12 Days of Christmas Books, Day 6

Today’s favorite books are also Honeybee favorites. Preschoolers LOVE Presents Through the Window by Taro Gomi and Gyo Fujikawa’s illustrations are so appealing to that age group as well. Neither is available at bookshop.org so definitely call your local bookstore to see if they can order them for you!

The Night Before Christmas is the standard Clement C. Moore poem but when it is paired with these images of babies getting ready for bed on Christmas Eve, the poem becomes more appealing to young children. I’ve always loved Fujikawa’s books, but after reading this picture book biography of her, it made me appreciate her books in a new way. She was a strong advocate in the 60’s for racial diversity in children’s books and as a Japanese-American woman, knew it was important for children to see illustrations of kids that looked like themselves in their books.

Presents Through the Window by Taro Gomi is so clever and fun. The preschool classes request this book constantly in the month of December and I’m happy to oblige. The illustrations tell the story of Santa as he is delivering gifts to animals in the village. He peeks through the window and assumes that he knows which animal lives there, but gets it wrong every time, leaving a gift that, at first glance, isn’t appropriate for the receiver. The book ends when the creatures wake up and open their gifts, and its a sweet surprise that the gifts turn out to be just right for each.

* I am not being paid or compensated in any way for these reviews. I’m not an affiliate with Bookshop.org, I just firmly believe that we need to support local business right now more than ever!

12 Days of Christmas Books, Day 5

A Christmas for Bear by Bonny Becker and The Doll’s Christmas by Tasha Tudor

These are two of our favorite books. I found A Christmas for Bear at Costco one day when my girls were small. The author, Bonny Becker, was there signing books, so I had to be very sneaky about it, as both kids were in the shopping cart! We have since fallen in love with all her “bear and mouse” books. The bear is a lovable grump and the mouse is curious and clever, making for quite a team!

A Doll’s Christmas might be out of print but local bookstores might have a source for it. Abebooks.com has used copies as well. We love all Tasha Tudor books, thanks to my childhood full of these books and illustrations. The story is sweet, the pictures are darling and wholesome, and my kids have always enjoyed reading about how holidays were celebrated before “movie nights” and Christmas light displays. A little dose of an old-fashioned-Christmas is refreshing and a good reminder that we don’t need all the holiday hullaballoo to celebrate the seasons together!

**I also want to mention that I am not being paid or compensated in any way for these reviews. I’m not an affiliate with Bookshop.org, I just firmly believe that we need to support local business right now more than ever!

12 Days of Christmas Books, Day 3

Today Ella (age 12) has chosen two of her favorite holiday books. She chose:

Walk This World at Christmastime by Debbie Powell and Santa Claus, the World’s Number One Toy Expert by Marla Frazee.

In Ella’s words:

“I chose these books because they both have great stories, fun pictures and are interesting to read. Walk This World is about how people all around the world celebrate holidays in December in their cultures and countries. I have always liked advent books that have one flap to open each day, so this one is fun. Santa Claus, The World’s Number One Toy Expert is cute and funny, and its the book I always choose to read first when we get the holiday books out each year.”

These are both linked to bookshop.org although it looks like one is backordered all of a sudden and the other is only available as a board book. Nevertheless, Ella really wanted to share these titles. Call your local bookshop and see if they can order it for you, or put it on hold at the library to check out after Christmas when the hold list is shorter.

Come back tomorrow, we have a special guest reviewer who will be sharing two of their favorite holiday books!

**I also want to mention that I am not being paid or compensated in any way for these reviews. I’m not an affiliate with Bookshop.org, I just firmly believe that we need to support local business right now more than ever!

Top 12 Easter Books for Kids

Our top 12 Easter and springtime books:

Easter is one week away and there is still time to order a new book or two. These twelve are some of our absolute favorites, both in Honeybee and in our family. My daughters are 7 and 12 and really enjoy holiday picture books. They like to divide them up so they each have a couple next to their bed and then often trade back and forth so they each get a turn with the top favorites. Its very common for me to gather them up from their bedside tables on preschool days so I have some fun books to read to my class too!

The Country Bunny and the Little Gold Shoes: This is the number one book requested by my daughters and its a treasured book from my childhood too.

The Easter Egg by Jan Brett: We love Jan Brett books around here, and the preschoolers love watching the scenes that unfold in the side panels of each page.

Humbug Rabbit by Lorna Balian: This is the number two requested book. We love all of Balian’s books and this one is charming and clever and has two stories going on at the same time. If you don’t have this book already, this Easter is a great time to pick it up!

