I am bored of moral tales. When I let my kids watch TV, I rarely choose shows about “being kind” or “telling the truth”. If the world is going to teach my kids something, I’d rather it be ABCs and 123s. The same goes for books. Modern books that teach a moral remind me of a formula sitcom. Is it just me?

This week at the library I followed my own advice and searched the card catalog by Christian publisher’s names. And I stumbled upon a set of books that I had forgotten about–Janette Oke’s Animal Friends. If you’ve been around Christian publishing for any amount of time you know Janette Oke. She was one of the first Christian fiction romance authors and I read most of her books throughout middle school and beyond!

The Animal Friends books are short chapter books (about 80 pages) that focus on a different young animal and a problem it’s having in it’s family. The first one I read was Prairie Dog Town by Janette Oke. Flick, a little prairie dog learns a lesson in obeying his parents and the dangers that come when he refuses. Today, we read 4 chapters from Pordy’s Prickly Problem by Janette Oke over lunch. Pordy is a fearful little porcupine that learns to be brave with her mother’s help.

Cover via Amazon

I like these books for several reasons:

1. Chapter book. I think kids should always be listening to books “too old” for them. So, if your child is a pre-reader like mine, this is still a good book for them to listen to. And I think books that take a few days to read are more apt to settle in your thoughts and heart.

2. Animals. Kids love animals. And little “kid” animals are even more fun. I actually learned something from the porcupine book today. Did you know porcupines are born in a nest on the ground but live in trees as adults? Maybe that’s common knowledge but I sure didn’t know it!

3. Christian Perspective. It’s a moral tale–but from a decidedly Christian perspective. I am sometimes slightly turned off by secular books that teach moral tales with a “embrace the universe/energy” or “look in yourself” mentality. Although there was no scripture or even the word “God”, the 2 books we’ve read from this series had a big nod to practical Christain thoughts–obeying your parents, recognizing authority, putting others before your desires, and more.

I’ve recently decided to read to the kids during lunch and I think we might just try to make it through all the Animal Friends books!

Which moral-tale books do you read to our children?

me, my sponsored child and her mother

Ever since I saw this Sponsored Child Lapbook, I have wanted to do some activities that relate to the locale of our sponsored children. We sponsor 2 children in Burkina Faso, Africa through Compassion International and one girl in the Dominican Republic through World Vision. (<—link to my trip with World Vision)

I’ve found a few books at the library about the Dominican. And just one that mentioned Burkina Faso. Burkina Faso is not the popular African country that Rwanda and Kenya are. (If you are looking for books about Kenya, Vanessa has some great suggestions!) Now I’m basically trying to pick up any book that shows the WHOLE WORLD. I want my kids to see they are not the only ones on the planet.

This week I found a seek-and-find, where’s-waldo type book called, Gigi and Zachary’s Around-the-World Adventure. There are fun illustrations of Gigi the Giraffe and Zachary the Zebra traveling all over the world. On the bottom of each page are words to search for. Obviously my kids are too young too read, but I can read them and then we can search for them together. The best part is they don’t know what all the words mean so we’re learning lots of new vocab and culture! The Indonesian page had us looking for “a hornbill, house on pilings and a sarong”  while the Istanbul picture showed us “mosque, quay and macaw”.

Asa and I looked at this book for a good 20 minutes when we first got it home. When Lydia and I sat down to look at it, it was perfect because the first page is Africa so we got to talk about our kids, Alizeta and David–and imagine them in the same scene!

I’m praying books like these will remind my kids that not only did God create the world but that He loves everyone on the planet and sent His son to die for them (John 3:16)!

Now, I’m on a mission to find more books like this–maybe even a fun atlas or two. What all-around-the-world books do you and your children like?

linked to Feed Me Books Friday at Little Sprout Books

I love the idea of a birthday box—a special box full of birthday books that you only pull out once a year. I first heard of this idea from Vanessa (my irl friend and awesome contributor here on IYK) and she has some awesome birthday book suggestions on her blog.

My son’s birthday is coming up and I’ve started collecting some birthday books for him. (OK, mainly just the ones we already own.) One of my favorite birthday books is a little I Can Read Book called, Happy Birthday Barnabas by Royden Lepp.

