Pete the Cat: Old MacDonald Had a Farm by James Dean

Pete the Cat: Old MacDonald Had a Farm by James Dean

Rating: 3.5 stars

This book takes nearly five minutes to read.  I know that because I timed myself last night reading it.  With no kids around.  (After this review, feel free to join in a brief discussion about the state of my mental health…  Let me know if there are any useful conclusions.)  I cannot imagine how long it would take if Kiefer wanted to sing the whole thing with me.  I realize that, as a good mama, I would want to encourage this sort of engagement and musical interest.  But as a tired mama at the end of a long day, that sort of engagement and interest might push me over the edge!

And, despite the fact that there are 14 animals in it, James Dean doesn't even help me out by explaining what on earth a good mama like me is supposed to say when your kid yells out "giraffe!" or "turtle!" from the peanut gallery in the backseat while singing this song.  The nerve!

Ok, seriously.  Enough kidding around here.  This book is, straight-up, a version of Old MacDonald Had a Farm.  There are no silly twists or unexpected turns.  It's just the song, and a whole lotta verses to the song.  If you love Pete the Cat, you might not be able to resist buying it.  If Old MacDonald Had a Farm is your kid's favorite book, you might not be able to resist buying it.  Of course it's great to have a book that kids can sing to; little ones like Kiefer can "read" every single page because he knows the song by heart and therefore he can "read" along with it.

And the illustrations are, as always, wonderful.  (I'm a big Pete the Cat fan!)

But know this! Pete the Cat Old MacDonald Had a Farm is a loooong, repetitive song book.  If your child is one of those "read it again, please!" types--which we all know, and we all sort of want--you will want to pretend like the dog ate this book at bedtime.  Because you'll be saying E-I-E-I-O 42 times!  You'll be maa-ing and baa-ing and cock-a-doodle-do-ing ALL NIGHT!

Don't say I didn't warn you!



P.S.  Click HERE for a fun twist-of-a-book on Old MacDonald had a farm for preschoolers.

Pete the Cat and His Magic Sunglasses by Kimberly & James Dean

Pete the Cat and His Magic Sunglasses by Kimberly & James Dean, illustrated by James Dean

Rating: 4 stars

He's ba-ack! And in a very good way...

Pete the Cat finds himself in a situation for which he's not totally prepared: he's grumpy.  "Pete had the blue cat blues."  His trademark cool black ears aren't sticking up--they are flopped down sadly, and Pete's trademark cool eyes are looking rather glum.

But that's okay, because his pal Grumpy Toad, who is actually less grumpy than Pete, rolls up on his motorcycle and gives Pete some cool blue magic sunglasses that will help him see everything in a whole new way.  And it works!  Turn the page, and all the blue has turned to sunlight bright yellow!

"Right on!" declares Pete, suddenly cool and happy again.

Pete the Cat had the blue cat blues.

Pete wears the sunglasses and skateboards along his day, bumping into animal friends that are grumpy. He shares his cool blue magic sunglasses with them and they, too, begin to see the world in a lighter, brighter way.  Once they don the classy shades, they each chant:

The birds are singing!
The sky is bright!
The sun is shining!
I'm feeling all right!

At the end of the book, Pete falls off his skateboard and breaks the sunglasses.  Oops!  He realizes that the magic sunglasses really just have a placebo effect (my word, not Dean's...no, you won't have to explain to your child what a placebo effect is), and he can still change the color of his world, the tone of his day, the mood within himself by simply choosing happiness.  There's not really any magic in them.

The sunglasses are cool, but they're not a necessary accessory for a good attitude.

The chant isn't quite so catchy as his first two books, but James and Kimberly Dean definitely did a lot of things right in this book.  I really like that cool Pete is in a bad mood--shows that we all have emotions and grumpy days are part of life.  I like that he shares his sunglasses and good mood with others--I always tell the kids that the most important thing they need for school is a smile, meaning a good, open attitude.  Cheesy, but they've got to know it.

Awesome!

Oh, and here's another fun thing: In the back of the book, there's a pair of cool blue magic sunglasses that you can rip out, put together, and wear.  Kiefer was dismayed to learn that we actually needed to BUY the book in order to WEAR the sunglasses.  And Lorelei and Ben wondered why, when you put on the blue sunglasses, did your blues go away and everything turns bright yellow...but they didn't stick around for my lecture on suspending your disbelief while reading fiction...

