The Usborne Book of Night-Night Stories by Sam Taplin and Francesca di Chiara is a delightful collection of tales to tell your sleepy child. The most wonderful thing I could think of after an exhausting day would be to be tucked in and read to. Most children love to lulled to sleep by the soothing voice of their caregiver. This book tackles traditional bedtime themes of the moon, wanting to stay up instead of sleep, lullabies, explaining natural phenomena, and dreams, all told with familiar and adorable animal pairs of elephants, lions, penguins, and polar bears, among others. All of the stories are tabbed, so that your child may locate his or her favorite.
Animals
Not All Animals Are Blue
Not All Animals Are Blue: A Big Book of Little Differences by Beatrice Boutignon is ideal for inquisitive children. If your child is constantly wondering about the world around them, this is the perfect book for you to share. On each new page you’ll be presented with five animals, and five questions. Each question matches up to one of the animals, and it’s your job to decipher how. No doubt this will lead to healthy discussion as your child argues for which animals the questions represent. The soft pastel palette of the illustrations is an added bonus.
Naked Mole Rat Gets Dressed
Naked Mole Rat Gets Dressed is the latest by six time Emmy award winning former writer for Sesame Street, Mo Willems. Our hero here is Wilbur, a naked mole rat, who is very strange, in that he doesn’t like to be naked. Wilbur loves clothes so much he opens his own fashion boutique, much to the chagrin of his fellow naked mole rats, who immediately report him to Grand-pah “the oldest, greatest, and most naked naked mole rat ever.” How will he judge this effrontery? Find out in Naked Mole Rat Gets Dressed!
Love the Baby
Love the Baby by Steven L. Layne, with pictures by Ard Hoyt, is the tale of one bunny’s transition to big brotherhood. He’s very happy when mom and dad come home with the new baby, but not for long. Soon mom is rocking the baby in his chair! Nana is singing the baby his song! Dad is building a tower for baby with his blocks! And everywhere he goes people are asking him to help love the baby. So he pretends to love the baby. He’ll tickle him, but not on the tummy. He’ll read to him, but not from his favorite book. Until one day he’s tired of pretending he’s not jealous of all the attention the new baby is getting, and runs up to his room. But that night, the baby is crying, and when big brother goes to comfort him, he realizes he really does love the baby!
Horton Hears a Who
To celebrate the birthday of Dr. Seuss, who was born 105 years ago this month, we held a large celebration at our library centered around his masterpiece Horton Hears a Who, the story of a kind-hearted elephant who discovers an entire city of tiny people living on a dust speck and vows to protect them because, after all, “a person’s a person no matter how small.” It was a pleasure to share my love for Horton with the children who attended our party. Like many of Seuss’s works, Horton Hears a Who teaches us valuable lessons, in this case about tolerance for others’ cultures and beliefs. If everyone was as caring and open-minded as Horton, I believe the world would be a better place. So please read this book to your child! A young person can’t have much of a better role model than Horton the elephant.
Olivia Forms a Band
Olivia Forms a Band is my favorite of Ian Falconer’s fabulous Olivia series. Olivia, you should know, is well endowed with the ability to wear people out, especially her mother. In this installment of the saga that is Olivia, her family is planning to attend a fireworks show. Olivia is outraged when she’s informed there will not be a band at the evening’s festivities. “I’ll be the band,” she concludes. But, her mother tells her, “the word ‘band’ means more than one person, and a band sounds like more than one person.” This sounds like a challenge to Olivia. She grabs all the items necessary for a one-pig band, and is soon clanging through the house (to her, of course, she sounds like the most marvelous marching band). You’re sure to enjoy this Olivia book as well as all of Falconer’s others. What will Olivia think of next?