cat—to track down the thief.
- Ask and Share: What does Catalina do when she notices the missing ruby? If you had a magical sweatshirt, what disguise would you pick and why?
Try, Try Again
Chapters 8–10
- Important Moment: When Catalina and Coco are skateboarding, Coco says that falling helps her get better and there’s no reason to be afraid of messing up.
- Ask and Share: What does Coco say about messing up that helps Catalina? Talk about a time when you messed up. Did you learn from it? How did you feel then? How do you feel about it now?
Ruby Reminder
Chapters 11–13
- Important Moment: Tía Abuela explains that she took the ruby to remind herself that there was a time when she didn’t know how to sew, but she learned, stitch by stitch.
- Ask and Share: Why did Tía Abuela take the ruby? What did she need to be reminded of? Do you ever need to be reminded of something you achieved or learned? How do these reminders help?