Read Aloud Thursday

Would it be cheating if I begin this Read Aloud Thursday post with a review of a book-and-CD combo?  No?  Good, good–because that’s what I’m going to do!  🙂  While I haven’t had a chance to read While Mama Had a Quick Little Chat by Amy Reichert to my girls, I did listen to it with the girls as we ran a few errands after picking out some new goodies at the library.  I think I enjoyed this story every bit as much as the girls, if not more, because it is almost a cautionary tale for distracted parents, which I must admit to my chagrin that I sometimes am.  In this story, Rose tries and tries to get Mama’s attention while Mama has a “quick little chat” on the phone with Uncle Fred.  Mama, of course, repeatedly brushes her off and ignores her, all the while missing out on the excitement that Rose is trying to alert her to.  By the end of the story, Rose has had all sorts of adventures without leaving her home, and Mama is just happy that Rose managed to prepare herself for bed while she had that “quick little chat.”  Seriously, folks, I was laughing out loud at this one.  Now that I’ve had an opportunity to look at the illustrations for this story, I must mention that Alexandra Boiger‘s heavily stylized characters really add to the charm of this story.

As far as books go, these two books that I’m highlighting couldn’t be more different.  That’s one thing I love about Read Aloud Thursday, though–the variety!  🙂  Duck!  Rabbit! by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and Tom Lichtenheld is more a series of illustrated optical illusions (really, primarily one illusion–the one on the cover) than it is a story.  Well, there is a story–it’s an argument between two speakers who never make an appearance in the book over whether this animal is a duck or a rabbit.  That’s it.  What I like about this one, though, is that my girls really got it and connected it to other optical illusions we’ve seen.  In fact, when Lulu saw the cloud illustrations (which, of course, are in the shape of rabbits and ducks) on the flyleafs, she immediately said “It Looked Like Spilt Milk!”  Now that’s the kind of connections I love for my girls to make! 

That’s it for us this week, folks.  Our read-aloud times seem hard to come by now that summer’s here.  Oh, we still read a good bit, but it seems like I’m more distracted this time of year by all the possibilities of places we can go and things we can do.  I thrive on routine, so this sort of living makes me a little antsy, but I also want to go with the flow since we’ll be on to the serious business of kindergarten soon enough.  🙂  What about at your house?  Has your family read anything good this week?  Do tell!  Leave a comment about it or a link to your own Read Aloud Thursday blog post in the comments!

Have a terrific Read Aloud Thursday!