Rechenka’s Eggs by Patricia Polacco: This is my favorite Easter/Springtime book. I love the classic illustrations, an introduction to beautiful Ukrainian eggs and the darling storyline. We make pysanky eggs each year because of this book!

Here Comes the Easter Cat: We don’t own this book but enjoy it from the library in Honeybee each year. All the books in this series are funny and cute.

The Little Rabbit: The Easter Bunny brought this book a couple years ago and we all loved the illustrations and sweet spring story.

Yoga Bunny: This book is on its way to us for Easter morning. It looks like a great addition to our easter picture book collection!

Bunny’s Book Club: This isn’t about easter but the bunny connection is strong. I love the illustrations and the kids love the story of a bunny who discovers the wonders of the library.

Bunny Roo, I Love You: This is a sweet little board book for the littlest one in the family. We have some board books that come out each year and this one, illustrated by Teagan White, would have been perfect when my girls were younger. Everything Teagen White touches is gold!

I Am A Bunny by Richard Scarry: This is the first Easter book I bought for my daughter and she still loves to read it, 12 years later! It’s a classic.

A Tale for Easter by Tasha Tudor: We love all of Tasha Tudor’s books and this one is a favorite for sure.

The Easter Egg Artists: This is considered a vintage book now, and it is my favorite from childhood. The illustrations are sweet and the story is inspiring.

If you have Overdrive through your local library, there are many easter books available now to read as an ebook or audiobook. They have thousands of picture books and if you use the filter with your search, you can narrow the results down to children’s books that are available now. We just did a search and found many of our favorites and also plenty of books we haven’t seen before that we want to read.

Don’t see your family’s favorite book on our list? Please comment to add it. I’m always looking for new favorites and I hope you choose a fun new book to add to your Easter book collection this year!

On My Bookshelf

I have two bookshelves. One in real life, for print books and one digital shelf for audiobooks on Overdrive. I also keep lists on Goodreads of books I’ve read and those I want to read/listen to. If you are on goodreads, please find me there so we can share recommendations! If you aren’t on goodreads, get over there and get started! :)

I’m currently listening to Moby Dick and when I need something lighter, I switch to The Garden of Small Beginnings by Abbi Waxman. I have to say, I thought I would be reading more during this quarantine/self-distancing time, but I’ve been outside gardening, painting and crafting with the girls, and not doing much sitting still and reading. I am listening to podcasts and audiobooks though, and am setting a goal to sit down and read at lunchtime every day next week.

I’m reading Hoot by Carl Hiassen outloud at bedtime the girls. At 12 and 7 its been hard to find a book they both want to listen to, so until now I’ve been reading to them separately. This is so much easier! I’m happy that they are really liking the book, and even happier that Hiassen has so many more books we can read after this one.

I only listen to 4 podcasts right now and would love to add to my list. My current favorites are Heavyweight with Jonathan Goldstein, What Should I Read Next with Anne Bogel, Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend and Armchair Expert. What am I missing?

Audiobook Activities

Ok. Now you have a list of audiobooks to try and the questions I’ve been getting are: “what do you use to play the audiobooks?” and “what do the kids do while they are listening?”

We have an old iPod and an old iPhone that are always available for using for a book, and the kids know how to add audiobooks using my iPad as well. Every once in a while we all listen together using my phone. We also get discs from the library and both kids have cd players in their rooms so they can listen that way as well.

The iPods are great because they can move around the house, put them in their bike basket or go outside with headphones.

My kids are multi-taskers and always have something to work on or play with while they are listening to books. Here are some of their go-to activities:

• Bike riding

• Legos

• Puzzles

• Watercolor painting

• Matching up pairs of socks

• Magnatiles

• Finger knitting

• Playdough

• Perler beads

• Whiteboard writing

• Origami

• Brio trains

• Friendship bracelets

I listen to books in the car, while I’m gardening, walking, folding laundry, washing dishes, cleaning the preschool and while I’m knitting. I don’t give myself much time to sit down and read printed paper books so I like to get my reading time in during the day while I’m getting things done.

So Now You Are Homeschooling.

