Fairies, Monsters, and Summer Magic

August 25, 2025 By Maria

While stores and social media are preparing for Halloween and back to school, I am intent on enjoying what’s left of the summer with my family. Especially the time we have left before school starts again. Don’t get me wrong, I love autumn. It is probably my favorite season between the weather, gorgeous leaves, and that cozy feeling I get preparing for winter. However, summer has its own magic and that’s what I am focusing on today. I love flowers and fairies, and I especially love stories with beautiful art that combine the two. The books I chose to write about here are a mix of both.  

As Peter Pan asked in J.M. Barrie’s classic book, “Do you believe in fairies?” Well, I think you might if you read The Night Fairy by Laura Amy Schlitz. It is an absolutely charming middle grade novel about the mishap and adventures of a tiny fairy, named Flory. The story is sweet and enduring, and Flory’s character development took me by surprise. The illustrations by Angela Barrett in this book are even more lovely than her gorgeous version of Hans Christian Anderson’s The Wild Swans that I loved as a kid. I read The Night Fairy last summer and then aloud to my kids right after I finished it the first time. I would have absolutely loved reading it as a child. We enjoy watching for “signs” of fairies as the seasons grow colder and comparing our neighborhood squirrels to Flory’s friend, Skuggle. Do you ever watch for fairies in your neighborhood?

Another magical and fairy themed middle grade novel I read last summer was The Hidden Forest by Dainty Jensen and illustrated by Alan Baker. It checked all my childhood imagination boxes. There are fairies, talking animals, mermaids, a secret magical forest and adventure. This story is about a girl working through her grief after her father’s passing. The focus was not on Adelaide’s grief, but on her journey back to living and enjoying life in the present through the healing of her imagination. I also loved the setting of the book – her grandparents’ home in a small island town with a beautiful garden and spectacular town library. I really enjoyed reading this book. It sparked my childhood imagination and warmed my heart. 

This summer, my oldest son found a very fun and imaginative book for me to read.  He brought it to me in the library with a little smile on his face saying, “I think you would like to read this.” He was definitely right. If Flowers were Little Monsters by Claire Le Men is part field guide and part fantasy. It is translated from French and contains cultural background and history of each flower’s cultivation and use. After the factual information, the author describes each flower as very imaginative monster versions.  The illustrations are lovely. The monsters are creative and fun, and the information was intriguing. I learned things I hadn’t learned before, especially about the diversities within a species. My younger son asked me to read it aloud last night and we finished about half of it snuggled on a cozy chair together before bedtime. 

Even though the summer is more than half over, let’s try to enjoy the rest of it. What’s magical about the summer to you? Is it the laid-back schedules and beach days or the fact that you can go out without a coat or jacket? I love how time slows down a bit or at least it feels that way. We spend more time together, more time outdoors or traveling, and on fun or creative projects. That feels a little magical, doesn’t it?

A Roar to Read About

August 21, 2025 By Maria

Most people, including myself, think it’s normal for a kid to cuddle with a toy teddy bear, which is essentially a fierce predator. When my daughter was a toddler, her favorite stuffy was a teddy bear named “Bear-Bear”. Bear-Bear is still sought out for cuddles at bedtime but now is called “Bearby.” My oldest son’s favorite cuddly animals are all dangerous predators – from a python to a T-Rex to a shark – they’re all lined up on his bed. We know that a lion is a fierce predator. Do our kids always see lions as fierce predators? I’m not sure, but I do know that kids love reading stories about animals, predators included. Lions are common in children’s literature. Think of the Cowardly Lion from The Wizard of Oz or Aslan in The Chronicles of Narnia to name a couple. I’d like to share a few of our favorite lion picture books. Hopefully, you will find a hidden gem or two. 

