Lots of great suggestions here. Two of my favorites, we have the smaller board book variety, are Guess How Much I Love You and Goodnight Moon. We actually had to buy a second copy of Goodnight Moon (and have Grandma re-inscribe it) because M LOVED that book to death, literally In fact, if you don't have Goodnight Moon yet, give me your address

Something else I want to say, perhaps the best piece of advice I can give you about little kiddos and books (I'm sure someone like Dweller or Amypata told me this, tough I really can't recall).

Make sure the books are age appropriate.

Sounds obvious, I know, but it's sooooo true. I know we all want our kids to love reading, to read well, and grow up reading. I know we can get excited that they like the things we like, or want them enjoying the things we enjoyed when we were growing up. But remember that it's an evolution, and the first step is to get them enjoying books, then hopefully the reading will follow. Having books to touch, scratch, open and close, drop, stare at and chew on are necessary at his age.

I only bring this up because in our enthusiasm to expose them to the things we remember, we can forget what really excites a kid at any given age. The worst thing we can do is give them books that bore them so that they don't want to pick them up.

Now, my other side of the coin to this is the second bit of advice that I truly believe, and that's read, read, and read some more to him. Even the shape books, the color books, the touchy-feely books; you'll want to talk to him while he explores. Say the words, the shapes, the animal sounds, the colors while he points and touches and looks. With M we even did 'open' and 'close' and 'front' and 'back' when she was tiny and just turning the tiny board books around in her little hands. And if you have a routine, be it bed time, just after dinner, or nap time, whenever it is you'll find that you are spending a lot of fun time with him, with books. As I think we'd all agree, that's a good thing.

M has a TON of books, and still a whole bunch of board books, and it's interesting to see her evolution with them. Obviously early on Rae and I did all the reading to her. Same books, over and over and over ..... even with the variety we have, she'd pick out the same three books every night for a week, or simply on rotation we'd get back to them by the end of the week. At some point the repetition sinks in, and she started 'reading' the books to us, because she'd remember the story and know where we were at by the pictures. It started off just reading what she saw in the pictures, but then she'd remember specific words and phrases in the story and use them on the correct page. Now that she knows her letters and she's starting to work on sounding out words, she's actually recognizing words on the page (usually the title of the book, or the title of the chapter). I think the first word she knew on sight was ZOO And many of these are the same board books we read to her 3 years ago.

I hope this didn't come off as any sort of lecturing, and as I said it's pretty obvious but sometimes bares repeating. We're all book lovers here, and want our kids to be book lovers, so we get excited and I particularly can get excited and long-winded

Okay, so just a list of books that I've enjoyed with M:

Goodnight Moon
Guess How Much I Love You
Biscuit books (eg, Biscuit's Snowy Day)
Corduroy books (et, Corduroy's Best Halloween Ever)
Sam books (by Amy Hest and Anita Jeram, eg, Kiss Good Night and You Can Do It, Sam) (and searching for this, I found one we don't have and need to get )
Maisy books (there are a ton of these, and there's a cartoon on Nogin I think, and I haven't seen these in board books so maybe in a few years, eg, Maisy's Bedtime)

I'm also going to mention Usborne Books ( link). One of M's aunt & uncles gave her some Usborne books when she was born, and we found a local 'book consultant' and have bought a TON of books for M, from touchy-feelies to shapes and colors to more 'easy to read' books, and on up the age/ability range. I think they're sold kind of like Pampered Chef or Tupperware in that you can find a local 'consultant' and they can hook you up with book, and many times special deals if you buy a lot at once or buy a particular set that might be on sale. You can apparently get them through the likes of Amazon, but probably not the discounts/specials. Ask around for a local consultant, you can spend a bunch of money with her on books.

In the Usborne catalog:
Goose on the Loose (this is where M learned the word ZOO)
Ted in a Red Bed
Farmyard Tales (we have 2 books, with 4 stories in each)
Animal Hide and Seek (we've given this to all of our nephews and second cousins)

Ok ok, I really need to get back to work That's enough for now

JP has some excellent points. Evolution is key. There are books that I thought Dev would adore that he doesn't even care about. Or didn't for ages and then suddenly he loved them. Or, that he is capable of reading certain books now, but still wants me to read them to him.

However, when we're in the car, he grabs a book. Even if I'm just taking him to school (not far away) he grabs a book. So many kids now need electronic toys to keep them entertained. A guy in at RadioShack trying to sell me batteries "because if you have a seven year old you must go through a lot of batteries" was astonished that I don't do those toys and that he reads books for entertainment.

OK, his favourites currently are Captain Underpants and Calvin and Hobbes, but we drove up to New York state on Sunday and he read most of the way there and back.

To follow-up on Maeve's follow-up M is the same way. For a few months now she's not wanted to take a nap on the weekends, opting instead to have quiet time in her room reading. She gets a huge stack of books and puts them up on her bed and she reads and plays teacher with her stuffed animals. A couple weekends ago Rae and I actually fell asleep during nap time and didn't wake up for an hour and a half, and she was perfectly entertained reading her books and playing quietly. Other than her 'laptop', we don't go for the electronic toys either, and she's a great traveler with her books, activity books, and seek-and-find books (her latest favorite passtime book). I'm amazed at how good she is right now at the seek-and-finds and I-spys

Maeve, have you seen Max & Pinky? A buddy of mine heard about them on NPR, got his daughter a couple books and she loves 'em. They got M a couple for xmas and she loves them (took them to school yesterday, in fact). It's really fun stuff, I need to go looking for more.

quote:

Originally posted by JeePz:

Make sure the books are age appropriate.