But that leads me to wonder: When the library gets copies of this book, do the librarians rip out the sunglasses and wear them around before we all get there, gettin' their Pete the Cat groove on before story time?  I sure hope so!

Take Me Out to the Ballgame by Jack Norworth

Take Me Out to the Ballgame by Jack Norworth, illustrated by Macky Pamintaun

Rating: 5 stars

A simple book, about a simple concept: good ol' baseball.  Add on the timeless tale of a young boy falling madly in love with the game, and you've got yourself a great song with fantastic illustrations.

The classic, oh-so-American song (full story of it is in the back of this book and in this fantastic other children's book, Players in Pigtails) provides the words; Macky Pamintaun provides the illustrations of an incredibly enthusiastic, super excited, ohmygodIcan'tbelieveitIamata-baseballgameforrealforrealforreal young boy going to a ballgame.

That's it, that's all.  Simple, but you've GOT to have this book if you've got a baseball-crazed guy around.

Ben, 12 hours before practice.

And I happen to have one such guy around.  His name is Ben.

The young boy in the book could easily be Ben who, as I type, is sleeping in his baseball cap after his first T-ball practice.  I don't know if the word "enthusiastic" accurately describes how crazy happy and crazy into this game he is.  We watched him throw himself into the game, running full throttle after a ball, listening with every fiber of his little body at his coach (my good friend), and paying more attention to the ground ball approaching his glove than he ever has paid attention to me.

In all, a great, great day.  A Big Day!  And where are we going on Sunday?  To a ball game.  A REAL one!  See that cover up there?  That'll be Ben, more excited than he was on Christmas morning...

Inch by Inch: The Garden Song by David Mallett

Inch by Inch: The Garden Song by David Mallett, illustrated by Ora Eitan

Rating: 5 stars

It's February.  My least favorite month of the year.  I'm just not a winter person.  As much as I try to appreciate what winter has to offer, I look out at our woods and see what is not there rather than appreciate what is there.  And it is so darn cold.  I try to keep a cheerful attitude, if just in front of my kids, because I don't like to hear anyone complain, including myself.  But when Lorelei started talking about how excited she was for Spring, I wondered if she had the winter-stinks gene, too.

When I saw this book in the library last week, I actually gasped with excitement.  The book is based on a song that I sang in my fourth grade class at Sacred Heart School in Savannah, Georgia.  Wearing my red plaid uniform and donning an amusingly unattractive feathered 'do, I belted my Catholic school girl heart out on the stage.  And I swear I have had this song stuck in my head ever since, though anyone who knows me well knows that that means I've only had a few lines of it stuck in my head.  I just can't remember the lines to many songs! But this is such a sweet song with such a sweet meaning that I might buy the book so I can actually commit it to memory so I can sing it to my kids.

Just read the lines:

Inch my inch, row by row, gonna make my garden grow.
All it takes is a rake and a hoe, and a piece of fertile ground.
Inch my inch, row by row, someone bless these seeds I sow.
Someone warm them from below till the rain comes tumblin' down.
Pullin' weeds and pickin' stones, we are made of dreams and bones.
Feel the need to grow my own 'cause the time is close at hand.
Grain for grain, sun and rain, find my way in nature's chain.
Tune my body and my brain to the music from the land.
Plant your rows straight and long, temper them with prayer and song.
Mother Earth will make you strong if you give her love and care.

Or you can listen to the song with another flashback of my youth, John Denver.  His voice sends me immediately back to our family's car, where my parents would put a cassette of his in and my mom would sing loudly (and well) to him.  "Montana Skies" is still one of my favorite songs (I know almost all the words, by the way...another decade and I'll get 'em down solid).

Spring is right around the corner...just 6 more weeks according to Punxsutawney Phil!  Here's a book to enjoy with your little one as a count down through the cold, to the warm.

Five Little Pumpkins by Dan Yaccarino

Five Little Pumpkins by Dan Yaccarino

Rating: 4 stars

I'm only reviewing this cute little baby book so that I can tell you a Halloween story and share a few pictures from our evening that are too cute to keep to myself.