How to Hide a Lion by Helen Stephens is both completely unrealistic and thoroughly cute. I wouldn’t put it past my daughter to try and hide an animal like this one day. The story may be a sweet fictitious tale but the emotions the characters go through are very real. My husband and I both enjoyed this book. We love how the little girl treats finding a lion in her backyard so casually. It made me think of when my sister was little and she would sincerely claim that she would go to Africa and cuddle lions one day. My daughter has absolutely no fear of large dogs. She will bravely walk up to a St. Bernard, whose large head is higher than hers, and confidently ask permission to pet him. It’s so comical in this story how Iris hides the lion in plain sight from her parents throughout the illustrations. It is a very happy moment when these two friends finally reunite after their painful separation. 

A merciful moment starts the well-known Aesop Fable of the lion and the mouse. The Lion and the Mouse by Jerry Pinkney is an almost wordless retelling of this fable. I love Pinkney’s artwork. I was saddened to hear of his passing in 2021. The watercolor illustrations are beautiful and realistic with lots of charm and character. I love how we follow the mouse around and see the world from her viewpoint in the beginning of the book. I heard Kate DiCamillo, the author of Because of Winn-Dixie, say in a podcast interview that children really emphasize with mice since they also feel small and vulnerable like the mice. Don’t we all at times? This story is communicated very well without words. This book was especially fun to read when my kids were very small. They were engaged with exploring the pictures and asking me to narrate the goings on. 

Exploring the details hiding in the borders of the pictures, always make a Jan Brett book fun and engaging. Honey, Honey Lion!: A Story from Africa by Jan Brett is a fun trickster story. As I may have mentioned in a previous post. My oldest son loves trickster stories. I think all kids do for the most part. But there are few now and then that really do not like the concept of one character tricking another. The greedy honey badger in this story is tricked by the unhappy honeyguide after he refuses to share the honey they found together. My kids felt certain that the badger would never be selfish again after the honeyguide’s trick. I see how the honeyguide helped teach him responsibility. I hope he feels gratitude for the lesson, but I wonder if he will have trust issues.

Like most of Jon Agee’s books, Lion Lessons is a great one for laughs. The boy in the story goes to lion “school” to be an officially licensed lion. What ensues is a hilarious list of tasks the lion gives him. The boy fails miserably at most tasks but finally succeeds to put all his skills together and earn his certification. The best reading of this book I have ever witnessed was when I walked in on my husband reading it aloud and then instructing the kids in the lion lessons. There were tiny roaring and pouncing people all over the living room. Silly and fun, that moment became a great memory.

From silly and fun to loyal and strong, lions in literature are a roar to read about. These books offer us opportunities to have discussions about mercy and fairness and just enjoy a laugh. After reading these books, would you want to cuddle with a lion?

Time for Sharks

August 17, 2025 By Maria

Apparently, not having cable can cause you to totally miss shark week. . .by a long shot. I thought it took place in August, but it was weeks ago in July. Oh well. It’s still summer.  Plenty of beach days remain, so let’s read about sharks!

One of my favorite shark picture books of all time is Shawn Loves Sharks by Curtis Manley.  This cute and fun book is about a shark obsessed boy, who takes his shark mania to loveable extremes. Tracy Subisak’s illustrations add to the playfulness and humor of the story. Shawn’s life is upturned when classmate Stacy is assigned sharks for a school project and Shawn gets leopard seals, dun dun dun! Shawn learns that seals aren’t as horrible as he first imagined and that friendship is more important than sharks. I love reading about Shawn’s shark obsession. This feels very real to me. My kids had, and have, their own share of obsessions from dinosaurs to Spiderman to corny jokes. I also remember having my own obsessions as a kid. Shawn and Stacy’s interactions mimic my two younger kids’ relationship as well. Especially the part when Shawn realizes he’s taken things too far and decides to do the right thing. Yes, very familiar. 

My kids are familiar with reading picture book biographies for fun and for learning. I usually also learn something new when we read them. Swimming with Sharks: The Daring Discoveries of Eugenie Clark by Heather Lang and illustrated by Jordi Solano is an awesome picture book biography. Picture book biographies are such a fun and engaging way to learn about historical figures. Eugenie Clark was a female figure in marine biology who worked extensively with sharks. Clark’s mother was Japanese American and her mother’s Japanese heritage and cultural focus on the sea partially inspired Clark’s interest in marine life. (If you are interested in reading another picture book about Clark, check out Shark Lady). Until reading this book, I didn’t even know who Eugenie Clark was. I loved learning about her and how her childhood interest in sharks nourished her career and life calling. 