Sounds obvious, I know, but it's sooooo true. I know we all want our kids to love reading, to read well, and grow up reading. I know we can get excited that they like the things we like, or want them enjoying the things we enjoyed when we were growing up. But remember that it's an evolution, and the first step is to get them enjoying books, then hopefully the reading will follow. Having books to touch, scratch, open and close, drop, stare at and chew on are necessary at his age.

I only bring this up because in our enthusiasm to expose them to the things we remember, we can forget what really excites a kid at any given age. The worst thing we can do is give them books that bore them so that they don't want to pick them up.

This is *so* true. We were so worried about our daughter not enjoying reading because for a long time all she wanted was the touch and feel books I mentioned earlier. Even Goodnight, Moon, she wanted nothing do with.

Also, every kid's different. The other night we tried reading a book where a frog has to take care of his best friend's (the goose, I think) unhatched egg. The frog has to save it from a mean boy who wants to break it, and some otehr obstacles. When the egg cracked at the end, my daughter started to cry because she thought the egg had broke, she didn't get that it had hatched. It was good writing, and it was supposed to be a tense moment, but I don't think it was supposed to make her actual cry.

(Says the guy who once screamed at his dad and called him a liar when ET died, and then came back to life. My poor dad.)

Other recommendations

Anything For You -- this is about the sweetest book I think I've ever read. My brother-in-law want read it anymore because it gets him choked up every. time.

Where's My Cow? Terry Pratchett -- she started to love this book not long after her first birthday.

Somebody else already mentioned Click Clack Moo (or however you spell it). That book is pure awesomeness.

Yeah, I agree with that - you never quite know what's going to upset kids.

There was one when I was little where a mouse made a five pound note into a nest, and the kids found it and made it into a note again, and spent it! The bastards! I was so upset about that, I cried all day, and the teachers were bewildered!

Someone gave me The Little Match Girl for my seventh birthday, and my parents had to whisk it away and hide it

quote:

Originally posted by daysleeper[chickie]:
Cheers, MoM! Didn't expect to see you pop in

My list keeps growing!

quote:

Originally posted by Limertilly:

i have a book that i used to read every single time i was sick or couldn't sleep or had a nightmare. it was called Nicky and his Forest Friends, and it seems to be out of print and almost impossible to get hold of now, but it was *wonderful*

looks like 2 sellers on Amazon.com have it

hee, i still have my copy, it looks a little beaten up, but is definitely still in reasonable nick. i'm never ever selling it!

greek myths

Runny Babbit by Shel Silverstein

The Thirteen Clocks

I second MoMs Frog and Toad books...I loved those when I was little.

I'd also recommend anything by Richard Scary or any of the Little Golden Books. The Pokey Little Puppy was always a personal favorite.

I remember having a collection of little Beatrix Potter books...Peter Rabbit, Squirrel Nutkin, Tom Kitten...simple, sweet tales in which mischeivous animals get themselves into a scrape and get themselves out of the scrape.

The Velveteen Rabbit will always and forever be close to my heart ( i guess i had a thing for bunnies when i was wee).

The original A.A. Milne tales of Winnie the Pooh are fantastic and wise and timeless.

I also highly recommend Mythology by Edith Hamilton and Aesop's Fables as good bed-time reading.

Oh! And how can I forget the BEST book EVER WRITTEN?

pat the bunny!

ETA: Oh! Oh! And the best silly book (other than Shel Silverstein): The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales (and everything else by Jon Scieszka-- he's the They Might Be Giants of children's lit!)

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Al-RAAR-a,

yay! for stinky cheese man

quote:

The Velveteen Rabbit will always and forever be close to my heart ( i guess i had a thing for bunnies when i was wee).

I had a velveteen rabbit when I was little! I found and re-read that book when I was home over christmas, and definitely got a little weepy at the ending.

oh, that makes me cry every single time.

that and the PROPER version of The Little Mermaid.

quote:

that and the PROPER version of The Little Mermaid.

Is that the one where she's caught in a tuna net and hauled aboard a fishing vessel that gets marooned when The Little Mermaid's dad turns the sea upside down looking for her, and then the sailors take advantage of her while on the deserted island before she escapes (but not after luring them to the gaping maw of a leviathan) but is shunned by the ocean dwellers when she gives berth to Aquaboy (who later turns out to be a mutant from the future sent back hunt down Namor for running up a bar tab with the Stargate: Atlantis crew).

Or was that just something I ran across online?

I dunno, but I'd read it to my kid.

haha. no.

it's the version where she dies and gets turned into a foam upon the sea, because the prince marries the wrong girl, who *isn't* a sea witch octopus thingy, and she can't bring herself to stab him and allow his blood to run over her feet to turn them back into fins, and therefore gains a soul through her sacrifice.

so many great suggestions and great advice! Thanks guys!

i'm also really enjoying the little moments of light that accompany being reminded of a beloved book of my own childhood that i'd forgotten about - every so often one of you suggests one of those and it's a lovely warm remembering.

quote:

Originally posted by Smaug:
...although there are levels of safe. the wolf is allowed to eat grandma, and in the rhyme of the woman who swallowed the fly, the line should be 'perhaps she'll die' not the safe...'oh me oh my!'

there was an old woman who swallowed a fly...

I forgot to say earlier that our Smaugie has a thing for getting all the kids of the world, or at least all the Board Kids, to learn this ditty. I was actually singing it while I was mowing yesterday and I taught it to M, but we haven't sung it in quite some time.