Lorelei's inventory

First, a story:  So just before I send Lorelei, whose school is closed today, and Ben off to quiet time and raid their Halloween stash of candy (a whopping total of 18 items for Lorelei, 19 for Ben), Lorelei "does math" with her candy.  Really, the clever little girl is creating an inventory.

Drat!  She'll totally know what I took!

Wait, Ben didn't create an inventory...  I'll be right back...he won't miss a Snickers.  Or three.

Second, the book: One of our favorite author/illustrators, Dan Yaccarino, creates simple, bold pictures to the preschool song: "Five little pumpkins sitting on a gate / The first one said, "Oh my, it's getting late!" etc.  Very simple, very cute, great little song for your great little one.

Third, some pictures: How cute are these trick or treaters?!

Lorelei the flamingo

Twin witches!

Little bee

Spidey-Ben

  

Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons by Eric Litwin, illustrated by James Dean

Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons by Eric Litwin, illustrated by James Dean

Rating: 5 stars

This one goes out to all the math people out there...who knew there could be a children's book on math--and a cool one at that?  And one with a foot-tappin' (if you're Kiefer, body-shakin') song?

So Pete the Cat, the resident Jamiroquai of children's books, is back.  And I'm pretty grateful for him.  Just when our house has reached another can-we-be-more-tired level, this book arrived.  We had already listened to it a few dozen times online (listen to it!  you'll smile for sure!), but the actual book did not disappoint.  This book ROCKS.

The story:  Pete the Cat puts on his favorite shirt, one with four, round, groovy buttons (what a joy to teach my kids the definition of "groovy!"  It's a new favorite word) and sings his song: "My buttons, my buttons, my four groovy buttons!"

"OH NO!  Another button popped off and rolled away."

And then...

"POP!  OH NO!  One of the buttons popped off and rolled away.
Did Pete cry?  Goodness, no!
Buttons come and buttons go.
How many buttons are left?  THREE!
Pete went on singing his song..."

(Not much math...no square root...maybe that's in the next one...but just enough for a preschooler.)

The song goes on, going from three to two to one, something easy and fun enough for little ones to work on their prediction skills, which is a huge chunk of why we're supposed to be reading to these tykes to begin with.  And then...they get to zero.  He looks down at his open shirt and...finds his belly button!  I love how he finds a way to smile after all those groovy buttons are gone.  Making lemonade out of lemons.  Finding the good in the not-so-good.  What a lesson.

But my favorite lesson that Mr. Eric sneaks in is "buttons come and buttons go."  I'm always telling the kids: "No big deal, right?" when they argue about whose turn it is to do something or if they didn't get something they wanted.  Sometimes it IS a big deal when something comes, and especially when it goes, but...hopefully they won't learn this lesson anytime soon.

I think I might have a crush.  On a cat.  This Pete guy.

Pete the Cat I Love My White Shoes by Eric Litwin, illustrated by James Dean

Pete the Cat I Love My White Shoes by Eric Litwin, illustrated by James Dean

Rating: 5+ stars

This morning, I needed Pete.  And Pete was there for me.  He is my hero.

I've been in a funk the past few days; waking up at 4:58 for the third day in a row did not help get this morning started off well.  (If Kiefer's molars don't come all the way through today, I might take him to the dentist and ask for some assistance so I can sleep in for at LEAST 15 more minutes.)  But at least the little guy wakes up happy to see me, seemingly appreciative of the time he gets to spend with just me, and nobody else.

But then I heard a certain door open at 5:24 and the "Mommy-mommy-mommy I need you come here I need you Mommy-mommy-mommy" (said in cry-y, whine-y voice) started.  I love Ben, but MAN I cannot relate to waking up so sad and mad at the world.  I am one of those annoying people who, even while in a funk, wakes up happy.

Ben trips down the stairs, half-undressed, already crying, with his "mad face" on.  My oh-so-unsympathetic response: "Choose to be happy and stay downstairs, or go back to sleep."  It wasn't received well (can't imagine why).

Ben, crazy with happiness!
(At 7:36 AM, after being awake for 2 hours.)

Anyway, I'll spare you the details of the next hour and half as the boys and I woke up Lorelei (who, as always, woke up laughing as we all bounced on her to wake her up), made breakfast, and got everyone ready for their last week of school.  And then I looked at the clock: 7:30.  I still had an HOUR before the sitter got here and I left to take the kids to school and work out.  Geez.  An hour!  How was I going to fill that time?!

