Let’s talk board books! Some of you all have asked for recommendations for books to gift to new babies and their families, and I am thrilled to oblige. This huge stack is full of our most-loved books and those we have gifted to others many times. They’re also not the same books that many people give, so you’re nearly guaranteed to not gift a duplicate. We love love love them and are sure you and the babies in your life will, too.
Matthew Van Fleet’s Animals is full of brain-developing colors, sensory touch patches, push and pull features, and alliterative text that kids will love from infancy through toddlerhood. Keeping it real, my 7 year old also likes to push and pull and touch those little patches. Let’s be super real- I do too! Matthew Van Fleet has several books like this as well. Check them out in my Board Books list in my Bookshop store.
Mem Fox and Helen Oxenbury’s Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes is the sweetest little book about how babies, no matter where they’re from or what they’re like have fingers and toes just like other babies! Babies will love looking at the other baby faces featured, and the rhyming, repetitive words will delight your ears and help the baby to learn sound patterns.
Benji Davies’ Bizzy Bear books have a permanent spot in my heart and on my bookshelf because these books (and there are a LOT) are super sturdy- one of ours may have gotten thrown in a kiddie pool but still works!- and have moving bits on every page! The text rhymes and repeats the call “Bizzy Bear, Bizzy Bear…” on every page, so young readers love to help you read them. We got Bizzy Bear Let’s Go and Play! when my youngest was little, probably in part because one of her nicknames is Bizzy, and they are still going strong.
Everyone knows and loves Sandra Boynton books, right? Confession: I love some but not all of her books. Moo, Baa, La, La, La! makes the cut for me without a doubt, though. I love that the text directly addresses the reader and is hilarious! It’s so fun to read over and over (trust me. after 2 kids I’ve read this book over 500 times I’m sure). It’s also one of the first books that my kid was able to memorize and “read” to me herself. I’m all for anything that helps our kids feel empowered as readers, and this one definitely did that for us.
Cedella Marley and Vanessa Brantley Newton’s adaptation of Bob Marley‘s song, Every Little Thing is a joyous book affirming that even when things look tough they’ll probably be ok. I found myself reading this to my kids after tough moments even when they were infants to remind us both that it was going to be ok. On the kid end, there is so much to see on each page- we often played “find the cat” or pointed to different colors, so this one will definitely grow with them.
I posted Monique Gray Smith and Julie Flett’s My Heart Fills with Happiness on our Valentine’s Day stack this year, and while I discovered if after the age where I can justify buying board books for my own kids, I have already gifted it to my niece. I love love love the way Smith counts things that bring joy, and Flett’s illustrations of things that bring joy are bold and delicate and beautiful. A must-have for sure.
Divya Srinivvasan’s Little Owl’s Night is a little bit of a perspective shift where Little Owl does all kinds of fun things during the night when some other animals are sleeping. When dawn breaks, Little Owl is snoozing in his nest. I loved reading this to my kids before bedtime and talking with them about all the fun things Little Owl would do while they, too, were sleeping. Then I crossed my fingers as I did our bedtime routine and snuck about the house hoping they’d stay asleep for a long stretch every night.
Alice Schertle and Jill McElmurry’s Little Blue Truck books are so so good. There are many of them, and this is the original, and my favorite. A close runner up for me is Little Blue Truck Takes the Lead . In both Little Blue is a pick up truck with a truckload of integrity who helps others to be kind as well. In the original, he helps a Dump Truck, even though the Dump was pretty rude to Blue and all the other animals who live on the farm. The Dump has a change of heart, and I loved reading to my kids about kindness and doing the right thing even when it’s hard, even from Day 1.
That’s Not My Dinosaur is one of the Usborne books, so I don’t have a link to it, but it’s full of multisensory patches throughout as Mouse looks for its dinosaur. Some are smooth, bumpy, scratchy, or fuzzy, and the words on the page help the kids make the connection between the feeling and the word. This realy helps baby’s development, and there are a TON of versions of this- dragons, unicorns. puppies, monkeys, lions, bees, etc- that make gifting super fun. We actually had several of them and my kids liked to read them all.
Stella Blackstone and Debbie Harter’s Bear on a Bike– and all the other Bear books- is so fun to read. It’s got rhythmic and rhyming and repetitive text! Colorful and detailed images! All kinds of adventures! In this one, Bear and the kid go all over via different modes of transportation- bike, train, and ultimately a ROCKET! We played all kinds of games with this book- finding colors, finding fruit in the market, spotting the dog on each page, and so on. I still love to read these books! I mean my kids do…
Rod Campbell’s Dear Zoo is a classic that stands the test of time! It was written in 1982, the year of excellent books and people- my birth year!, and it is still so fun to read today. In it, the speaker has asked the zoo to send a pet and through trial and error ends up with the perfect one. The zoo sends many others first, though, that come in different packages that babies and toddlers will love to lift the flaps on and giggle at the different animals the zoo sends!
This is me when my kids got up before 7AM.
Spike Lee and Tonya Lewis Lee’s Please, Baby, Please is a must have. The little clock next to each line of text gets me- it shows a day through the eyes of a kid and their mama, starting at a ghastly 3AM and showing all the times Mama reminds the kid what to and not to do. My kids giggled at the fun and funny moments that the kid has even when they had done the same exact thing themselves just moments before. In the end, the kid asks for a hug, Please, Mama, Please. It’s such a sweet ending that adult readers will remember how easy it is to forgive the tough moments when the sweet ones come along.
Molly Bang’s Ten, Nine, Eight counts down to bedtime by counting all the things in the kid’s room as she gets ready. It’s great for babies to see the bright colors and large numbers paired with the rhythmic words. It reads a bit like a lullaby, which I love. We also delighted in finding the cat on each page!
Peek-a-WHO by Nina Laden checks all the boxes for baby books: bright colors, peek through pages, rhyming text, and a mirror! I read this 4 million times and it was fun every time- well, nearly every time. It’s short and my kids were able to fill in the word after “peek-a…” after a few times. Nina Laden has also written Peek-A-Zoo, Peek-A-Boo, and Peek-A-Zoo, which are all just as delightful!
Of course, the links here go to my Bookshop store. You can find these books in my Board Book list (and many others!). If you purchase one from my store I’ll make a commission. Thank you for your support!