Where's Arthur Gerbil?

Good thing I don't have a filthy mind cause I'd probably think of a few places where Arthur's gerbil could be hiding.

This is a little flap book depicting Arthur's hunt for his elusive gerbil. You go from his stinky socks in his bedroom to finally the kitchen where you find the gerbil in Arthur's lunch box. I have no idea why children's authors always depict animals rolling around in people's food but they really need to stop.

Layne really likes flap books and we've watched Arthur a few times. He actually spent about 10 minutes flipping through it in the car so it's a good book despite the rodent in lunch box issue.

Carlene gave us this book along with many, many others. :)

The Clown Arounds Go on Vacation

This is another book from Carlene and it has become the book of the moment. Layne has asked for it every night for weeks now.

It's a silly story. The Clown Around family decides to go on vacation and get an invitation from Uncle Waldo to visit him in his new house. They fuel up the mouse car with cheese, which is cute, and head out. There are lots of wrong turns and for awhile they end up in the Arctic but eventually make it to Uncle Waldo's.

Dragon in the Wood

Another one from Carlene but Layne wasn't so interested. Mommy liked it though.

One day a dopey little dragon enters the wood and begins to sing. He sings so badly that all the other woodland creatures pop up to tell him to stop. (I really wanted him to breathe some fire on the critics but that probably wouldn't make it a children's book.) The bees instead teach him to hum and he is then accepted by the woodland community. Again, I would have preferred fiery destruction to peaceful acceptance.

Clifford's Valentines

Clifford confuses me but Layne likes him. We picked this up after Valentine's Day.

Clifford wants to make a valentine for everyone on Birdwell Island. All the residents give him presents which I guess are just gestures to keep him appeased. If I lived on a small island with a 20 foot dog, I'd be sure to give him presents too. But not too many to make him feel welcome - you don't want him doing his business in your backyard. In retaliation to all the gifts, Clifford draws a humongous heart in the snow. Aww.

The Book of Me

I'll have to scan the cover in at some point. This was very 70's ish and Mommy enjoyed that.

It's all about me; head, toes, feet, etc. Very cute and very 70's. All I have is that it was published by Hallmark.

Layne like the little ladybugs on the little 70's kids toes.

Happy Birthday to You

I may have said previously that we heart Dr. Seuss. It's still true.

I don't think I ever read this one growing up.

It's all about what happens on your birthday. It's all very magical and wonderful as usual - hot dogs, camels, cakes, presents, and parties. But the repeated chorus is, "If you'd never been born, well what would you do? . . . be? Why, you might be a WASN'T". You're special for being born and you're special because you are you.

The ending got me a little teary, "And I wish I could do all these great things for you!" (The reader most likely being a parent saying they would lavish their child on their birthday if they could.)

Layne was interested in the pictures but didn't get the deeper meaning. Guess who's getting this read to him on every birthday for the rest of his childhood.

Curious George Takes a Job

Or How Curious George Got High on Ether.

We meet George again who's now bored of zoo life and his absentee owner, The Man with the Yellow Hat. George leaves the zoo and explores the city. He ends up in a kitchen infecting the food with god knows what. (Was he quarantined when he was brought into country? This is Outbreak all over again.) The cook puts George to work washing dishes instead of calling animal control. When that doesn't work out, he's sent to the elevator man to wash windows. George does a decent job of that until he looks into one apartment and finds painters leaving for lunch. George enters the apartment and by the time the painters have returned, he's painted a kick ass mural of his jungle home on the walls and furniture. A chase ensues which leads to George falling 20 feet to the sidewalk and breaking his leg.

This first part is pure hi-jinxs but now we enter the problem area. George is taken to a people hospital and admitted. He's fixed up and then left ALONE with a room full of drugs. George being curious and all gets high on ether.

At point in time was it funny for kids book characters to abuse drugs?

Eventually TMITYH shows up and collects George. Could someone for the love of god call Animal Precinct?!

Love Is...

I would just like to say I freaking hate Precious Moments. Yet we have one of their books.

This book is sweet and simple and incredibly unrealistic. Yes, I know, kids books are like that. I really did want to vomit after reading it. The only redeeming quality is that it didn't use the g word.

The real answer - love is filling your friend's ex husbands apartment with praying mantis eggs.