Clark’s passion for sharks is inspiring. Several years ago, I met the author of Swimming with Sharks, Heather Lang at a children’s picture book festival. We had a short discussion about her writing and research process and how she chooses her subjects. She glowed when talking about Eugenie Clark. It was very inspiring to see how much she cared about Clark, science, and women in history. Another thing I loved about this book was that we learned about a woman in science and how important her contributions to the field were. I even used one of Clark’s discoveries about sharks in a fun competition with my husband last summer. We were playing a shark trivia game at a children’s museum and my knowledge of Eugenie Clark gained me the winning point. I hope you are also inspired to follow your calling and investigate your interests after reading this book. 

If you are interested in investigating more facts about sharks, I recommend The Shark Book by Steve Jenkins and Robin Page. This book is information packed with a sleek and simple design.  The book has clear and non-scary illustrations of different sharks with comparisons to show their size. The book covered general shark information including gestation and birth. It’s a great overview of sharks and the perfect book to bring into a science shark lesson or read with a shark story book. 

Another lesson to learn about sharks is their importance in our ecosystem. If Sharks Disappeared by Lily Williams is a great book to teach about sustainability and ecosystems. A young girl and her dog teach about the history and importance of sharks as the ocean’s apex predator. This book shows that sharks are not evil, but a necessary component to our environment. The author explains overfishing and extinction in a way children can understand. The book ends on a positive note about how we are all connected and need to do our best to work together and take care of our planet. 

Connecting learning and science with great stories is one of my favorite things. As an adult, I can’t believe how much I have learned from picture books, especially history/biographies and science picture books. I felt that the visual way Williams’ book showed the part sharks play in the environment helped me understand more fully the impact of over hunting. I loved Shawn’s enthusiasm for sharks. I felt that same passion taken to a deeper level when reading about Eugenie Clark. I expanded my knowledge of sharks in Jenkins’ book. What have you learned while reading to kids?

Unique and Resilient 

August 9, 2025 By Maria

This is a piece I wrote a couple of years ago regarding my middle child. He is now nine years old, not seven, but he still enjoyed these stories when we revisited them recently. I was actually about to return the books to the library, when my son asked me to keep them out because he wanted to read them together again once more. 

Maybe I am getting a little sentimental. Cross that, I am getting sentimental. My middle child has a loose front tooth, his first loose tooth. I am having a moment, a moment to grieve the coming change in his smile, which also means he’s getting bigger and older. My younger son was born prematurely and spent months in the NICU, in doctor offices, and therapies, but he has grown and accomplished so much. He is resilient. I am so proud of this kid, his creativity, passion and accomplishments in his seven years. 

My son has taught me a lot about patience, parenting, and acceptance. We’ve had good times, and tough times. Some of the tough times were due to medical issues, but it was also just the experience of learning how to raise this unique child. Since I started with talking about a loose tooth, you may be expecting this to be a post about teeth books, first loose tooth stories, etc, but it’s not. I want to share four picture books that my son enjoyed, but also made me laugh out loud and sigh in appreciation of how much they make me think of him. 

The first book I’d like to introduce you to is No Fits, Nilson! written and illustrated by Zachariah OHora. (We also love OHora’s Not So Quiet Library). While being fun and relatable to kids, this book demonstrates self-regulation and kindness. Nilson has big emotions. Amelia responds to Nilson’s tantrums with kindness and redirection. This book shows kids that it’s okay to have big emotions and it also gives tantrum prone kids a chance to see tantrums from another perspective. We found this story useful to keep in our mental database. I could remind my son of Nilson and Amelia when he was approaching a tantrum. Sometimes a relatable story gives kids enough of a pause to breathe and think for a moment instead of just blowing the lid. 