It’s the story of a little bear who sees his forest friends walk by with cupcakes, crayons and other “suspicious” items. Finally, he follows them to see they’ve set up a party just for him! Barnabas is so happy he stops and leads his friends in a prayer, “Thank you God for birthdays, cupcakes and tea time with friends.” (<—sorry about that big spoiler!)

It’s a simple little book but I love the sweetness of it! I had pictured the author/illustrator, Royden Lepp to be a grandfatherly man who sipped tea while sketching in front of his fireplace. Instead, (after I googled him today) I discovered he is a man with eclectic interests–including photographing reptiles and drawing realistic warrior images from the Bible. Very cool. I just love the extremes of this fuzzy little Barnabas and a drawing of a scary looking Goliath. (Really, check out his blog to see his portfolio!)

There are several Barnabas books in the series—in each one, it looks like Barnabas is always looking for a way (and finds it) to praise God. The name Barnabas means “encourager”. So, maybe that’s the reason for these books? To encourage kids? To show how easy it is to encourage yourself by thanking God for his blessings? Regardless, they are fun books your kids will love!

Do you have any good birthday books to share?

Our Shoes2Share linky goes live on MONDAY. Don’t forget to collect some shoes (even from your own closets). Let’s see how many shoes the Impress Your Kids community can collect!

linked to Feed Me Book Friday

Vanessa is a regular contributor to Impress Your Kids. She is a stay-at-home mom to an energetic three-year-old, Juliet. They spend their days together reading books, attempting crafts, and occasionally beating tree trunks with large sticks. You can read more about their adventures at Silly Eagle Books

Amanda asked me if I had any good camp books to share with you this week, and the only ones I could think of were these songbooks that we found a few months ago. I love using songbooks instead of story books from time to time and was thrilled to discover these Camp Song books at our library.

I spent many a summer at camp learning all those classic songs like Found a Peanut, Bringing Home a Baby Bumblebee, and Make New Friends. Juliet had a blast learning these song and I had fun reliving my camp days. There’s something about songs that really bring back memories, isn’t there?

While I’m not interested in getting a real campfire going, we had some imaginary play by making our own pretend campfire in our living room. You can read more about how we made it using scraps of paper, river rocks, and twigs on Silly Eagle Books. It was fun and easy and the kitty cat LOVED it. It was the perfect place to sit next to and sing our camp songs together.

We also made some pretend paper marshmallows, but next time I think we’ll use the real ones. They’re more fun to eat!

What camps songs do you remember from your childhood?

Lydia is at Vacation Bible School this week. It’s the High Seas Expedition by Group. It’s got an eye-catching pirate-like ship with cute sea animals and lots of nautical decor. Each day they are focusing on a new aspect of the Bible–the Bible is true, the Bible is comforting, the Bible is surprising, etc. The theme song is a roaring, swelling dramatic musical about diving into God’s Word and having his love roll over you. It’s quite exciting!

This afternoon, after Asa was in bed (poor guy fell asleep in the car), I remembered a great book to read to Lydia that lines right up with what she’s learning about at her VBS. No, it’s not the Jesus Storybook Bible (although, I’m sure I could find a connection if I tried), it’s one of my other favorites, Mrs. Rosey Posey and the Hidden Treasure!

Three little boys are playing pirates in Mrs. Rosey Posey’s tree house. She sends books and apples up the rope swing and when the boys investigate their books they find a treasure map with a clue: “A treasure sweet. Open it up, adventures meet!” They follow the treasure map hoping for an edible treasure and finally discover a chest with Bibles and candy bars. Mrs. Rosey Posey tells them that God’s Word is sweeter than candy and more precious than gold!

They ask about the second part of the clue–the adventures meet! She tells them stories of giants and kings and talking donkeys and giant fish swallowing men whole!

This is such a fun book–cute illustrations, fun dialogue and easy, kid-friendly, powerful words that lead kids to God and His Word. I’m so happy Lydia is being immersed in a program like this VBS that is showing the many wonderful facets of God’s Word. And I’m glad I remembered this little book to remind her of how precious and exciting God’s Word is in her life!

