Hello Mr. Hulot!

Kindly direct your attention to Hello Mr. Hulot if you please.  This book is nearly wordless (I have a thing with wordless books...) and packed with witty action.  Monsieur Hulot was a French character created for movies in the mid 20th century by Jacques Tati.  He is something of an early Mr. Bean and has translated beautifully into picture book form by David Merveile.

The delight of this book lies in its very simple humor.  And adults and children alike should be able to appreciate that.  I suspect there's more to come and am eager to see them!  Look at these small vignettes:

Butterfly Bonanza: a Top Ten List

Yesterday, we just celebrated a butterfly-themed birthday with my 5 year old.  I never do birthday themes, but after my mother-in-law gave her a lovely butterfly dress and I purchased the excellent Live Butterfly Garden... we decided to go ahead and make a butterfly cake and call it a theme.

This of course led to me thinking about all my favorite butterfly books since the tail end of June is just when our weather starts to think about heating up a bit around here and fluttery creatures can finally be seen in earnest... so here's my vote of Top Ten Butterfly Books in no particular order:

A bright and colorful starter book. The novelty factor in turning different sized pages helps engage kids. I like the very basic ID primer to butterflies and the flowers they like in the back.

One of Kleven's newer books, this continues to offer her typical feast for the eyes with a sweet lost and found story about a glass-wing butterfly—(a real creature!).

A lovely, nostalgic memory put into picture book form

Studying the Middle Ages? Scientists?  This is an excellent, easy biographical story for very young readers on how our understanding of the natural world has changed for the better, partially through the work of Maria Merian.

An exquisite photographic journey through the alphabet that will awe young and old alike; one of my very favorite alphabet books.

Sublime illustrations... truly.

I love the size of this book.  It is a great mix of story and information Meilo So's art is really the standout.

One of the four gorgeous books that this author has made in this series; these are the ideal "strewing" books.

Not a lot of older Jack Kent books are still in print, much to the dismay of his cult followers.  But this one is!  It's a silly, simple story of a smug caterpillar changing into a butterfly much to the confused amazement of a polliwog who does some changing himself.

I would hope that this one is a given... I prefer it in board book myself.  

And these are the titles of a few more books I've just requested from the library to check out; butterflies are a prolific genre of bug!

Gotta Go! Gotta Go!
Butterfly Butterfly: A Book of Colors
Wings of Light: The Migration of the Yellow Butterfly  (update: very nice book following the tale of migration)

Do Bookshelves Make Bookworms?

In my experience, yes.  Books are always there, easily accessible and if the parent is savvy in selecting delicious titles and strewing them about... how can a child NOT become a reader?  Investing in (good) books then, pays a high return on dividends.   Here is a(nother) study proving this point.

"...growing up in a home where there are books on show is far more important than having educated parents. Growing up in a home with a 500-book library propels a child 3.2 years further in education, on average."

Celebrating Gyo

Gyo Fujikawa is recognized for being the first mainstream illustrator to show children of many different races in her books. She does so in a beautiful, natural way—not a "trying-to-be-politically-correct" way.  Gyo was an author/illustrator that I never fully appreciated until I had my daughter.  As an adult, I'm captivated by both the beauty of pictures and the storyline; my boys are too.  But Gyo's books dwell happily in the beautiful world with just a quirky amount of prose. Her books are perfect "looking books."  And they lend themselves well to children finding and identifying themselves (and siblings... and every friend they have... ahem) with someone on the page.  This is especially important for my four year old who squeals in delight at the abundance of red-heads in her books. (She especially sees herself as the messy-haired girl holding a brush with a sassy look in Are You My Friend Today?)  Then she yells "There's Henry, holding a dog!" and "Here's Leo making cookies!" And people of all age regress into babies in her favorite title: Ten Little Babies.

I for one just enjoy the art: such detailed, vintage imagery (and for the record, my favorite title of hers is Oh, What a Busy Day) ...