MommaReads

Okay, I know these aren’t technically books, but they are a great way for early readers to get some fun practice. These are similar to the Mad Libs you may be used to, but they are a little more user friendly for our younger friends. These have four lists of words: verbs, adjectives, nouns and misc. Each category has a symbol by it so children can easily tell which type of word goes in each blank. The super awesome part is that most of the words are words the early readers will know or they are words that they can probably figure out with a little help. For example, I bought one today and there are color words in the misc. column. Some words found in the nouns column include: ham, map, pizza, boat and tree. The adjectives column has words like: sad, sick, nice, wild and ugly. The verbs column has words like: sing, clap, burp, fart (yes, fart), cry, skip and run. There are definitely some harder words, but that’s why the parents are there. This is such a great way to build reading confidence in a fun and non-traditional way.

When I was a little girl, I wanted nothing more than to wear my mom’s high heeled shoes. Birdie feels the exact same way. She imagines how fantastic it will be to do cartwheels while her feet are glittering in mid-air and how grown up she will feel dancing around in high heels. She begs and pleads and her mom lets her wear her high-heeled shoes for just a little bit. Birdie tries doing cartwheels and realizes it is very difficult to land with heels on. Dancing wasn’t so easy either. She finally kicks them off because her feet are starting to hurt and realizes how much she can do barefoot…it’s much more comfortable too. 🙂

Love this book! It is the adorable rhyming story of Mr. MaGee and his little dog, Dee, who decide to spend their day at sea. (See, told you it rhymes.) 🙂 While they are at sea they have a run in with a friendly whale. Things don’t go as planned and they have to be rescued by an unlikely group. Super cute!

This is a non-fiction book that is very child friendly and is written and illustrated in the classic Gail Gibbons’ fashion. This book discusses the history of apples, the parts of an apple, the role bees play in making apples, some of the yummy goodies that can be made with apples and different types of apples. This is a great non-fiction book and could easily be read in parts or all at one sitting.

Loretta and her son, Delmore, each have their own goal. Loretta’s goal is to get her apple tree to grow some apples. Delmore’s goal is to be able to hit a baseball. So all through the spring and summer Loretta tends to her apple trees and Delmore practices his swing. Loretta does get some apples to grow and Delmore does end up hitting the ball, just maybe not where he should have it. Whoopsy!

Love this book that celebrates a family’s fall traditions…A young boy and his grandma go to the farmers’ market to buy a variety of apples (unless he has soccer, then he doesn’t go) to make homemade applesauce. While he makes applesauce with his mom and grandma, his dad makes potato pancakes and crepes to go with the applesauce. As fall passes, different apples become available and the color of the applesauce they make changes. They eat their applesauce with ice cream, cottage cheese, cookies and sliced bananas. They even make his grandpa an apple pie for his birthday instead of a birthday cake.

I love how this book not only shows how the apple tree changes throughout the seasons, but it also shows all the ways the tree is used by Arnold…it’s much more than “just” an apple tree. He makes a swing to hang from a branch of the apple tree and he also builds a tree house in the tree which gives him shelter when it rains and also gives him a great place to read a book or have a picnic. When fall finally arrives, he makes apple cider with his family and he decorates some of the apples for Halloween. Finally, during the cold winter months, Arnold decorates his tree with strings of popcorn and berries for the birds to eat.

Sam the mouse lives in the library and when everyone goes home one night, he decides he is going to write and illustrate his own book. He works very hard on it and when he is done he puts it on the library shelf for the children to read. He loves it so much that he keeps writing books and the children keep discovering them. The librarian, however, can’t seem to figure out who the mystery writer is. So she puts a note on the bulletin board asking the mystery writer to come to a special event to talk to the children about writing books. Well, Sam is very shy, so he comes up with his own way to help each of and every one of the children realize that they, too, can write their own books.

LOVE this book!!! Mr. Rabbit has some new neighbors, but he isn’t sure how to treat them; he has never had otters as neighbors before. Wise old owl tells him he needs to “do unto otters as you would have otters do unto you”. The book addresses being friendly, being polite, being honest, being considerate, being kind, playing fair, sharing, not teasing and being able to apologize and forgive. Great book to read at home and a great book for the beginning of the school year as teachers set those classroom expectations. Such a cute and clever idea!

Since we just got back from the beach…luckily our trip to the beach went a little more smoothly than the family in this story. This is a cute story of a family who just can’t seem to remember all of their beach gear and they have to keep turning back. They turn back again and again and again and then it starts to rain. They make lemons out of lemonade though and enjoy the beach in their own way.