This would be a great book for our little boys. How fun to dress up like pirates, make a cardboard tube telescope and follow a map to a hidden treasure of stories from God’s Word? What am I talking about? My little girly princess would love that, too! And I’m all about anything that helps my kids understand how awesome God’s Word is!

The law that brings respect for the Lord is pure.
It lasts forever.
The directions the Lord gives are true.
All of them are completely right.
They are more priceless than gold.
They have greater value than huge amounts of pure gold.
They are sweeter than honey
that is taken from the honeycomb.
Psalm 19:9-10

linked to Feed Me Books Friday!

I’ll be the first to admit that there are not a lot of great Christian kids books. I feel like I’ve read all of them. Every time I walk through a Christian book store I’m disappointed in the titles and even illustrations. But really, I’m disappointed with the quantity. But I never give up looking through the shelves for new books by some of my favorite authors!

This week at the library I happen to see a Zonderkidz label on the edge of a book. Zonderkidz is the kids arm of Zondervan, a Christian publishing company. So, I checked it out. The book is called The Grimy-Slimy Bug Safari. It’s about a little girl named Tracy who goes outside to hunt for bugs then hangs upside down from a tree to see them all. Honestly, I’m not really sure what the message was…the illustrations are fun, the rhyme is cute but it was just about a girl hunting bugs. Nothing more. Nothing less.  BUT. The more we read it, the more it grows on me.

The message isn’t life changing, it doesn’t have any scripture, there isn’t anything for me to even make a teachable moment out of. I like that it quietly mentions God and His role as Creator. I like that a normal fun colorful book has the same God-ward worldview that I try to have in our family. And. My kids love it. They ask me to read it every day! The fun of the book to them is that it’s a “topsy-turvy” book–every picture of Tracy hanging from the tree, you can turn upside down to see what she sees.

Not to mention, I started having all these great ideas about doing a bunch of bug crafts and bug hunting hikes and teaching Lydia to hang upside down on monkey bars!

Plus, finding this book gave me a great idea! I went to my library’s website and searched for “Zonderkidz”. It only brought up 22 books, but it was 22 Christian-themed books I’d never read to my kids! Then I searched for more Christian publishers that have kids’ extensions: Tommy Nelson, Standard Publishing and Concordia. I’m going to place a few on hold and see if we can find anything we like!

What’s your kids’ favorite Christian book?

linked to Feed me Books Friday hosted (today) at Mom Tried It!

Vanessa is a regular contributor to Impress Your Kids. She is a stay-at-home mom to an energetic three-year-old, Juliet. They spend their days together reading books, attempting crafts, and occasionally beating tree trunks with large sticks. You can read more about their adventures at Silly Eagle Books

With Father’s Day approaching, I have been trying to get “ahead of the game” and have Juliet make a few homemade gifts for her daddy. (My usual trend is to wait until the night before and hastily throw something together!)

She can’t write yet, but she sure can talk. I decided to record some of her thoughts one afternoon in a “Thank You God for Daddy” poem.

I envisioned her sitting down with me and listening as I explained to her that God made a special daddy just for her. She would immediately be grateful and join me in a prayer of thankfulness for daddies…

That is not what happened at all.

Instead, she sat for about 2 seconds before jumping up and running away.

I yelled to her, “Why are you thankful for your daddy?”

“Huh?”

“How can we thank God for daddy?”

“Look! An airplane!”

Okay. Let’s try this a different way: “What do you like about daddy?”

“Oh. I like when he lifts me up!”

So, for the following ten minutes, as she raced around the backyard, I kept asking her what she liked about her daddy. She got more and more into it and gave me some memorable Juliet phrases. I scribbled them down on my piece of paper to be used later.

After she was in bed, I got on the computer and went to Wordle.net to create the card. If you’ve never used this site, it’s really easy. You just type in whatever words and phrases you would like to appear on your page and then it scrambles it and gives you different font combinations.

Since I wanted my card to read a certain way, I had to do a few things.

1. Words that you want to appear the largest need to be typed in multiple times. I typed in Thank You God for My Daddy at least ten times. (The words will only appear once, but the more “Daddy” s you have, the bigger it will be.)

