The potty training book our family LOVED - Toilet Learning by Alison Mack

Our family has reached a wonderful milestone -- our youngest son has mastered use of the potty.  It was the best Christmas present of 2011.  One of the tools, and perhaps the primary tool we used for potty training was this book, Toilet Learning, the picture book technique for children and parents, by Alison Mack.

Originally I heard about this book on a parenting forum and sought it out on Amazon.com.  The book is divided into two sections, the front for the parents, and the back part, a picture book for parents to read to their children.  The picture book is excellent, it explains very nicely to children about using the potty and includes a lot of details that are interesting to children.... things like.... there are bathrooms almost everywhere you go...  and.... that everyone uses the bathroom.  The drawings feature a child that can be described as a boy or girl and the author recommends using the words for pee and poop that your family uses to describe them.

Happily, our third child's potty learning was the quickest and easiest of all our three kids. I don't know if we're getting better with practice, or if he's just caught on better.  But this book has been a staple for all our three kids and we loved reading a book so much more than watching a video.  Mr. Rodgers' book is also nice and we had some Elmo but this book was our favorite.  I hope your children enjoy it too.

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O Christmas Tree

This year, we decided to make all of our Christmas ornaments as a family.  The goal is to spend some time together creating.  We started tonight, with no special supplies or plans, just what we had on hand, which was some construction paper, scissors, glue stick and we're doing big, chunky super-fast paper chains, that's it.  The boys worked in a bit of a rush but we had all the kids around the table.  It was nice.

Seymour Simon VOLCANOES

We were just reading this book at bedtime and my oldest, Alek (age 7) pointed to a couple of the books on the back cover and asked for additional titles. This book is part of the Smithsonian series by Seymour Simon.  We have at least one other Simon book, which is the Seymour Simon book of Trains.  For now, let's talk about the Volcanoes book.

This book has been in our stash for a while. I like reading nonfiction titles to the kids, they are curious about the world and are very interested in many topics, space, ocean animals, science, etc.  It's great to read to them and they sit quietly, and really listen to what I'm talking about.  These books are geared toward slightly older kids, grades 1-5.  My kids are 7, 5, and 3 now, and even the little guy pays attention.  Right now I read to them, but I like that the books have a long life and later on the boys will be able to read the books again themselves.   The text has great vocabulary, it's great to have the boys hear unique and interesting words as we read together.

The photographs are stunning, and the book has many details about volcanoes, along with specific examples of volcanoes around the world and various eruptions (which reminds me we have another volcano title called Eruption, by D&K)  This book has greater detail, is a bigger format and has more dramatic photos.  I like the map that shows the Earth's plates.

The book is 32 pages and includes a glossary.  Tonight we didn't make it all the way through before bedtime, but it was a great reading experience.  We're getting a few more books from this series for Christmas, I've chosen Lightning, and Earthquakes (the one my son requested).  I expect they will be great reading experiences as well.

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Dusting off...

I've let the blog go idle for... a long while... we have been thoroughly enjoying family life!  My oldest son is now age 7 and beginning to read independently, which is extremely exciting and we have been enjoying a lot of great books through our elementary school's library days.  I will try to stop in occasionally and share our very favorites. Best wishes to you and yours!  --Karen

Christmas shopping!

Small update:  My two oldest are now in K and 4K -- it's been good so far!  My oldest is starting to learn to read.  Awesome.  Love our teachers, love library day every Wednesday -- the kids have been bringing home some great books!

I am doing last minute shopping and wanted to share this link -- I'm using it for reference to add some picture books to our collection -- this was a wonderful list to work with!!!

http://blog.schoollibraryjournal.com/afuse8production/2009/05/16/top-100-picture-books-poll-results-1-101/

Happy Holidays!
Karen

Butterfly Kit

We're going to try a butterfly kit this spring!  A friend who homeschools her preschooler son has done this and they loved it. 

Update on the butterfly kit:  it was a very interesting experience.  A little traumatic for me when one of the butterflies was caught up and struggling in getting out of the chrysalis and ended up not making it.  I blame myself for not removing enough of the stringy fibers around the chrysalis when transferring to the net container. Lessons learned through experience.   I would approve of repeating the experience, the kids would love to do it again also.  

Dinosaurs! The Complete Guide to Dinosaurs and Prehistoric Reptiles

My 5 year-old-received this book as a gift, and it is AWESOME! I had 
looked online for a while to find a good dinosaur book and didn't ever 
find one that seemed right for a preschool-kindergarten age child. We are so lucky to have been given this book because it is wonderful -- 
the perfect dinosaur book for children!