A Bug, a Bear, and a Boy Go for a Ride

This is a book about cooperation.

The boy and the bug cannot move the wagon holding the bear. After several attempts they finally get the right idea and all ride down a hill together.

Layne was mildly entertained.

Skating on Thin Ice

Joe and Rosie the elephants love to ice skate together. One day Joe meets Flo another elephant and he ditches Rosie to skate with Flo. Apparently Flo is a wee bit heavier than Rosie causing the ice to break under Joe. But Rosie is there to rescue Joe and he learns not to stray.

I think there are several morals to this story. Cheating will kill you. Rosie is a doormat. And elephants should really not ice skate.

Cookie's Guessing Game About Food

Layne's favorite Sesame Street character is Cookie Monster. Elmo is a close second but my son is no sheep. He even made his own sign for Cookie.

So this month Target had Sesame Street books in the Dollar Isle. Guess who was bent over on the floor digging through the bins. Our prized find was this Cookie Monster book.

Ok, Cookie may have an eating disorder. In this little book you have to guess which food Cookie is describing. The last food he describes is of course, cookies! He does go through pizza, bananas, and milk so he's sort of balanced.

Layne isn't really interested in descriptions of food since they are still foreign but he liked Mommy's cookie voice.

Barnyard Dance

You can dance if you want to...

Yay, we have another Sandra Boynton book. Yes, the animals are cute and the rhymes are adorable but Layne and I don't get why people rave about her books. If we want rhymes we pull out the Dr. Seuss Bible. So overall, we give it an "eh".

Let's Find the Colors

This is Layne's second most favorite book.

Little Donald, Daisy, and Pluto are out for a picnic. Each page asks you to find a color. Layne likes the little bugs that are often hidden.

The colors are rich enough and its a good hunt and find activity for Layne.

Teddy's Toy Box

Board book number 17 of the year.

This is mostly pictures. Teddy's is cleaning out his toy box and we have to count how much stuff he has. Damn capitalist Teddy. You start off counting toys and then it gets a little weak at the end. I don't think counting markers and crayons is really an exciting way to reach 20.

Wormy Worm

There's really not much too this one. It's cute and shot and worm centric. Layne wasn't too into it. Just a lot of pictures of worm butts and heads.

Mr. Happy

This was disturbing. Based on the reviews on Amazon, I'm all alone here.

Mr. Happy, who's obviously on something, goes for a walk and finds a door in the woods. He goes through and runs into Mr. Miserable. Mr. Miserable is everyone who's ever lived and loved and lost. Mr. Happy however has to "cure" him and takes Mr. Miserable back to "Happyland". It takes some time but eventually Mr. Miserable finally becomes brainwashed and he becomes happy...just like everyone else.

I took this as statement that we should live, feel, and react in the exact same way as everyone else. And if we don't, there's something wrong with us.

Fight the power.

It's Tigger Time

This has been Layne's favorite book for about a year now. It's a Pooh book firstly and the pages flip out to view what the other characters are doing.

Tigger visits all the characters in the Hundred Acre Wood and you follow along to see what everyone is up to. Mostly the same personality disorders for each character. But you do get to see Roo take a bath which Layne loved. We're big into comparing other people to ourselves right now.

ABC Bunny

Yet another board book.

This one tells the very short story of Little Bunny who goes to the zoo with his grandmother. The find animals and items in the zoo for each letter of the alphabet.

It was pretty white bread as far as the animals went. No aardvarks or even baboons.

Kitty Love

This is a little board book we found in the Target Dollar isle. It's roughly 5 pages and features kitties in obscenely cute poses. We were fond of the kitty pile picture.

We meowed, we used our sweet voices and we petted the one dimensional pictures.

The Foot Book

We heart Dr. Seuss.

For the life of me, I don't remember where this came from. I think it came from my brother in his attempt to replace all the Dr. Seuss books my cousins removed from my mother's apartment after she passed. I'm supposed to have let that go.

The foot book is all about....feet. And we do like feet. If there was only a butt book, we'd be in heaven. This Dr. Seuss had an especially appealing rhythm and Layne tried to read along. It was very cute. :) He liked the pig feet best of all.

Sleepytime Farm

Another little board book. It's short and sweet - around 4 pages. You can move the beads on top to correspond with the characters in the story. I think we found this at Goodwill for a dollar. It retails for $8. That's a rip off.

