M has named Corduroy
, by Don Freeman as his favorite book since we first read it almost 2 years ago. I’m sure everyone reading this knows about Corduroy, the bear with the missing button, who wants to find a home and a friend. He is very loveable. :) 
Recently we picked up Dandelion at the library. We both enjoyed this book about being authentic and not worrying too much about appearances. “Be who you are” books are always a big hit around here. :) I didn’t realize until later that it was also written by Don Freeman!
Then Vanessa, over at Silly Eagle Books mentioned Beady Bear
, also by Don Freeman in this blog post. Of course we had to find it! It’s an adorable story of another toy bear and his silly experiment in living like a real bear.
. We read it this past week. Without a doubt, this one is my favorite Don Freeman book (of what we’ve read so far). Earl is spoiled by a little girl named Jill and has no idea how to get his own acorns, which irks his mama to no end. Eventually he ends up getting some acorns on his own in a very unusual way. It’s just a cute, funny story. And well, who wouldn’t love a squirrel named Earl, right? :)For more book reviews, check out Natalie’s blog carnival at Mouse Grows, Mouse Learns!
Have a beautiful day! :)
I quickly drew a picture for him to use as a guide, and added some foam stickers, a googley eye, and some decorating options (watercolor pencils, watercolor paints, glitter glue).
, by Cathryn Sil. 
This book has lovely illustrations (I think watercolors and perhaps acrylics… I couldn’t find the exact mediums used listed anywhere in the book) by John Sil, a well-known wildlife artist. The text is brief and easy to understand, and this book acts as a wonderful introduction to various kinds of birds, as well as simple facts about birds (ie. some birds fly, some swim, others run). 
, by Priscilla Belz Jenkins. 
This is a “Let’s-Read-and-Find-Out-About-Science” Stage 1 book. It is chock-full of great information and detailed illustrations! It talks about many different kinds of birds, but gives detailed information about Robins in particular. It explains and illustrates the steps of making a nest, shows the development of a baby bird within an egg, and there is a great feather identification page with 24 different species listed. This is an amazing book and M was pretty interested in it. I appreciated that the book had “normal” text on each page and then additional little blurbs throughout for more info. It can get to be a bit long and you can take cues from your child about whether they want to know all the additional information or not.
, by Margret and H.A. Rey (the writers of Curious George). 
This is just a cute and fun book. We love the Reys and pretty much anything they’ve written. Little Whiteblack wants to collect some exciting stories to tell his friends in Penguinland. So he sets off and has quite an exciting adventure! The more we read this book the more interesting it became… I enjoyed the difference between the cold land Whiteblack is from and the camel he meets from the desert. He also meets up with an ostrich family, another bird that can’t fly. I think there’s a lot of great conversation starters in this book as well as good jumping off points to learn about other animals and their habitats.
This book is just funny, funny, funny. M loves it and laughs at it every time we read it. Two birds return to their nest to find a very large egg in it and although they have a few misgivings they decide to keep it and let it hatch. The baby “bird” doesn’t really look much like a bird, and he’s very hungry… extremely hungry. Eventually it’s time for him to learn to fly and this is where M really cracks up. :) It was a great book for learning that many animals, not just birds, come from eggs.
(Eek! Don’t look at my stained bowls throughout this post, please!)
It was about 2 minutes and they were already getting super-shiny! We did this part over and over with all our pennies, and talked about how copper is a metal and oxidizes when it’s out in the air. So now my 3 year old is walking around saying “oxidized”. :) He has future nerd written all over him. 
Then we waited. A couple of hours later we checked and here’s what our silver paperclip looked like: 
The metal on the paperclip attracted the copper particles that the pennies shed in the vinegar. 
You can read about our other bunny activities and bunny books 
Cotton balls, glue, 2 large green buttons, 2 small pink buttons, pink pipecleaner shaped into bunny mouth, pink pom-pom, pink construction paper with ears drawn as well as 4 to 6 straight lines for whiskers, and scissors (not pictured).
For some reason M thought he was supposed to cut between the black lines instead of along them. So, while I intended to have 6 whiskers, we ended up with 5 and only used 4. I actually liked how they looked with the black line down the center. While he did this I cut out the ears.
M is 3.5 years old.
I found these in a lapbook file at 
I believe this was originally intended to be a file folder game. I’ve had this for at least a year if not longer, and think I originally found it at 
Sorry the photo above is blurry. I wanted to share this activity anyway because it was definitely a favorite!