See this book at Amazon.com

The reason our family loves this book is the wonderful illustrations -- 
as the cover states -- "more than 250 superb illustrations". Dinosaurs 
of all types come to life, with great visuals, size references to adult 
human beings, and helpful pronunciation guides. The book is oversized giving plenty of room for the rich visuals inside.

Who knew there were so many dinosaurs -- at bedtime my 5-year-old will ask to browse a few spreads and talk about these fascinating 
creatures. It's wonderful to share and learn together, and I'm pleased to recommend this book as a great family exploration or as a great gift to share.


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Baby Danced the Polka

See this book at Amazon.com

First, I want to thank my friend Susan for recommending Karen Beaumont's book, Baby Danced the Polka!  This is a sweet book with wonderful text, artwork and lift-the-flap details that make it a delightful book to read with our own children or to share as a gift.

Baby Danced the Polka tells the cute and fun story of a couple with their little baby living on an old-fashioned farm.  The farm is an interesting setting, and ma and pa are trying to do their chores -- interesting chores, like starching long johns and fixing chow...  and baby is supposed to be taking a nap... but... baby wants to DANCE!!!!  And so, baby dances all through naptime with a variety of toy animals, cat, pig, cow and sheep.

In the end, the whole family dances the night away together.

Nearly every page has a lift-the-flap that shows baby dancing and dancing.

I love this book for the great words and lift-the-flaps and also the happy family relationship, along with the real and very familiar situation of mom and dad tring to get some things done during naptme.

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What we are listening to: Junie B Jones

The boys and I trekked to the library this morning after preschool.  Library visits with three children 5 and under are interesting.  I am thankful that the librarians are easygoing about the four of us getting a little crazy in the children's section (which is open to the whole library).  The boys enjoy library visits, but baby Mark was having a little too much fun opening the audiocassette and CD cases in the audiobooks shelves.

Alek found magazines and he decided to check out one Highlights and two copies of Boys Life.  (Unfortunately he was suckered in immediately by the toy advertisements and now wants an age-inappropriate marble run for Christmas.  It's not happening.)

Getting to the point, we have been exploring audio books as something to do instead of watching TV. The boys are mildly interested.  We checked out The House at Pooh Corner a few weeks ago, and now we found Junie B Jones on tape.  Alek and I started reading a copy of Junie B Jones recently (about a farm trip) and the reading is holding his interest.  I think it's nice that Junie B is about Alek's age and she's precocious and I think he relates to that and finds it funny.

That's what we're listening to this week!

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What we are reading: The Legend of Spookley the Square Pumpkin

See this book at Amazon.com

Halloween is coming up! Last year we checked out and shared a great collection of poems -- It's Halloween! This year, our family borrowed a copy of The Legend of Spookley the Square Pumpkin from the library and want to share notes about this cute book.

Spookley is a cute little story with a basic message -- it's OK and even valuable to be different from everyone else. The plot is like a Fall version of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer... Spookley is a pumpkin who is square. The round pumpkins make fun of him until one night during a storm, Spookley saves the day. The farmer realizes how special Spookley is, and decides to plant his seeds in his fields the following year, which leads to a magical kind of surprise -- pumpkins of all shapes, colors and sizes!

The book comes with a bonus CD, which we listened to and enjoyed as well. Spookely is a cute book that our kids enjoyed very much. My oldest talked about Spookley a lot after reading the book.

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Cardboard Building Blocks

See this toy at Amazon.com

Sometimes the simplest toys are the most fun. This is true with one of our family's favorite toys, basic cardboard building blocks. I think these have been around forever, I remember playing with similar blocks waaay back when I was in preschool and kindergarten, and they are still in early childhood classrooms today.

We've owned our cardboard blocks for about two years now, and they have been the most played with blocks in our house. (We have three sets, the cardboard blocks, a set of very fine wooden unit blocks, and a set of wooden ABC cubes. I should probably also mention plastic peek-a-blocks, although those are separate in my mind as baby toys vs. building toys.)

What I like about our cardboard blocks:

1. They are lightweight, I do not have to worry about anyone getting hurt when they topple over
2. The boys are pretty good about cleaning up the large cardboard blocks -- we keep them in a not-so-attractive but very functional LARGE cardboard shipping box that sits in our living room. Clean up is often a game of toss-the-block-in-the-box. It's fun.
3. Everybody can play with them. The 5-year-old, 3 year-old and 1 year-old all play and everybody loves it. Dad and I play too, and we have a good time.
4. They are not made of plastic. Our family has many plastic toys, but it's nice to have something fun that's not plastic in the mix.
5. They are sturdy. They have been thrown, stepped on, kicked down and knocked over many, many times, and are still in good shape despite our rough handling.