Thanks to the Coronavirus, more than 1 millions students in Washington are going to be home for the next 6 weeks, which means many parents are now tasked with homeschooling. Every family will approach this task differently and I think that is great! We are still working out our loose plan and schedule and will start things up on Monday after a long weekend of netflix and quiet time with audiobooks. The transition of busy, school filled days to long, quiet days at home is going to be a rough one I think, so I’m allowing more screen time this weekend than usual, and I’ve loaded up a bunch of audiobooks to various devices around the house to help us ease into our new “normal.”

Our family loves to listen to books. I thought I would list some of our favorite audiobooks here in case you’re looking for a few to try. We use Overdrive and Libby through the King County Library System as well as RBDigital. There is always something available when we search for audiobooks and we put holds on other titles too. There is a great mix of chapter books and picture books available for audio too!

Preschool:

Mrs Piggle Wiggle by Betty McDonald: This series is charming and funny and both my kids loved listening to it over the years.

Stuart Little by E. B. White: We have enjoyed other books by this author but others were too sad (Charlotte’s Web) when my girls were really young. Stuart Little was perfect for them when they were 3-5 years old.

Paddington Bear series by Michael Bond: We loved the narrator and his accent and my girls would laugh out loud at the silly things Paddington would get himself into.

Winnie the Pooh series by A. A. Milne: Don’t forget an old favorite!

Elementary Grades:

Roald Dahl Books: My kids have loved every Roald Dahl book they’ve read or listened to but their favorites are Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, James and the Giant Peach and Fantastic Mr. Fox.

Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren: These books kept my then 6 year old occupied for several days while she rearranged her bedroom one summer.

Mr Poppers Penguins by Richard and Florence Atwater: I’ve read this book to my preschoolers and they enjoy it, but I think 5-7 year olds like it even more!

The Boxcar Children series by Gertrude Chandler Warren: These books inspired several summers of imaginary play, both inside and outside, with friends and alone. We stopped reading after the 6th book so I can’t vouch for the whole series.

Wayside School is Falling Down by Louis Sachar: I remember these books from my childhood and I thought they were hilarious. My kids haven’t really been hooked yet but we’re trying again this week.

Upper Elementary:

Pax by Sara Pennypacker: This is an intense book that is two stories told parallel to each other, one from a young boy’s perspective and the other through the eyes of a fox.

The Poet’s Dog by Patricia MacLachlan: This is one of Ella’s favorite books and she has read it and listened to it several times.

The Greenglass House by Kate Milford: A little bit mystery, a little bit magical.

The Wild Robot by Peter Brown: A great book with an ending that brought a tear to our eyes, we talked about this book for weeks after listening to it and reading it. The sequel is just as good!

Adult Books:

I listen to ALOT of audiobooks and these are some of my favorites. I listen at 1.25x or 1.5x speed because normal speed feels terribly/painfully slow. I also find that if I speed up the narration it helps with annoying narrators too.

The Lager Queen of Minnesota: This one took a little while to get into but I really loved the seperate story lines that wove together as the book progressed.

The Nix: This was similar, separate story lines around a common theme.

Children and Other Wild Animals: Short Stories that are sweet and thoughtful.

The Dutch House: Narrated by Tom Hanks and an engaging story.

Where the Crawdads Sing: Part mystery, part small town fiction, partly about the natural wonders found in the swamps of North Carolina, it adds up to a fascinating story.

Celine: I’m hoping this one has a sequel, I loved it so much!

City of Girls: Looking for a long audio book to keep your mind off things? This is the book for you right now. Told from a 95 year old woman looking back on her life, it starts in NYC in the 1940s and ends at the present. A beautiful story of growing up in the theater world in New York City.

Louise Penny Mystery Series: If you like cozy mysteries, you’ll love these. They are all available on audio, have charming and lovable characters and there are 15 books in the series so its a great series to start now. Set in a small town in Canada.

I’d love to hear about books that you or your children really enjoyed so we can add some new books to our list!

Favorite Books for February

This month I like to read books at Honeybee that are about Valentine's Day, delivering mail, writing letters and spreading love and joy. Isn't it fun to celebrate holidays with beautiful books and meaningful messages?

Mail and Letter Writing:

Millie Waits for the Mail by Alexander Steffensmeier

The Jolly Postman by Janet and Allan Ahlberg

Mr. Postmouse's Rounds by Marianne Dubuc

A Letter for Bear by David Lucas

Valentine's Day:

The Shape of my Heart by Mark Sperring

The Best Valentine in the World by Marjorie Weinman Sharmat

Catching Kisses by Amy Gibson

I Heart You by Meg Fleming

The Valentine Bears by Eve Bunting and Jan Brett