So, about pausing and thinking before acting. . . my son loves food, fruit, snacks, trying new things. I love it, but he hasn’t always had the best self-control about waiting for snacks or not holding back and just helping himself to a treat. (Having a self-sufficient kid is awesome, but there are some moments when it’s not. I’m sure fellow parents know what I mean). I Really Want The Cake by Simon Philip and illustrated by Lucia Gaggiotti made me laugh out loud. It is a cute and funny story of a girl who tries with all her might not to eat the cake her mom left on the counter, but despite all her tactics of avoidance. . . the cake wins. We discussed things like self-control and trying to cook without assistance when reading this book. In amusing ways, the girl and her dog try to distract themselves from the cake with games and dress up. When she approaches the cake, she’s dressed like a cowboy with a fork and spoon in her holster (my kids found this super funny). Horrified, my kids watched and listened as the girl makes a huge mess trying to make a replacement cake after she and the dog devoured the original. 

Sometimes you need to make a mess, sometimes you just have to go a little wild. Having a unique kid can often feel like breaking the norm and going wild. Being accompanied by a three-year-old clad in a Spiderman suit to the supermarket and library is always an adventure. Our next book, Mr. Tiger Goes Wild, written and illustrated by Peter Brown is just the story for those out of ordinary days. (Peter Brown also authored The Wild Robot novels). I like that this book doesn’t show wildness as the best and only route, nor does it demonize being formal or “proper.” It encourages a pleasant balance of both. There are times to be wild and there are times to sit quietly. You can have self-control and still get the chance to play loudly and run and be “wild.” This book encourages kids to be true to themselves and tells them that it’s okay to be different and not a cookie cutter of everyone else. 

My son has moments of wildness, tantrums, play, but he’s also a sensitive and empathetic kid. I am really impressed by how well he can now identify his own emotions. He still has big feelings (don’t we all), but he can also, if given the opportunity, self-regulate and not always lose himself in the moment. The Rabbit Listened by Cori Doerfeld highlights how sometimes you just need quiet support. Different animals tell Taylor, the child in the story, what to do after his block towers are knocked over, but the rabbit does not. The rabbit listens. The rabbit lets Taylor tell the story and be mad and sad and work his way through the emotions. The artwork in this book really tells a lot of the story. We see how Taylor is feeling and reacting to each different animal who comes by and gives unsolicited advice. This book really shows compassion and being heard in a way that kids understand. Sometimes they need us to fix things for them, sometimes they just need a silent hug. It was really nice to see how my son understood this story. The book communicated with him in a way that just words alone did not.


I love books that communicate authentic characters to their readers. I love Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, but Tiny Tim, though super sweet, lacks the realness of a child that Beverly Cleary’s Ramona Quimby demonstrates. I know Tiny Tim is an idealized child for the sake of that story, and I will not go into a tangent about him and Dickens. These four books show real characters, having real experiences that kids can relate to even if the characters are not children like Mr. Tiger, for example. These books helped me connect with my son in a fun and unique way. What books remind you of your kids or help you connect with them?

Books of the Month July 2025

August 4, 2025 by Maria

Just in case you missed anything, I put together a list of the books I wrote about in July. At the end of each month, I will write a list of all the books I wrote about during that month. The post titles will link back to the original blog posts. 

Planting Seeds of Kindness July 17, 2025

Teatime and Closeness July 24, 2025

Teatime and Closeness

July 24, 2025 By Maria

Tea. My family all know that I love tea. I started drinking black tea with milk as a teenager. On a trip to England, I was introduced to British tea and that was the end of that. No more weak Lipton Tea for me ever again. Tea has been my preferred drink for many years, but my husband is starting to turn me over to coffee with his impressive new coffee making skills. One thing tea has that coffee doesn’t seem to have, at least in literature, is the power to unite and bring people together. I haven’t read too many children’s books that talk about the unifying power of coffee. Tea, however, seems to do the trick again and again, at least in books.