What I don't like about our cardboard blocks:

1. They were spendy. Daddy purchased ours at a learning boutique store, and I remember saying -- you spent what on a bunch of cardboard?? cardboard??? The blocks come packed flat, and so it's very clear that what you have purchased is really not all that much in terms of material. Thankfully, the delightful experience of building big structures and the enduring play value of the blocks has made it seem like it was a good purchase vs. some of our other toys that have not gotten nearly as much use. (Frugal tip: a fun free alternative to purchasing cardboard blocks is to save up a lot of cardboard shoe boxes and let the kids play with them. This is what the boys' grandma has done, I walked into her house one day to an enormous tower of shoe boxes and it was also delightful. Grandmas are so smart!)
2. Storage. They take up a little room, so it may be useful to have a place in mind for keeping them. I am OK with a big shipping box full of cardboard blocks in the living room. These could fit in a closet if I were more organized.

What the kids love about the cardboard blocks:

1. They are large (comparatively). It does not take stacking many of the largest red blocks before my 3 year-old has a tower taller than he is, and that is just cool.
2. They are open-ended, and the boys get to be creative with them. We love building walls, and towers, and caves, we enjoy walling off a corner of the living room for a fort (and using the large storage box and couch cushions as additional building materials), we build statues... Most recently the boys have gotten into karate-chopping the blocks and kicking the blocks, which is a little rough on them, but it's been loads of fun.

I'm happy to share that these simple blocks are some of our favorite toys and recommend them for families with toddlers and preschoolers.

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Go Away Monster!

See this game at Amazon.com

In all honesty, we don't play many board games in our house. That is kind of sad for me as a mom, because I grew up loving all board games and playing them as often as I could wrangle a willing friend or adult into playing with me. Perhaps the boys are still too young to love board games (and still working on turn-taking skills). My oldest (now almost 5!) loves Candyland. (Our three year old does not play it yet.) But one game that both our 5 and 3 year olds play is.... Go Away Monster by Gamewright.

Go Away Monster is a cute and simple game. Each player (up to four players total) chooses a game board that looks like a bedroom. There is also a small sack with game pieces that fall into two categories -- items that belong in your bedroom and... MONSTERS! If you happen to draw a monster, you get to yell GO AWAY MONSTER!!!!, and in our house, you get to toss your little monster across the room.

This has been loads of fun. The boys like picking their rooms and selecting items for their rooms in the game. The game has gotten my older son acting a little bit like a decorator, wanting to coordinate his favorite room with the best matching room accessories. The boys also enjoy all the monsters, they like the surprise of pulling a monster from the sack, and they love yelling GO AWAY MONSTER!!!

My nearly-five-year-old also at times decides that some of the monsters are nice monsters and he has chosen to invite them to stay and hang out in his nicely decorated room.

Game play moves fairly quickly, and it works with our kids' attention spans. The set packs up nicely in it's container, and it's an easy way to have a little family fun. The kids have not grown bored with it.

Go Away Monster is a simple, fun, delightful game that our family enjoys very much. I recommend it and think it's a great game to share with preschoolers.

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Scaredy Squirrel at Night

See this book at Amazon.com

I had heard about Scaredy Squirrel around the kidlitosphere (that's the children's books blogging community) -- librarians and other kids' books fans had written favorably about it. But I had never made a big effort to go out and find it.

My oldest son (almost five) grabbed a copy of Scaredy Squirrel at Night by Melanie Watt when we were at the library a few weeks ago. (His book selection method right now is pretty much grabbing anything the librarians have on feature display, we are coming home with many great things!)

Scaredy Squirrel at Night is written in a cartoonish format with very cute illustrations. A simple plot summary: Scaredy Squirrel is very worried about having bad dreams. He has very specific concerns about the subject matter of nightmares -- he is afraid of things like polka-dot monsters and mean fairies and unicorns. (The drawings for all these things that Scaredy Squirrel is afraid of are cute, in a scary way.) Being proactive, Scaredy Squirrel comes up with detailed plans to avoid his bad dreams by staying awake. Unfortunately his plans go very wrong and poor Sacredy Squirrel has an unexpected adventure.

It's a cute and funny book. And I think my five-year-old has picked a winner. We recommend Scaredy Squirrel at Night and I'm making a note to also check out the original Scaredy Squirrel (and any other in the series that may exist.)

Happy reading!

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Back to blogging

We had a wonderful summer! Our family has made several library trips recently and we have discovered several great books that we look forward to sharing with you!

