But How the Witch Wailed and How the Cat Spat...

Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson

Illustrated by Axel Scheffler

This book has great rhythm, great rhyme -- it almost seems like it was written by a modern-day Romantic poet. The rhythm asserts itself the moment you start reading, and there is never a stumble.

Great for toddler participation.

Eliza has two parts she likes to say. First, as each new animal asks to get onboard the broom, the refrain is "Is there room on the broom for a dog like me?" And the next line is "Yes!". Well, Eliza is very excited to give her permission: "YES!" she says.

The next line she loves is: "The witch tapped the broomstick and WHOOSH! They were gone." She really gets into that "whoosh", let me tell you!

So, whether it's Halloween or not, this is a fun one.

The Best of Boynton

I feel very remiss not getting some Sandra Boynton recommendations up here sooner. She has earned herself a very respectable share of the real estate in the board book section at the bookstore. In fact, there are so many Boyntons, which ones should you choose?

In my opinion, every board book library should include at least these two:

The rhythm and rhyme work great in these two (some of the others are a little rougher, though still funny). Barnyard Dance sounds like a Square Dance caller, so you might find yourself adding a bit of Southern twang to it. It is really catchy. In fact, I think both Eliza and I have memorized it at this point.

We have also memorized Oh My Oh My Oh Dinosaurs. It's got colors, feelings, opposites in it... Lots of fun. Now that Eliza is talking more I will often leave off words in the rhyme, and she will fill them in. It starts off like this:

Dinosaurs happy.

Dinosaurs sad.

Dinosaurs good.

Dinosaurs bad.

And, later on, it gets funnier:

Dinosaurs early.

Dinosaurs later.

Dinosaurs crammed in an elevator.

There a few other Boyntons I particularly like, namely Moo Ba La La La and But Not the Hippopotamus:

So, anyway, those are our faves!

More Claus!

Okay, so it has been far too long. It's because I moved across the country, started going to graduate school, etc. But now I am back because I have a few recommendations that I really want to share.

As we head into the holiday season, if you are looking for a way to introduce Santa Claus to your little one, I have found a Christmas gem by Marla Frazee. Marla (who is a two-time Caldecott honoree and the illustrator of the popular Clementine series) has totally and wonderfully captured the fantasy of Santa Claus. We see Santa's warehouse full of toys on three-story-high shelves, his wall of wrapping paper, his tiny filing cabinets filled with post-it sized notes about children he will be choosing gifts for.... We see Santa testing the pogo stick and the bubbles... We see him in his giant billowing boxers shorts of all sorts of hilarious patterns... And, as my toddler likes to point out, his "Coffee cup!" is everywhere (it starts with one and by the end he has about twenty of them).

The text is actually not particularly stunning, but we can forgive that because we can have so much fun with the pictures. And hey, this text is introducing my toddler to the phrase "99.9% of the time" (this is how often Santa correctly matches the exactly right toy to the exactly right child).

This book is definitely a hit--- Eliza requested this book twice tonight, saying "More Claus!" the second time.

So, anyway, just wanted to recommend this one. I noticed it's on sale at Amazon for $12! Bargain!

Baby Likes Upside-Down Books

These days, when Eliza looks at books by herself, more often than not, they are upside down. And sometimes, when we read together, she will grab the book and turn it upside down. Has anyone else experienced this?

She is also into head-tilting these days. It almost seems like she has discovered the idea that she can look at things different ways...

Parrots Squawk . . . But I Talk!

Mice Squeak, We Speak by Tomie dePaola

Do you remember Strega Nona? This is by the same author/illustrator. It was recommended to me by a fellow editor who also works at a bookstore. Back when I first went back to work and was too exhausted to shop (and did not want to buy all my books on Amazon), I gave her $30 and asked her to buy me some good board books with simple rhyming text and bright colors. This is one of the books she got me. Good pick!

It's colorful, and the text is short and simple to read... just two or three words per page. It's all about animal sounds, like so:

There is rhyme every other line....

Monkeys chatter

Cows moo

Ducks quack

Doves coo

Pigs squeal

Horses neigh

Chickens cluck

[turn page to find three kids, one of whom says...]

But I say!

I don't actually do the animal sounds . . . but later I can imagine Eliza wanting to do that as we read. So anyway, that's what I say about this one!

An "I Love You" Book

Only You by Robin Cruise, illustrated by Margaret Chodos-Irvine

No child's library would be complete without a warm and fuzzy "I Love You" book or two, and this is a very good one. It is not a board book

(I wish it were), but still, I think it's good for a baby. We read it almost every night.

The text is a simple poem in three parts. The first part is set in the morning with a mom and her baby. The second part is in the afternoon with a dad and his toddler boy. The third part is in the evening with a mom and her preschool-age daughter.

Essentially, it's a love song from a parent to a child.

An excerpt:

When the sky glows peachy-rose at dawn,

I love the way you stretch and yawn.

I love your mouth,

your ears,

your eyes.

I love your happy wake-up cries.

As you can see, it is dripping with sweetness-- "love" is in every sentence. And the art, by a Caldecott honoree, is good -- simple and sweet like the text:

I should say that even though the title is "Only You," the idea is not that the parent loves "only you," or that the book is for only children (which is what I thought when I picked it up). The title comes from the last line of the book, which is: "I love my one, my only, you."