Enter Pete the cat, my hero.

Ben has been telling me about this book for a little while, and I finally saw it at the library and grabbed it.  And I read it a few nights ago.  I am going to buy it, and the other two books along with it.  I LOVE IT!  Why?  It has all of my favorite parts of a children's book:

1. It is simple; Ben has memorized all the words already.
2. It is fun to read, mostly because...
3. It has a SONG--wait, make that FOUR songs in it--and they can bring Ben's cheery smile back in a jiffy (and, the tune can be changed to anything else at any time, and the cheery smile comes back because he remembers Pete the cat and his favorite book when I sing it).
4. It has a groovy character that is cool but still nice.
5. It has a fantastic moral to it.

I had seen on the cover of the book the "download free song at..." and though the kids rarely use my laptop for anything, I said to Ben, who was looking around for something to do that would have probably annoyed me though it probably really shouldn't have "Hey, Ben, want to listen to something?"  And he sat for 15 blessedly happy minutes listening to the book and song being read and sung to him again and again and again.  Click here to listen, too.  Or check out this video (it is so worth it!  I double dare you to watch it and not smile.):

And my morning got a little brighter.

Maybe I should tell you about the book, in case you don't want to watch the video?  Okay...  Pete gets new shoes and loves them.  He sings this song: "I love my white shoes, I love my white shoes, I love my white shoes!"  Then he steps in strawberries that turn his shoes red, so he sings how he loves his red shoes.  Then he steps in blueberries and...  After each time he steps in something, he sure doesn't cry or carry on.  The author, "Mr Eric," writes: "Did Pete cry?  Goodness, no!"  This happens a few times, until he steps in water and he has white, wet shoes.

The moral of the story?  As Mr Eric the author puts it: "No matter what you step in, keep walking along and singing your song..."

Roll with it.  A good lesson I've been taught lately and need to practice more.  Like today.

So thank you, Pete the cat, my hero for today.

She'll Be Comin' 'Round the Mountain by Philemen Sturges

She'll Be Comin' 'Round the Mountain by Philemen Sturges, illustrated by Ashley Wolff

Rating: 5 singing stars

Warning: This book/song will get stuck in your head, and you will definitely be singing it to yourself after the kids are tucked in bed, while on a date night with your partner, taking the dogs out for a walk.

That's the bad news.  The good news is that it's a really good book/song to have stuck in your head!  Philomen Sturges changes the words to the old folk song that no one can remember the words to anyway (or is that just me?).  It's a pretty decent length of a book, but the text/lyrics don't get old at all, and I even pretend to play a banjo as if there's a space left to rock out on my nonexistent banjo in front of my highly amused kids.  (I'll have the only kids who play air banjo, not air guitar.  Geeks in training!)  This book is so different from all the others because it's a song, and Lorelei and Ben beg for it again and again and again.  And I'm happy to oblige!  Even when my in-laws were in town so I had a crowd of people listening to me croon, I was happy to oblige. 

The basic storyline (songline?) is this:  Some "she"--it's a mystery who--is comin' 'round the mountain to this little animal village in the middle of some southwestern state.  Everyone is getting ready for a party when she arrives, including "making ensalada" and getting "old brass beddy" ready.  Here is Lorelei's favorite part: "We'll have a fiesta grande while she's here. / Salsa, rice, and candy--hope she's near! / That table looks just dandy, the pinata will be handy. / Let's build a great big fire for good cheer."  In the background of many of the detailed pictures is a camper, the vehicle of the mysterious lady, making its way to the town.  On the last page, when the whole town cheers "Yea, she's here!" we realize that it's a mobile library called Six White Horses, and everyone is excited to check out new books.

A book about books!  I love it.

I also must admit another dorky fact about myself, other than the fact that I play a pretty rad air banjo.  I make up songs for everything.  We have a quesadilla song, a guacamole song, a whatever-needs-to-be-sung-about song.  I usually take the lyrics to a song Lorelei and Ben know, and it cracks them up to here the latest version of it.  Lorelei plays along, too, and she makes up songs about things as she plays by herself or with Ben or with whatever it is that interests her at the moment.  We've all had a great time learning the lyrics to this book/song and also authoring our own!