I Spy Winners

Grand Prize Winner:

#26 -- Laurie

One of my favorite children's books is The Girl with the Silver Eyes. I don't remember a lot of specifics, but I remember completely understanding the main character. She gets treated differently because of her intelligence (and her supernatural powers)!

I Spy A to Z Book Winners:

#11 Marielle

I'm pretty selfishly leading my children to my own childhood favorites. So far Ramona, Henry & Ribsy books as well as the infamous Amelia Bedelia get a ton of play around here. Reading Ramona books from the viewpoint of a parent is beyond hilarious.

#13  Lori

Right now I'd say I really like the Knuffle Bunny books by Mo Willems -- and my daughter loves them, too! Love the illustrations and some of the parental humor.

#10 Danielle

My favorite children's book is "I Love You Stinky Face" because the little boys goes through all these scenarios with his mom about if he was these different creatures and monsters and his mom just lets him know that no matter what he was, she would love him and take care of him. The illustrations are awesome and all 3 of my boys have loved this book and I love reading it to them. It's just a fun book with a sweet message!

#9 Carey

Our favorite book is Zin Zin Zin a Violin. The rhythm of the words is great and he uses the perfect words to describe each instrument and the pictures go perfectly with the words.

Numbers drawn by Random.org

I Spy... A Great Giveaway!

It's been about a year since I started Mommy's Favorite Children's Books last summer and when it started, I hoped someday to do a giveaway contest with a great prize.   Now I am happy to announce the first blog giveaway..... featuring I Spy books.  

I Spy books are favorites of my 4.5 year old son.  We have a few in our collection and he enjoys the photos so much.  I love how focused he is while working on searching for items within the pictures.  We love I Spy books for anytime, and they are very useful when kids need to sit a while while waiting or traveling. 

This giveaway celebrates a brand new I Spy book....  

I Spy A to Z!

Easy-to-read riddles by Jean Marzollo are paired with forty-six object-filled photographs by Walter Wick to create I Spy A to Z, the most engaging alphabet book ever! With more than thirty titles and 36 million books in print, the I Spy series continues to win the hearts and minds of parents and kids everywhere. 

 

This giveaway offers FIVE prizes!  Wow!

One very lucky reader will receive an awesome grand prize package valued at more than $80 with books AND games! 

• Wii Video Game ‘Ultimate I SPY’

• Board Game ‘I SPY Memory Game’

• I SPY A to Z: A Book of Picture Riddles

• I SPY Treasure Hunt

Four (4) runner-up winners receive a copy of the new book I SPY A to Z: A Book of Picture Riddles!  (Each book valued at $13.99)

HOW TO ENTER:  Leave a comment (with your email or a link with a way to contact you if you win) and include 1) the title of your favorite children's book and 2) why you love it.

We're doing this the old fashioned way, one entry per person, please. No duplicates or incomplete entries. Entries will be accepted through July 6.  US residents only, please. Winners will be chosen at random, announced and notified by email on Wednesday July 8.  

(Anonoymous commenters and new visitors -- thank you so much for visiting --please be sure to leave me a way to contact you if you win, otherwise your entry is invalid. If you forgot and want to fix it, post an identical comment with a way to reach you, thanks.) 

Thank you for reading and entering the I SPY giveaway at Mommy's Favorite Children's Books!  Good luck!

First giveaway coming soon!

Mommy's Favorite Children's Books will be hosting a giveaway to be announced on Monday!

Top 30 picture books - what we have read

My friend Marietta at Bookworm's Booklist asked which of the Top 30 Picture Books featured at A Fuse #8 Production, School Library Journal we have shared with our family.  Here is our list:

#1: Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak (1963)

#2: Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown (1947)

#3: The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle (1979)

#4: The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats (1962)

#5: Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus by Mo Willems (2003)

#6: Make Way for Ducklings by Robert McCloskey (1941)

#7: Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson (1955)

#8: Madeline by Ludwig Bemelmans (1939)

#9: Millions of Cats by Wanda Gag (1928)

#10: Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale by Mo Willems (2004)

#11: The Story of Ferdinand y Monroe Leaf, ill. Robert Lawson (1936)

#12: Good Night Gorilla by Peggy Rathmann (1994)

#13: Blueberries for Sal by Robert McCloskey (1948)

#14: The True Story of the Three Little Pigs by Jon Scieszka, ill. Lane Smith(1989)

#15: Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse by Kevin Henkes (1996)

#16: Owl Moon by Jane Yolen (1987)

#17: Caps for Sale by Esphyr Slobodkina (1947)