Layne liked it. He's liked every $8 beaded book like this. Maybe if the book was reasonably priced we'd recommend it.

Big and Little

This is a cute little board book that we got at the Doctor's office last year. Layne was mildly amused at the pictures when I read it to him but I caught him a few times looking through it by himself. His favorite picture is the big boat and the little boat. Its only about 7 pages long so it's a quick read.

My First Book of Animals

Ok, this isn't technically a book. But I love anything that Melissa and Doug makes. Layne almost loves this book as much as I do. :)

This is 8 pages of animal magnets. There are four categories of animals: zoo, farm, dinosaurs, and pets. The magnets are durable and brightly coloured. It takes a little effort to free the magnets from the pages but Layne has no problem with them.

The Three Sillies

The Three Sillies tells the story of a family of idiots.

A farmer and his wife are visited upon by a gentleman who wants to court their daughter. One night at dinner, the daughter goes to the cellar to draw some cider and has a vision of her future son's death: mallet hanging above the tap hits junior on the head and kills him. Pretty soon mom and dad find her sobbing at the tab and begin their own mourning once daughter tells them of her vision. The gentleman finds them all weeping in the cellar now filled with cider and is inspired to go on a quest to find three sillier people than these.

He finds a woman who's killed by a falling cow, a boy who can't put his pants on, and an entire town who attempts to rescue the moon from their pond. With his deed done, he returns to the farmer and his clan to immediately marry the daughter. The mallet eventually does get its day however but they live happily ever after.

Layne was mildly interested in the story. The pictures are silly and are sort of in a comic book form. The language is silly as well with the use of "a" in front of many of the verbs: a-courting and a-crying.

A Bear Lived in a Cave

This short little story tells the story of a bear living in a cave. He's antisocial and won't let anyone else come into his home until...the mouse who's lives there as well comes home. Layne liked it. It's short and cute. He recognized most of the animal visitors as well.

The Cat in the Hat

The Cat in the Hat is quite possibly the greatest story, ever.

Mom leaves kids alone. Enter the cat who uses every means possible to entertain the kids and irritate the fish. The fish is the only character with any sense but he's quite the bore.

Layne is the fish right now so he enjoyed the story. Everyone is naughty and must be yelled at.

Oh, and we ignore every theatrical release of any Dr. Seuss story. There's a special place in hell where Mike Myers will burn.

The Bear Who Didn't Like Honey

This story is all about overcoming fears, making excuses, self esteem, and dealing with your abusive siblings.

Little Bear is afraid of many things and has to use excuses like "I'm not hungry" or "I'm not tired" to escape the insults of his siblings. One day he saves a little cub all by himself. The cub' s mother praises Little Bear. Her words of wisdom, "You did your best even though you were afraid, and that makes you a very brave bear." Little Bear goes home to eat the honey he rejected and possibly slaughter the other cubs that berated him.

It was a little long for Layne, who's just now surpassed board books. Mommy liked it though. It was a sweet story with a good message.

Bedtime for Baby Bop

This little board book goes through Baby Bop's bedtime routine. It was very helpful to start Layne's own bedtime routine. "See, Baby Bop is putting on her jammies and brushing her teeth, maybe we should to that too."

Layne does like his Barney. Really, Barney is fine without the kids. If they could ditch the so called child actors, we'd watch the show more often.

Snow Family

This is the most adorable story.

A little gang of snow boys is running amok; losing their hats and noses and throwing snowballs at bears. Each of the boys is uniquely dressed. My favorite is the snow boy wearing the fez. How cute is that! The snow boys meet an actual boy who takes it upon himself to create snow parents for the little delinquents. Now mom and dad keep everyone dressed and stop the snow ball throwing.

Layne loves this book but he could care less about the story. He loves the illustrations of the snowmen/women/boys. Right now, he's in love with snowmen and its a shame or a relief that we've had enough snow to make one.

Sir Dwight the Knight

Clifford Follows His Nose

This was originally a scratch and sniff book where you could smell all the places where Clifford had been. Sounds lovely, right? Unfortunately the smell had all be scratch off of our copy.

This takes place when Clifford was still small and Emily Elizabeth, the great pet owner that she is, loses Clifford after ordering a pizza. We follow Clifford from the pizza parlor to the bakery to the florist and finally home. (Our copy was missing a few pages so how Clifford gets home is still a mystery.)

