Favorite Books for Kids

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A few of you have asked for some good book recommendations for kids, and since we do a whole lot of reading around here, especially during the winter months, I thought I would share a few of our current favorites.

Baby Books:

Books for Preschoolers and Early Grade Schoolers:

Really, I could go on and on. Children’s books are some of my favorite things. Having kids just gives me a good excuse to read them! What are your top 3 children’s books?

18 thoughts on “Favorite Books for Kids”
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  1. Lots of good ones in there, Lauren!

    For the younger set, my top three are:

    Freight Train by Donald Crews — such a simple book, but it’s been a favorite of both kids.
    Cars and Trucks and Things That Go by Richard Scarry — no surprises here.
    Scuffy the Tugboat by Gertrude Crampton — such a sweet story.

    For my oldest:

    My Father’s Dragon by Ruth Stiles Gannett
    The original Raggedy Ann and Andy series by Johnny Gruelle — I wasn’t sure whether my son would be interested in these or not, but he loved them.
    The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum — I just pulled this from the free reading section on my Kindle and my son and I blew it. Who knew Dorothy’s magic slippers were silver and not ruby? Also, the tin man’s back story is a little macabre so use discretion.

  2. One of my favorite classes in college was a children’s literature class. I loved every minute of it. So this post is awesome.
    Picture books are the best! As toddlers, my kids loved the Gossie & Gertie books by Olivier Dunrea, Cowboy Small by Lois Lenski, and No David! by David Shannon.
    When they got older they loved Bad Kitty by Nick Bruel, Betty Bunny Loves Chocolate Cake by Michael B. Kaplan, and The Dirty Cowboy by Amy Timberlake.
    Sometimes I’ll still check out picture books for my oldest kids. Last year we read an picture book about a French Mosque that hid Jews from the Nazis during WWII. It was fascinating. We also read a picture book about how the author of Curious George escaped the Nazis.

  3. Edward the Emu, The Belly Button Book, and The Ugly Pumpkin are some of my favorites. I love rhythmic, rhyming books. It makes it so much more fun to read them over and over again.

  4. Sorry, but I have to add Hervé Tullet’s Press Here:

    http://www.amazon.com/Press-Here-Herve-Tullet/dp/0811879542/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1359052424&sr=8-1&keywords=herve+tullet

    It’s my go-to gift whenever my son is invited to a friend’s birthday party. Everyone gets a kick out of it, including adults.

    Also, I love that you included Farm Anatomy. My sister-in-law gave it to me as a gift, but the boys quickly claimed it for their own! The illustrations are so beautiful.

  5. We LOVE books — probably one of the few things I always say, ‘yes’ to purchasing. 🙂

    For Mina:
    The Giving Tree
    The Gardner (cry every time I read this!)
    We just finished…Matilda.

    For Harrison:
    Anything with trains!
    Anything Dr. Seuss
    Moo, Ba, lalala…nothing like hearing him say…a cow says: MOO… 🙂

  6. great list! for babies i love all of gyo fugikawa’s books. the illustrations are just too cute! another favorite is “i love you through and through”. and marianne loves any book with babies in it and i remember both my older kids enjoying the little house series. i’m having a total mind blank right now so that’s all i have to recommend 😀

  7. I need to mix up our books as we tend to read the same Dr Suess and Berernstain Bears books every day!

    Alice loves ‘Hand, Hand, Fingers, Thumb’ and ‘Mr Brown Can Moo…’ and, before every nap and before bedtime we read ‘The Book of Sleep.’ It gets tiresome but its part of her sleep ritual!

    I’m going to check on these baby books at our library. Thanks!

  8. Great picks, some that I’ve never seen! W loves ‘I want my hat back’, but I always feel bad for the bunny 🙂 The books I loved as a child were Blueberries For Sal, The Rainbow Goblins, and everything by Maurice Sendak. W loves anything with bugs or animals at the moment, but we really like everything by Nikki McClure. Right now we have ‘To Market To Market’ from the library and it amazes me that he’ll sit through these pages of intense information about grafting apple trees and planting kale… plus hearing him excitedly exclaim ‘kayawl’ whenever we pass a leafy green does my heart proud 🙂

  9. Great list! I am so partial to Frog and Toad 🙂 My husband and I like to force our favorites on our littles, so we read a lot of Richard Scarry around here, Maurice Sendak (especially In the Night Kitchen) and Gyo Fujikawa’s collections.

  10. Oh, Ruthie, I know! We definitely push our favorites too. Maurice Sendak and Roald Dahl are the top choices around here. I even have a Dora the Explorer book limit when we go to the library (they are allowed to choose ONE). Is that cruel???

  11. Great list! Thanks for posting. Our little one loves the illustrations of all of the animals and food so much in Rothman’s Farm Anatomy.

  12. Great lists! I’ll be referring to them when my daughter’s library suspension is up. (Mom-imposed for writing in library books. It was so embarrassing having to tell the librarians!).
    We love anything by Mo Williams, and now that my 4-year-old is taking an interest in reading the words, his Elephant and Piggie books are in heavy rotation. We also love Charlotte Jane Battles Bedtime, lots of Dr Suess and The Paper Bag Princess.
    I can’t stand Dora, so I limit those books, too!

  13. Well this topic is right up my alley! Here are some new favorites:
    Extra Yarn- Mac Barnett
    And Then It’s Spring- Julie Fogliano
    A Sick Day for Amos McGee- Erin and Philip Stead
    Bear Despair- Gaetan Doremus
    and an odd one that I personally love, Cecil the Pet Glacier- Matthea Harvey
    And oldies:
    anything by William Steig, any of the Frances and Gloria books (Hoban)
    Oren went through a Little Bear phase and Iris loves Knuffle Bunny.

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