What better way to bring people together than with a tea party? Translated from Japanese, Tea Party in the Woods by Akiko Miyakoshi is a sweet story somewhat reminiscent of Little Red Riding Hood, but without any malicious wolves. While traveling through the woods to bring a pie to her grandmother’s house, a little girl is invited to an animal tea party. The kind animals give the girl a warm welcome and assist her with the accidentally squished pie she was bringing to grandma. Afterwards they accompany the girl on the rest of her journey. The tea party brought this large group of animals together in a harmonious community.

In Luli and the Language of Tea by Andrea Wang, Luli connects all the kids in her mixed language daycare class with a pot of tea. Before Luli shared tea with her classmates, the children were always quiet, not knowing how to communicate since they all spoke different languages. The similarity of the word for tea in so many languages is what inspired the author, and it is so beautiful to see all the kids understanding the significance of the tea shared together. The endnotes tell about tea customs across the world and the end pages show international teacup designs. One thing that draws my attention over and over again is the unifying ability of tea. I always love stories, children and adult fiction, that show this. 

In Cloud Monkey Tea, people are not brought together to share tea, but tea saves and brings a girl and her mother together. This lovely book by Elspeth Graham and Mal Peet is a very different story than the rest of the books here. This story could stand alone with a whole essay devoted to it. To me, this is a book of enough. It has just enough hardship and realness and just enough hope and magic. 

Magic and hope are found in The Gift from Saint Nicholas by Dorothea Lachner. It is a Christmas story, but it is also a beautiful story of a community surrounding the comfort of a large pot of tea. In a village plagued by snowstorm after snowstorm, the people have stopped bothering to shovel and the snow has now divided the village, separating them all from each other. No one is going out and everyone is lonely in their homes. Two children make a wish to Saint Nicholas to bring everyone together and Saint Nicholas does just that with a mysterious package, that eventually leads to a cozy gathering of villagers in Grandfather Gregor’s warm kitchen all sharing a generous tea together.  

Tea has brought my kids and I together many times. When they were smaller, I used to make a pot of mint tea and set out cookies and teacups for them. While they were occupied with the novelty of drinking from teacups and eating cookies, I would take that as a perfect opportunity for a read aloud. I would usually read poetry or short stories during teatime, unless we had a longer novel I was reading aloud. I always enjoy sitting down to a cup of tea with my family and friends. I also love a solitary and quiet cup of tea now and then, especially in early mornings or as a break in the afternoon. If one of my kids catches me brewing tea, they usually ask, “May I have a cup, too?”

Planting Seeds of Kindness

July 17, 2025 By Maria

Now that summer is here, all three kids are home and unfortunately, they are not getting along as well as we would like. We have had many talks about kindness and treating others as you wished to be treated, and so on. Thankfully, we are starting to see a shift in behavior, even if there is a trying day now and then. One of our favorite ways to explain things to our kids is by relating their real-life experiences to stories. On a recent trip to the library my daughter and I found a couple good stories about kindness. We all enjoyed reading and discussing these books together at home. 

My daughter found a picture book we have read several times over the years. It is called If you Plant a Seed written by Kadir Nelson. We all read it once again and discussed how this simple story of a mouse and bunny and a group of birds relates to sharing and planting seeds of kindness instead of selfishness. The book gives a great visualization of how small acts of kindness can grow into bigger and larger results. Planting a seed of kindness as we all know goes much further than anger and unkindness. 

The other book about sharing and kindness and giving others a chance is Prunella by Beth Ferry. It was a book we hadn’t read yet. Illustrated by Claire Keane and published just last year, this book is about a little girl named Prunella who was born with a purple thumb and has a knack for growing unfriendly plants. She tries to share her plants with other kids, but the smells and prickliness deter them. Prunella slowly closes off and becomes pricklier like her plants until one day quite by accident she invites another child into her garden and new friendships start to bloom. On the side of learning about exploring your interests and passions, this book shows that it’s okay to be different and it demonstrates how kindness and sharing your passions are beautiful things.  

