Steve, In this first story "er" could be blue or "er." I lean toward "er" and forgeting about "er" as a combination. There is the strong r problem but at this moment I can't think of how I resolved it. I have used 25% gray here. I prefer 33%. This is about story 54.

bread or butter?

nan put butter on her bread. tan put bread on his butter.

tan said, "butter is much better than bread."

"no," said nan, "bread is better than butter."

mom said, "it can not matter. can you eat butter with no bread? can you eat bread with no butter?"

so, tan had bread on his butter. and nan had butter on her bread.

the end

 

The next is about story 80, just before capitals are introduced. "TO" and "want" are treated as irregular. "LONG" could be problematic. "I" is taught as an irregular early on. For "sky" I still have not made a Y decision, which means I have not checked word frequencies or usage.

the big eagle story

by sam

high up in the rocks an eagle lived. from her nest she saw far over the land. this eagle was a big black bird with a head of white feathers. she sat on the top of her rocks and waited for a great wind to help take her up into the sky. she needed to have some eagle’s fun.

flapping her long, long black wings, she said, "the sky is a home to me. not a thing to hold me. the wind on my feathers. the sky is my land, a real home to me."

then the wind took her up, up, up. she went high into the sky. she was not hunting for animals to eat. she just wanted to soar high up in the sky and ride on the wind with her large wings. up, up, and up she rode the wind, going this way and that. this was her play, gliding high into the sky and then diving at the ground. she said, "this is eagle’s play."

later, she told her little eagle that it was the "eagle’s game" to glide so high and catch the wind. to her it was more fun than eating dinner.

the end

when nan finished reading, she said, "I like this story. it was like I was the eagle. I felt like I was taking hold of the wind high up in the sky. yes, I like this story."

sam smiled. he said to himself, "nan liked it and nan is a good writer."

more eagle stories to come

I used 50% gray in the last 3 paragraph. My preferrence is for 33% otherwise on the screen, green looks close to gray. (But I am so color bind that I must ask an expert. 25% is very clear from green even to me and it may be all right when converting to all black.)