Birthdays Books

My 17 year old daughter has collected the entire set of Michael P. Waite's Building Christian Character books in the last year. She is preparing to be an elementary educator and finds these books engaging for the younger crowd. The characters are silly, but tackle issues kids really face and come up with great solutions. Practical lessons, yet not overly preachy.

This book helps children see the diversity of animals and how wonderful things can start just by one person. The pictures are very friendly and help explain the story.I was very impressed to see a story made just for fun.

This was shipped promptly and packed well. This is a wonderful birthday gift for anyone!

The Mom's Choice Awards® honors excellence in family-friendly media, products and services. An esteemed panel of judges includes education, media and other experts as well as parents, children, librarians, performing artists, producers, medical and business professionals, authors, scientists and others. A sampling of the panel members includes: Dr. Twila C. Liggett, Ten-time Emmy-winner, professor and founder of Reading Rainbow; Julie Aigner-Clark, Creator of Baby Einstein and The Safe Side Project; Jodee Blanco, New York Times Best-Selling Author; LeAnn Thieman, Motivational speaker and coauthor of seven Chicken Soup For The Soul books; Florrie Binford-Kichler, Founder of Patria Press, Inc.- an award-winning independent publisher and Member of The Children's Book Council; Tara Paterson, Certified Parent Coach, and founder of The Just For Mom Foundation(tm) and the Mom's Choice Awards®. Parents and educators look for the Mom's Choice Awards® seal in selecting quality materials and products for children and families. This book has been honored by this distinguished award.

As a kindergarten teacher, I discovered this book to use in my math lesson for teaching the concept of "half". Every time I use this book, the children have a good understanding of what "half" is by the time the reading is finished. A great story with a cozy family and a great teaching tool!

Here is a classic album from 1977 featuring some of your favorite characters. Highlights on this album include the title song, "A Little Bit Bigger", "When Will My Birthday Come?", and Cookie Monster's immortal, "Put a Cookie In My Mouth". You will find yourself playing this even when nobody is celebrating a birthday!

My 2 year old received a copy of this for her birthday. SheLOVES it! It captures all the fun of her Birthday party with a spotfor a picture too! I must really like this I've ordered 7 to give as gifts:)

I used to borrow this book/tape ALL the time when I was younger. I highly suggest it for anyone who wants to hear a catchy tune!

I have read several different Charlie Brown milestone books and this has got to be the best! I hated to put it down once I got started. It shows how Charles Schultz got started and the evolution of the Peanuts gang. This is a must read for any Charlie Brown fan.

Happy Birthday Coco by Oneones is a picture book about a year in the life of Coco, who turns one at the start of the story. Coco is a small dog. We never see her human companions, but they clearly value Coco's presence in their lives.

This book is a gorgeous production with few words, thick pages, and soft colors. It includes occasional sheer overlay pages to add visual interest and complexity. For example, a translucent page with a faint net pattern overlays a picture of Coco playing with a tennis ball. A page showing the cage that Coco came home in has shiny reflective bars, like very narrow mirrors. Another page includes a cut-out of a word that can be read backwards or forwards. It's like the author is playing with the medium of picture book, just as Coco plays with balls.

The author is a graphic artist, and the book is more a visual delight than a narrative story. Coco's year passes as a series of incidents. She makes a friend, gets into trouble, loses her friend, plays in the snow, and goes for walks. The illustrations frequently reflect the mood of what's going on with Coco. For instance, there's an incident where Coco is yelled for misbehaving.

"Usually Coco likes to go for walks. After shouting, though, she just sits and looks."

The background is gray here,like a fog, and we can see clearly that Coco is sad. Coco is also sad when her friend goes away (presumably dying, though this is left vague). It's surprisingly profound for a picture book with so few words.

Overall, I found this to be an excellent, quiet sort of book. Happy Birthday Coco is well-presented, with subtle but meaningful messages about friendship and loss, and getting into trouble but still being loved. The book concludes "Coco will have many more sweet dreams, and many more friends, and many more happy birthdays." I certainly hope so.

This book review was originally published on my blog, Jen Robinson's Book Page, on November 10, 2006.