What We’ve Been Reading & Watching
What We’ve Been Watching
Peg + Cat is an AMAZING show. It’s on PBS and has episodes on YouTube. I don’t like that the episodes on YouTube aren’t free, but there are free episodes on the PBS site, which has videos, games, and more. My daughter is too young to really play the games yet, but she loves watching the show. There are Peg + Cat books, but since we haven’t yet read those, I can’t vouch for them. I am adding them to my wishlist, though, and if they’re anything close to the same quality as the show, they’ll be great for my daughter.
The character Peg even makes a habit of counting down from five when she’s overwhelmed, and we’ve started referencing that when my daughter gets overwhelmed or cranky. Tried it for the first time at a restaurant tonight, and my daughter seemed to have an “aha” moment when I referenced the show and counted from five. We hummed the theme song afterwards, and all of that together was enough to snap her out of the cranky, overwhelmed state she was in.
What We’ve Been Reading
- 3 stars
We read this one awhile ago actually rather than recently. Each page has a brightly colored photo focusing on a single single and the word for the item. For example, “Shoes” and the image of shoes. My daughter liked looking through this when she was first learning to match words to items. There are a lot of books like this, and they’re great letting babies flip through. The images with other kids in them in particular may be of particular interest.
Bumble Bee by Margaret Wise Brown — 4 stars
The book is a single poem by Margaret Wise Brown, the author of the more recognized Goodnight Moon. The images were fascinating — the pictures were crafted from yarn and textiles, creating a fascinating aesthetic.
The Nose Book by Al Perkins — 2 stars
This was so much like Seuss’s The Eye Book but didn’t seem to capture Seuss’s creativity and joy. It was fine, but parts of it struck me as odd and seemed like Perkins was just trying to show as many noses as possible without showing their utility or how they can enrich our lives. Seuss demonstrates the amazing things that eyes, for example, let us see and engage with our world.
Whooo Loves You? by Sandra Magsamen — 3 stars
A book that encourages touching and interacting with flaps. It was cute but not great enough for me to want to add it to our own collection.
by Gene Zion — 4 stars
I love that my daughter is getting to the point of appreciating books with plot. It makes it much more enjoyable for me at least! This book was quite amusing, especially since we have a couple dogs and could imagine them getting into similar sorts of trouble as Harry.