Layne liked it. Clifford was bad and Layne's into telling people they're bad... so he got a lot out of the book. I was mildly disturbed that Clifford rolled around in food at public eateries and no one seemed to be that upset with him. Apparently they have lenient health codes where ever Clifford lived.

If I Ran the Zoo

My brother also bought Layne a Dr. Seuss collection for Easter. We read If I Ran the Zoo.

This was written in 1950 and it shows. Some of the helpers Gerald would employ to capture the animals for his phenomenal zoo are not PC; Namely the tribal Africans and Asians and even the little Russians. They're all stereotypical and reminiscent of a less enlightened time.

But...the rhymes are sweet and Layne loved the Iota with its blue hair. This would probably be a good book to bring up when he's older to show him what racism looks like.

I can't say it’s bad. It’s still Dr. Seuss. It’s like my grandmother who still used racial slurs until her dieing day. You hate it but you still are obligated to love it.

One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish

The first Dr. Seuss book of the year. Keith gave Layne this book on Election Day last year.

Layne loves Dr. Seuss. I love Dr. Seuss. How can you not love Dr. Seuss?

Layne loved the rhymes and his favorite section was the man with 11 fingers. He counted along and said what sounded like 5. I know he can definitely count to at least 11 now and he's said his second number. Yay, Dr. Seuss!

Buzz off. I'm busy.

Oh, how Layne loves this book. My Aunt Teresa gave it to him on his birthday last year.

He loves the pop up pictures and grew angry that he couldn't play with the little bugs while they were attached to the book. He has ripped each and every pop up bug out. This was his first adventure with destruction and my first lesson on not leaving him alone with books. I finally gave in and let him finish ripping them out this weekend. I don't think the book can be salvaged. Maybe I can tape the bugs up and he can play with them.

Moo, Baa, La La La

This whimsical little board book is supposed to be a great book for toddlers. Layne disagrees. Maybe he's just out grown the baby/toddler books. He does know all the animal sounds and the illustrations really didn't enthrall him even if the pigs wore pants.

If it was made of paper, he would have torn it to shreds. Thankful its not and it is one book that I can leave him alone with even if it does insult his intelligence.

Curious George

My brother bought Layne this collection last year for Easter. We read the first story entitled Curious George.

Layne was pretty much bored for most of the story so I had to resort to funny voices.

This first story tells how the Man in the Yellow Hat abducts George and smuggles him back to the U.S. He sedates George once their on board his ship by giving him wine and a pipe. This may or may not have lead to George's near drowning. Once back in civilization, the Man in the Yellow Hat disappears leaving George alone in his house. Of course mistakes are made and the poor little monkey is sent to prison for prank calling the fire station and escapes to the "freedom" of the zoo by stealing balloons.

I never read these stories when I was young. My brother remembered them quite fondly so he bought Layne the collection. I'd have to say these are quite disturbing little stories.

Good Zap, Little Grog

Layne loved, loved, loved, this book. He made me read it through twice, which never happens, and he asked for a third but it was time for zap.

I thought it was about a little caveman boy but apparently he's an alien. I guess that would explain the multiple moons. Anyway the water colour pictures are wonderful. There are 3 little poems describing Grog's day ending with Good Zap. It's a sweet little book.

A Children's Book About Being Destructive

Being Destructive is one of many in a series of books focusing on controlling children. The book, resembling a power point presentation features a young boy and his cat who are hell bent on destroying anything and everything. The book lists the consequences and appropriate punishments for the offense of being destructive but doesn't even cut you any slack for accidents.

Layne was thoroughly bored and threw the book across the room. The message of obey or else was lost on him.

Three Favorite Tales

This gem was published in 1975 and features the stories of:

The Bremen Town Musicians - Mickey, Donald and Goofy are mediocre musicians who prey upon innocent travelers.

The Little Red Hen - The Little Red Hen makes some bread and won't share with Donald's lazy, illegitimate nephews: Huey, Duey, and Luey.

The Princess and the Pea - Prince Mickey's high standards keep Princess Minnie up all night.

Layne liked the condensed stories especially the Bremen Musicians. The retro pictures enthralled him and he had to rip multiple pages out while Mommy was out of the room.