Anyway, I give this one a thumbs up, even though I was highly allergic to sentimental stuff in my pre-baby life. I have to say, after having been away at work all day, I like sitting with my baby and reading words like these to her.

Eliza seems to like it, too. I often play a game with her where I hold up two books and say "Which one shall we read?", and when I offer this one, she almost always picks it!

Front Feet, Back Feet... Feet, Feet, Feet!

The Foot Book by Dr. Seuss

This is another book that I salute for having a rhythm that is perfectly suited to its content. Like Chugga-Chugga Choo Choo by Kevin Lewis, which has the rhythm of a train, this book about feet has a "marching" rhythm.

Here is how it begins:

Left foot

Left foot

Right foot

Right

Feet in the day

Feet in the night

Doesn't it sound like marching? I think so anyway.

It goes on:

Up feet

Down feet

Here come clown feet!

(My husband likes to say "Broken arm clown feet" for that last line because Seuss has taken some artistic liberties on one of the clown's elbows...)

I happen to like crazy elbows!

Anyway, bravo, Seuss! Another brilliant book.

Echo Calling... Whooooo! Whooooo!

Chugga-Chugga Choo-Choo by Kevin Lewis, illustrated by Daniel Kirk

This is a brilliant book. If Shakespeare were alive today and wanted to read a contemporary book to a baby, I would hand him this one. No kidding.

I say this because there is unusually clever and clean use of poetic meter in this book-- Kevin Lewis has taken the meter of "chugga chugga choo choo" and made a poem out of it.

"Chugga chugga choo choo" has a falling meter, made of two trochees and a spondee. The English major in me was dying to scan the text, so here it is:

As you can see, the final part of each line is not always a spondee-- in fact, Lewis usually has an unstressed syllable between the two stressed syllables. But you know, when you say "Choooo Choooo" with an extended "ooooo" sound, there is a tiny pause after the first oooo, (almost chew-uh-chew), so it works great that way.

Anyway, I love reading this book. Love love love it. My husband and I will often say lines in call-and-response fashion when we're playing with our daughter... He'll say "whistle blowing," and I'll say "whooo-whooo." Or I'll say "echo calling," and he'll say "whooo-whooo."

The art is vibrant and beautiful, too. The idea is that we're in a little boy's room with his toy train set. The toy train goes under the boy's bed when the text talks about going "into tunnels, underground," and the train goes across his fish tank when the text says "across the river, swift and wide, a bridge goes to the other side." So, there's visual cleverness, too.

And, finally, as you can see from the last spread (above), the book has a bedtime theme, so it fits in that "bedtime story" slot, if you are in need of another.

So, bravo, author and illustrator-- you both get high marks from this editor!

Now YOU feel Daddy's scratchy face!

Pat the Bunny by Dorothy Kunhardt

It took my baby a while to warm up to this book. Perhaps the quiet, pastel-hued art just didn't grab her. Also, touch-and-feel didn't really interest her until about 7 months. (She liked other touch-and-feel books before this one.)

The first spread she wanted to play with was "Now YOU play peek-a-boo with Paul." She would grab the little turquoise cloth flap and peek at Paul. So, it was a lift-the-flap experience first. (She liked lift-the-flap before touch-and-feel.)

Then she liked flipping through "Judy's book." Another lift-the-flap experience.

Daddy's scratchy face was the first texture she would touch. Then, later, it became her favorite page (indicated by her smiling, laughing, and/or looking up at me when we would turn to it). It's funny, because she likes to play with her own dad's "scratchy face." In fact, my husband has a little goatee just for her. Is it possible that she was making the connection to her real-life experience? I really think so!

Here is a picture of her touching her uncle's scratchy beard, making the same scrunchy-face smile she makes when we turn to the page in Pat the Bunny.

Anyway, I like to think she makes the connection!

Eliza also likes the mirror spread. She will peek in it and make eye contact with me through the mirror (and smile!). I must say, though -- the art on the mirror spread is one of the lamest pieces of children's book art I have ever seen. Come on, Dorothy! Who looks at a hand-held mirror like that? Did Judy fall over?

Eliza also likes to stick her index finger through "Mummy's ring." It is so cute to see her work her tiny finger through that hole. Takes some dexterity, I think!

Anyway, the funniest thing about our experience with this book is that Eliza refused to "pat the bunny" for the longest time. She would interact with every other page (she would even touch the flowers, which are meant to be sniffed-- lost on her)... but the bunny was always ignored. If I tried to put her hand on the bunny, she would yank her hand out of mine very quickly.

Finally, just a few days ago (right around 9 months), her little hand ventured to touch the bunny fur. It was the very last feature she found. Oh, the irony.

The amazing thing to me is that they still bind this book with a plastic comb binding. My daughter considers this one the touch-and-feel features, as she will frequently touch that part of the book (in fact, she touched that part of the bunny spread before the bunny). My daughter also likes to chew on this book more than any other, and she has managed to get bits of paper off the spine. So, we don't let her play with this book unsupervised.

Anyway, I recommend this book as a "stage two" infant/toddler book, after your child has learned to enjoy flaps and textures in other books.