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I've been reading picture books aloud to my children for over a decade, and we've definitely worn out a few favorites until the layers of Scotch tape can't help anymore. Here are some of our family's best-loved children's picture books:
Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown: Of course. This one has to be at the top of the list. I could do it from memory, probably backwards, but it never fails us as the best of best.
Time For Bed by Mem Fox: This is another favorite bedtime book, with such a sweet message that many nights I find I have a catch in my throat by the end.
Jamberry by Bruce Degen: My favorite children's books tend to be those that are fun to read aloud, and it's hard to top the rollicking verses of this lyrical book.
Silly Sally by Audrey Wood: Cheerful pictures and repetitive verses makes this an especially easy book for little ones to enjoy.
Chugga Chugga Choo Choo by Kevin Lewis: This is another one that rolls easily off the tongue and grabs parents and children with its musical phrasing.
Even with our time-worn favorites, we try to introduce a few new ones (or, at least, new to us) into the rotation. Recently we've been especially loving these:
Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star by Kate Toms: A fun variation on the song, this one has especially captured my three-year-old daughter's imagination. I suspect the glitter on the pages may have something to do with that!
Pigs in the Mud in the Middle of the Rud by Lynn Plourde: This was a library discovery for us, and the hilarious rhymes keep us all laughing. It tells the story of a family in Maine facing some unusual challenges trying to drive down their rural road in their old car.
A quick check of the blogosphere is a great source of new picture books ideas for kids and parents. Betonica writes about her own favorite children's books, including this reminiscence about the Noisy Book by Margaret Wise Brown:
I like the Noisy books for their illustrations: the solid-block colors vibrated against each other and leap out of the page at me when I was three; also, I can still hear my father's voice reading them to me (he died when I was four). I don't suppose they'd really stand the test of time, were it not for my personal history with them.
Sarah of Apartment Therapy tells how strongly the memories of her favorite children's books stay with her today:
Kids books are funny things. If your household was like mine, my brother and I would pick out a few for our parents to read to us each night before bed. We read the same stories over and over again knowing what happened before we even got to the next page. We knew the illustrations inside and out as if we were part of the book. The alligator doll in A Bargain For Francis could have actually been real in our 6 year old brains. And the loose tooth in One Morning In Maine was so real, we could actually taste the warm blood in our mouth.
Yvonne Perry of Writers In the Sky talks about one of her new favorites, Queen Vernita's Visitors by Dawn Menge:
My experiences as both a parent and a teacher have taught me that repetition is important when teaching a new concept to a child. Menge goes through each day of the week on every page and always mentions the number of days each guest gets to visit (including the fact that Tommie only visited for twenty-eight days in February because it wasn’t a leap year). By the last few months detailed in the book, even the youngest readers will be able to recite the days of the week with you.
And Martha of Lookin' Up tells about the things she's looked for in kids' books over the years:
In my 27 plus years of being a mom I have read more children's books than I can keep track of. For some unknown reason, strange to some, my favorite books often have a sing songy type of rhyme to them. Horton Hears a Who not only has a beautiful prolife (in my opinion) message but it rhymes too! I can't help but think of Ol' Horton when ever I see a field of purple clovers.
What are some of your standby favorites? What new books have