2. Phrases had to be pushed together. I chose to separate the words with periods, but you could use dashes or some other symbol or even just let the words all run together without spaces.

3. After typing in my words and phrases, I hit the “submit” button and it gave me my first option. I didn’t like it because it read “My Daddy Thank You God” . I kept hitting randomize until I came to the option that I liked the best. You can print out as many pages as you like and even save your creation to a public page if you want to share it with the world.

Try it out! It’s really easy and you can play around with it until you get the look you want. It’s a fun (and free!) way to preserve your kids’ thoughts and cute phrases.

You could use it as a card or even frame it to make it look even more fancy–and hopefully, your gratitude/thankfulness discussion will go better than mine did!

(If you are looking for some good children’s books about daddies, I’ve compiled a Father’s Day Booklist that features our favorites!)

As I searched through the songs on the Seeds of Worship CD I found one of my favorite verses, Romans 8:38-39:

For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

I so want my kids to know and believe God’s love for them. This verse-song is on the Seeds of Courage CD and at first I thought, “What does that have to do with courage?” But think about it–how different would you live your life if you knew NOTHING could come between God and His great love for you. It would be easy to stand firm and in strength during all occasions.

The first thing I thought of when listening to this song was one of our favorite books! I got this book as a review on my personal blog a year ago and it has barely left the kids’ bedside tables since. It’s called God Loves Me More Than That by Dandi Daley Mackall.

The story is really a little boy asking questions about God. He asks how big God’s love is, how wide, how loud, how soft and how deep. It’s absolutely beautiful. The questions are answered in measurable kid-friendly descriptions. The illustrations are modern and so realistic–but whimsical and childlike, too.

It’s gorgeous and a go-to book for us. So, I was excited to find a song to go along with it. Then I realized—wait a minute, that’s not the same verse! The book is based on Ephesians 3:17-19,

And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Oh, well! So much for lining things up perfectly! But guess what? This is still a perfect connection! Here are two verses that talk about God’s great love for us! What a fun activity you could put together for your kids with this book, the Seeds song, a few heart shaped crafts and a group hug!

It’s easy to impress your kids! Use books, songs, crafts and whatever is at your fingertips to them show God’s great love!

:: :: ::

If you leave a comment on this post, you’ll be entered in our Seeds Family Worship CD giveaway. And if you do THIS activity with your kids, blog it and leave the link on our MckLinky, you’ll get FIVE additional entries! If you have no idea what I’m talking about, see our Ultimate Blog Party intro page!

Want more great book suggestions? click over to Feed Me Books Friday at The Adventure of Motherhood!

Last year, I heard about Resurrection Eggs for the first time – and I thought it was a neat idea, but that my boys were too young to understand the Resurrection of Christ, even with the visual aids that the eggs supplied.  This year, I saw this post, and I thought it was time to revisit the idea of resurrection eggs.

There are several ways to use Resurrection Eggs to help tell your children the Easter story – you can buy a set online or at a local Christian book store or make your own (our set is pictured above).  If you make your own, you can fill the eggs with visual aids from the actual story from the Bible or from any number of Easter books… I chose to use the book Benjamin’s Box: The Story of the Resurrection Eggs.

I love this little book – it is the Easter story told from a child’s viewpoint, like Easter in the Garden, one of the books Amanda reviewed here.  I love how Benjamin knows Jesus before the book starts, and how his path keeps crossing with Jesus’s during the last week of His life.  During that week, he picks up small things that remind him of Jesus and what is happening, and he puts them all in a box that he has (they all correspond with an object in one of the Resurrection eggs).  It is a very sweet book, appropriate for younger children. 

Reading this book and using the Resurrection eggs have led to a lot of questions and discussions in our house – Elias is letting the big questions fly!  I was hoping to find some more ways to talk through his questions in the next book…

The Very First Easter by Paul Maier is a detailed book about Jesus’s last week  – I like the way it is written as a dialogue between a child and his parents, with the child asking some tough questions, and the parents answering them and going to the Bible for the answers.  There is a lot of Scripture in this book – in fact most of the Easter story is told in the Scripture that the parents quote to their son.  However, this book is a bit too much for my kids.  The pictures are not terribly graphic, but they do show Jesus carrying the cross, on the cross, and dead, before the resurrection.  The details are pretty descriptive, too – and this book will be perfect for Elias in a year or two.  