#18: In the Night Kitchen by Maurice Sendak (1970)

#19: Miss Rumphius by Barbara Cooney (1982)

#20: George and Martha by James Marshall (1972)

#21: Bark, George by Jules Feiffer (1999)

#22: The Monster at the End of this Book by Jon Stone, ill. by Mike Smollin (1971)

#23: Bread and Jam for Frances by Russell Hoban, illustrated by Lillian Hoban (1964)

#24: Chicka Chicka Boom Boom by Bill Martin, Jr. and John Archambault, ill. Lois Ehlert (1989)

#25: The Little House by Virginia Lee Burton (1942)

#26: Corduroy by Donald Freeman (1976)

#27: The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter (1902)

#28: Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day by Judith Viorst, ill. Ray Cruz (1972)

#29: Sylvester and the Magic Pebble by William Steig (1969)

#30: Brown, Bear, Brown Bear, What do you See? by Bill Martin Jr., ill. Eric Carle (1967)

I am not certain whether I will make it a goal or not to do the whole Top 30.  The ones I am most interested in trying with our kids are:

-- Millions of Cats

-- The Monster at the End of This Book

-- The Story of Ferdinand

-- Sylvester and the Magic Pebble (I have seen this on PBS' Between the Lions) 

A sweet classic board game: Candyland

There are only two board games that get regular use at our house -- Candyland and Go Away Monster  (review to come).  

I wonder if there is anyone who is unfamiliar with Candyland -- this classic board game has been around for generations.

A (our oldest, 4.5 years), loves Candyland, he is willing to play it anytime. 

See this game at Amazon.com

As a child I remember being very bored with Candyland.  Perhaps it's because I was an early reader and I felt the color cards were too simple.  I much preferred Chutes and Ladders .  I think that may mean I'm unique.  My new brother-in-law has detailed memories of Candyland's Lord Licorice.....  uh, I thought, who is that?  

It is interesting to compare various versions of Candyland published over the years.   The current came has Princess Frostine instead of Queen Frostine.  The molasses swamp has become a chocolate swamp, and the gameplay has changed.  In the version of my childhood, a player would get stuck on a dot space until a certain color card was drawn, which made for a long, frustrating  time stuck.  The modern version has a photo of licorice on the sticky spaces and the unlucky player only loses one turn -- for a gentler and less frustrating wait. 

The Hasbro web site has a history of the game and neat slide show with photos of the different versions through the decades.  Which version do you remember playing as a child? 

Now that I have a child that loves Candyland, I'm just now experiencing the best of this game with him.  

I admit, I let my son cheat and win every time we play.  He does not like getting sent back to an earlier point in the game by one of the special cards.  For a little while the house rules were that pieces only go forward, but now I am sending my player back to try and model the correct way to play.  A seems to be innately competitive, and he wants to win Candyland every time we play, cheering for himself when he receives double color cards and expressing disappointment when his game piece advances only a space or two.  He sweetly invites me to join him in the Candy Castle as soon as he wins.

I have heard the new, electronic Candy Land Castle  game suits younger players (2 and 3 year olds) who aren't ready for the classic Candyland game.  Apparently the concepts are totally different, and Castle is about color and shape matching.  I am not a big fan of electronic games though, and they can be expensive.  Have you tried Candyland Castle?  Let us know what you think!

A book for Father's Day -- I Love My Daddy by Sebastien Braun

I've got to say, Infant Bibliophile is on top of things -- I visited today to find Father's Day books -- a topic that would very possibly have completely slipped my mind until the week of.  I so admire the organized!  

Anyway, I have a single addition to the Bibliophile's list.  It's a beautiful, beautiful picture book called I Love My Daddy by Sebastien Braun.  

See this book at Amazon.com

Just look at the gorgeous images! Beautiful color! Each spread depicts a father bear and baby bear spending time together in sweet everyday moments.

The boys have enjoyed this book, especially, "My daddy tickles me!"  

I discovered this great-looking book when it was sold at Pottery Barn Kids a couple years ago -- those home decor style-makers picked a winner!   Since this purchase I have perused the PBK book selections a few more times -- I didn't find anything that grabbed me as much,  but kudos to PBK for making shelf space in its stores for children's books.

Added:  When is Father's Day this year, anyway?  I went and looked it up -- June 21!  Mark your calendars!

(Also, yes, today is Memorial Day!  Yes, I have the holidays all mixed-up! We do not have any books about flags, the USA or patriotism!  It's a huge deficiency in our collection.    And my husband was an Army reserve tank commander.  I have one book about Abraham Lincoln, that's it!  Any suggestions?)