Even 4 year old Princess has many parts of Skippyjon Jones, our current favorite book, memorized. We have so much fun reading this book! Rhianna received it from my aunt and uncle for Christmas and we instantly fell in love with the little rascal. Skippyjon Jones (AKA, Mr. Fluffernutter, AKA, Mr. Cocopugs) is banished to his room for pretending to be a bird. He starts jumping on his bed when he catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror, and sings out in a muy loud voice, "My ears are to beeeeg for my head. My head eez to beeeeg for my body. I am NOT a Siamese Cat, I am a Cheeehuahua!" Must be read in a thick accent. He disappears into his closet and finds himself in the desert with a band of Chihuahuas who are sad because the BumbleBeeto Bandito has stolen all their frijoles. It is muy sad. It is quite the adventure.
If you have children who are reluctant readers, (And I mean children of ALL ages. ALL of my kids, from my 4 year old up to my 11 1/2 year old LOVE this book.) or if you do not particularly enjoy reading aloud to your kids, I recommend this book. There are others in the series, but we haven't read them yet. I have listed the website below. I just found it today when researching for this post. It looks like a lot of fun.
http://www.skippyjonjones.com/
Another recent favorite is Five Little Monkeys jumping on the bed by Eileen Christelow. This one is fun for predicting because of the surprise at the end. It is also quite repetitive for those early readers. Another favorite by this author is Five Little Monkeys sitting in a tree, "Tease Mr. Crocodile, 'Can't catch me.'" Also repetitive and a fun surprise.
http://www.christelow.com
Ten Gallon Bart Beats the Heat is a blast to read. The characters are adorable and it's fun reading with different drawls. Wild Bill Hiccup and Wyatt Burp are the deputy pigs. How cute is that? When we first fell in love with this book, two summers ago, we borrowed it from the library and basically read it all summer. When we borrowed the original Ten Gallon Bart book that same year we were a little disappointed. It just didn't compare to Beats the Heat. But last week we tried it again and we are loving it. I would recommend reading the original first. Yesterday, Daniel, Brendan, and Rhianna were gathered around me on one side of the couch. Ashton (Mr. 11 1/2 year old) who was on the other end reading one of his Diary of a Wimpy Kid books, ignored us until he could no longer resist the call of the drawl, then he came over and joined us for the rest of the book. There is also Ten Gallon Bart and the wild west show. We have not read that one yet.
I cannot seem to get the image uploaded, but below is a link to the author's web page.
Those are our top three favorite books. At least this week.
