Category Archives: Childrens

I have been picking up various Little Golden Books for my grandchildren. I’ve been impressed with the wide range of books available compared to the number of titles I had for my kids.

I’m also a fan of artist Joey Chou and have a number of his other children’s books, so I was very pleased to find this new book by Mallory C. Loehr with his illustrations.

I picked this book up for my granddaughter who is just two years old. While she is used to board books, I wanted something to transition her to paper books. This was the perfect book for that purpose.

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I was happy to find that Little Golden Book had introductory books about both Abraham Lincoln and George Washington. I picked these up for my grandchildren to read when they are at my house. While the books are by different authors, they have the same illustrator and a similar feel to how the stories are told.

My grandson, at 4 years old, is able to follow along with the story about President Lincoln. His sister, who is two years old, enjoys the illustrations and a shorter, verbal story.

The book starts with Abraham Lincoln as a boy, his family life and how he improved his lot in life with self-education and hard, honest work. The story continues through his election, fight against slavery and the Civil War. It ends as the war ends and does not mention the manner of his death (which might be distressing for the age group this is aimed at.)

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This is a lovely book to have for the holidays. While it is intended for toddlers and young children (my grandkids are 2 and 4 years old respectively), it is also a fun way to display a cute Nativity no matter what your age is. Along with the nativity, there are several pages of activities and songs at the back of the book to help bring the Christmas story to life for kids.

The only problem I ran into was with the both the palm trees and the various people with feet. It took a little bit of effort to make the feet level one to the other for the people to stand straight and not topple over easily. The palm trees were a bit difficult to get to stand without falling over. In the end, I tilted them slightly backwards and that seemed to work. Both getting these to stand and pushing the pieces out are probably better left to an adult or older child as both take a delicate touch (even with a bit of care, I still managed to tear a slight bit of the design off of one of the bull’s legs.

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This is a cute and fun and jolly Christmas book of ornaments to have for the holidays. While it is intended for toddlers and young children (my grandkids are 2 and 4 years old respectively), it is also a fun way to add a little jolly Christmas ornaments to display regardless of your age.

The ornaments include: angel, star, Santa, several snowflakes, reindeer, snowman, several ornaments (including a bell shape), a Christmas tree and two hearts, gingerbread girl and boy, and two candy canes. There are also pages of Christmas activities and songs to enjoy throughout the season.

I bought this book thinking that the items would be able to stand on their own but they are really ornaments as only the tree, the reindeer and a star can really stand. All of the items have hole punches at the appropriate spot, so you can add string or thin ribbon to hang them. I don’t have a tree this year (I’m recovering from a severe pneumonia with 24/7 oxygen while I recover so a dusty real or artificial tree is a big no-no for me.) I thought I could display this set with the grandkids helping put them together. The tree does stand and will sit on my foyer table with the reindeer and star with a few other Christmas items – so it is my Christmas tree this year! By next year, I will be able to use the rest of the ornaments as intended.

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I was happy to find that Little Golden Book had introductory books about both George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. I picked these up for my grandchildren to read when they are at my house.

While my granddaughter is too young (at 2) to sit through the entire reading, my grandson (who is 4) enjoyed hearing the story. Both children liked the illustrations.

The book starts with George Washington as a boy, then on to his days in the English military, to the War of Independence, to his days as President and then finally to his retirement (back to the hobbies he enjoyed as a young boy.)

There are also some interesting facts listed in the back of the book. All together, I find it a great introductory book about the first President of the United States.

“Little Blue Truck’s Halloween” is a great addition to the series and a wonderful come back from last year’s disappointing “Little Blue Truck’s Beep-Along Book”. In the new book, the author Alice Schertle’s great rhymes are back and the illustrations by Jill McElmurry are cute and fun once again.

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This is the third and last book in the “Bogler” series by Catherine Jinks. I enjoyed both the first and second books just as well as this one and I recommend reading them in order to get the most out of the series. The book picks up shortly after the events of the second book in the series. The series concludes in a really interesting and satisfying manner and one that I was not expecting.

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This is a fun tale about a slave boy who finds out that he is much more than what Fate has decreed for his life. The boy, who is nameless throughout much of the book, is sent on a trip with his master’s son – not really much more than as a pack mule. As it happens, it turns out to be a momentous trip and one that sets the boy on a quest to find out his true identity.

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I am always looking for new board books for my young grandchildren. This is a lovely addition to our collection. The illustrations are so well drawn, I thought they might have been photographs. The poem of the book is in a lovely type of sing-song melody as I read it out loud. I am reading it just before nap time and we talk a little about the different animals.

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“Curiosity House – The Shrunken Head” is the beginning of a new series by Lauren Oliver and H.C. Chester. In the story, four children with unusual talents try to solve an ever increasing number of murders and other crimes. The kids, who live at The Dumfrey’s Dime Museum of Freaks, Oddities, and Wonders, use their abilities in solving the the crimes. There are many red-herrings which add even more to the solution as you, as the reader, are pulled this way and that.

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