Relating life to books is a beautiful and fun way my husband and I have always explained things to our kids starting back when my oldest was a toddler. Discussing these stories amongst others is helping us work on behaviors this summer. (We even read The Hundred Dresses before the school year finished to talk about the sneaky way bullying behavior can worm its way into everyday interactions). The picture books here are great for younger kids, but in our experience, we found they also communicated with older children, including our twelve-year-old. It will take work, but we will keep talking and reading our way to a kinder summer.

Books of the Month – May

June 22, 2025 by Maria

 Just in case you missed anything, I put together a list of the books I wrote about in May. At the end of each month, I will write a list of all the books I wrote about during that month. The post titles will link back to the original blog posts. 

Mystery Books in the Attic  May 8, 2025 

  • The Boy Mechanic: Popular Mechanic Press
  • Webster Dictionary

Is Your Mama a Llama?  May 12, 2025

Boxes of Adventure  May 26, 2025

  • Box by Min Flyte

Boxes of Adventure

May 26, 2025 By Maria

What is the box? Is it a device for carrying something? Is it a way to transport something through the mail? Is it used for storage? Treasure? Trash? Maybe you think it belongs in the recycling bin. But my question is, what do your kids think a box is? Well, in our house whenever we get a box from a purchase or in the mail, my kids have plans for it. They are always trying to get their hands on new boxes. Sometimes, I even hide new ones in the basement because I know I can’t handle another new box creation in the house. My kids once used an oversized box to make a “duplicator” and a “transmogrifier” like Calvin does in the Calvin and Hobbes comics. They had blasts of fun with that box and their imagination. 

The books here are all about kids and their boxes and how imagination leads them to find new and creative uses for their boxes. Our favorite book here is probably Christina Katerina and the Box by Patricia Lee Gauch. We love the interactions between Christina Katerina and her neighbor and all the creative things that they do with their gigantic box. It starts as a club house and ends as the dance floor at a grand party. Meanwhile, Christina’s mother continually attempts to get her to relinquish the box to the trash bin.

My kids really enjoy Not a Box by Antoinette Portis. This book is similar to another book my kids also enjoy by the same author called Not a Stick. In Not a Box, a bunny plays with a box – sitting in it, standing on it, even squirting it with water. While an off-page voice, presumably an adult asks, “Why are you sitting in that box?” “Why are you standing on that box?” To which the bunny always responds with a version of “It’s not a box” and illustrations showing what the bunny is imagining with the box. 

What to Do with a Box by Jane Yolen goes through all the various imaginative uses of a box with detailed and fun illustrations by Chris Sheban. One thing all these box books do is really make me wish I could play with the box. We have some great memories of our kids playing with boxes over the years. During the pandemic, we had large, long boxes from furniture that we bought. We used the huge sheets of cardboard to create a cardboard castle in our living room with a working drawbridge. The kids had so much fun with the cardboard castle. They were very sad when it finally came time to remove it from the living room and send it off to the recycling center. 

Also, when we bought a scooter several years ago, my daughter turned the narrow box into a train, and she would sit in the box and ask my husband to take her back and forth to different destinations in the house. She would also pass the “ticket” through a small hole in the side of the box. She was tiny and light enough to carry it like that, but it was still tiring work for him. The smiles on both their faces after train rides were the best. 

Smiles always came to my kids’ faces when we read Box by Min Flyte. It is a lift-the-flap book about kids discovering what’s in their box and what they can do with said box. The artwork by Rosalind Beardshaw and flaps make this very fun to read. This is especially fun to read with small children. My kids all loved to lift the flaps when we read this book when they were tiny. What kid doesn’t love a lift-the-flap book? I have several destroyed ones as proof of it.

I know kids playing with boxes all around the house is annoying and it is clutter. Not just small easy to clean up clutter, like a pile of toys, but big obstructive clutter. However, dealing with the annoyance and letting them have that imaginative play really pays off. They make great memories and have awesome stories to share. My kids still talk with a happy wistfulness about the cardboard castle five years later and Kristian Catherina is still one of their favorite books. Maybe it will begin with a delivery and end in a spaceship, have fun with some boxes!