Here are some more posts that we’ve written with Easter book reviews and activities – this year and in the past:

• Easter: Jesus is the Lamb of God
• Easter and Resurrection Books for Kids
• Easter and the Resurrection for Kids {another round-up of past posts}

What are your favorite ways to share the miracle of the Resurrection with your children?

A few months ago I picked up a picture book/CD combo at our library. It’s one of those follow-along-and-turn-the-page-when-you-hear-the-tone-things. There were only a few CDs to choose from (most of them were tapes. remember those?) so I randomly picked up Imogene’s Antlers by David Small.

We hunkered down in the car to drive home, popped the CD in and were MESMERIZED. The book tells the story of a cute little girl who wakes up with antlers on her head. Her family is completely freaked out but she rather enjoys them. It is hilarious and has adorable illustrations. The kind you want to look at for several minutes—they add such depth to the story.

We listened to Imogene’s Antlers about 25 times before we returned it. I finally bought it for my daughter, Lydia for Christmas. She was disappointed that the CD didn’t come with the book. I am apparently not as entertaining of a reader. Hmph.

A few weeks later, I found another CD/book combo called The Journeyby Sarah Stewart. It is the sweetest story of an Amish girl who travels to Chicago for a special vacation. Her trip is shared through entries in her diary. She falls in love with the city but still has a longing for home. As soon as we pulled into the garage after listening to it, I made Lydia hand me the book so I could flip through the pictures. It is just LOVELY.

As I was looking at The Journey‘s cover, I realized it was illustrated by David Small. The same man who wrote Imogene’s Antlers. How fun! That made me like The Journey even more!

{Let’s keep going because the story is just getting started…}

Last week I picked up yet another CD/book combo called The Gardener. I didn’t even read the back. I just liked the picture on the front and it wasn’t a casette tape. We pop it in the CD player immediately.  It reminds me a lot of The Journey. The story is told via letters written by the main character. She’s a young girl who has to leave her family’s farm to help in her uncle’s bakery in the city. It’s during the Great Depression, so it’s got a sad undercurrent to it. But it’s also upbeat and positive. At the end of the first letter, the little girl signs her name, “Lydia Grace.” Well, my daughter could not contain herself! She thought this book was written just for her! A book! With her own name?!!

Lydia listened enraptured on the way home. Then we took the book inside to read it again and look at the pictures. Well, lo and behold, who wrote the book? Sarah Stewart. And the illustrator? David Small. Apparently I am drawn to them like flies on butter!

Let’s fast forward to this morning. We go to storytime at the library. Which we rarely do because they are always during my son’s naps. But today, it was raining for the third day in a row and I had to get out of the house. Anyway, I picked up Not a Box. Lydia grabbed The Way Mothers Areand I Love It When You Smile. She also snapped up a kids’ book by Danielle Steel. I thought that was a little odd, so I set it down and snatched  another book off that same shelf called, The Library.”Oh, look, Lydia! It’s illustrated by the same guy who did Imogene’s Antlers!” BIG SURPRISE.

We read the book as soon as we got home and loved it. It’s a delightful story about a girl who loves to read. Like really really loves to read. She collects so many books that they take over her house. So, she…well. If you’re a bibliophile, it’s a must read.

After these four “random” selections of David Small, I had to do some googling! David Small is married to Sarah Stewart. They have written five books together (that means I need to find two more!!). David has written seven. He has illustrated over twenty. I’m officially smitten with him (and her). I am now on a mission to read any and everything they’ve touched!

You will fall in love with all the books I mentioned above. They are sweet, full tales that leave you wistful for the time and setting. The illustrations only add to the story. Please check them out right away! (And hey, don’t forget to look for those CD/book combos. So fun!)

You’ve got one more day to win No Time For Flash Card’s new ebook, Alphabet Crafts!

For more fun book suggestions, click over to Feed Me Books Friday and What My Child Is Reading! And check out more great stuff at the Other Mama’s Friday Favorites, Amy’s Finer Things Friday and Simply Sweet Home’s Friday Favorites.