Is your Mama a Llama?

May 12, 2025 By Maria

Mother’s Day was yesterday, so I figured it’s a good time to write about some of our favorite mother themed picture books. I never have high expectations for Mother’s Day. For me it is still more a day for my mom and grandmas (when they were around). The focus is still on my husband’s mother and my mother and my kid’s last living great grandmother. I am so grateful that they have been able to know three of their great grandmothers. I never met any of my great grandmothers, but I wish I did. I haven’t sat down to read mom themed books for Mother’s Day in a while, but here are a few of our favorites from over the years. 

A well known favorite is of course Are you my Mother? By P.D. Eastman. Does this old book even need an introduction? It was published in June of 1960 and is still widely read. My kids always love how the baby bird is asking so many wrong animals and things if they are his mother. The bird’s questions get sillier and more ridiculous as the story progresses. The relief between mother and baby bird is beautiful at the end of the story even if we know it’s coming every time we read this classic.

When he was little, I used to read my oldest son Is Your Mama a Llama? By Deborah Guarino all the time. It is a delightful rhyming book about a llama asking all his animal friends about their mothers. I used to read this book over and over to my oldest son when he was small. He loved Is Your Mama a Llama? I don’t know if it was the rhyming or the silliness, but he loved reading this book. He was also with me constantly at that time of his life. This book is so silly and sweet. I loved reading this it and quoting it to my son. Steven Kellogg’s illustrations were also nostalgic and fun for me. It’s a little different with your first child. You have more time and the ability to focus just on them, at least until they have siblings. Your attention gets stretched after that, but it’s not a bad thing either. 

On Mother’s Lap by Ann Herbert Scott and illustrated by Glo Coalson is a book about siblings learning to share time with their mother. Ha, does this book feel true! My younger son and daughter often fight over and occasionally share sitting on my lap. The bigger they get the more I get crushed. The little boy, Michael, in this book definitely makes me think of my son, especially when Michael has to bring a blanket and a toy and a puppy all to cuddle on mother’s lap. My son has carried around his blanket since he could walk. He also doesn’t always want to share me with his little sister. I used to be able to easily hold them both on my lap (actually, I even carried them together all the time when they were smaller). Now that they are getting so big it’s hard to even hold them both on my lap at once, at least without testing my endurance of being squished. 

A beautiful book about testing the boundaries of a parent’s unconditional love is Mama, Do You Love Me? By Barbara M. Joose and illustrated by Barabra Lavallee (we also love another book illustrated by Lavallee). I love this book! When my kids and I are upset or having disagreements, I often pull this off the shelf to read aloud. It is a sweet reminder that yes, your parents will always love you, even when they get mad and even when you’re naughty. I like how the little girl in the story attempts to push her mother further and further to see how far she can go and still have her mother’s love. It shows her confidence in their relationship and the comfort between them. 

The comfort between siblings and the confidence they have in their mother is easily demonstrated in Owl Babies by Martin Waddell. This book is beautifully illustrated by Patrick Benson and tells about three little owls longing for and waiting for their mother to return home. The mother owl is only present for a small section of the book. We always love little owlet Bill’s refrain: “I want my mummy!” said Bill. This book is fun to read out loud and do different voices for the three owl babies (that is if you have fun doing voices when reading aloud). It is also a good starting point to remind little ones that even if mom or dad aren’t with them all the time, they will always come back. 

This Mother’s Day I didn’t actually see my mom because she’s away on a trip. I had a nice visit with her earlier in the week and gave her her card and gift then. We saw my mother-in-law and her mother the day before, so this Mother’s Day was just my family and I having a slow and pleasant morning and afternoon. It was different, but really nice and my daughter and I even sat down to read one of the books from this list together. I am happy we had some read aloud time this Mother’s Day.