We recently completed a space unit and, wow, it was incredible. My son absolutely loved learning about space and even though we have moved on to apples, we will definitely be returning to space for some more learning as well. For us the spine of any unit is books. Books were actually part of what inspired me to choose space as our topic.

Around when my son turned 3 I decided I wanted to dive into some chapter books with him. He has a very long attention span for books and it seemed like a great next step for us. We have read some truly wonderful literature in the last five or so months. I feel that this has helped him expand some of his listening comprehension and focus for longer stories. Along the way we have read some books we’ve treasured together and found some that were misses. This post will share some of our favorites along with notes on the ones that were misses for us.

This spring as we prepared a garden I decided to do a bit of a gardening book rotation as well. I went on a search for books about gardening that captured the magic of seeds becoming plants and the patience required. This reinforced our hands-on learning as we planted the seeds. These books became some of my favorites I have added to our library. My three-year-old loved these and I highly recommend adding them to your bookshelf.

I love real picture books. In general, babies tend to connect to them better than illustrated books. However, there are not a ton of real picture books available. Lovevery makes a gorgeous set but they are only available with a subscription. This blog post features our favorite real picture books that are not Lovevery. I have found more companies are producing real picture books recently, including some with more storylines. This is absolutely wonderful to see! These books I share below are, for the most part, not just books with real pictures and labels. They mostly have some sort of story, at least a very short poem throughout.

Books about love are a favorite theme for me. It is always wonderful reading to our children about just how much we adore them. Unsurprisingly, there are a lot of books for babies and toddlers about love! These books include some classic favorites as well as some beautiful modern books. Many share a similar style of poetically convincing our children just how much we love them.

It is nearly the Jewish holiday of Tu BiShvat (the new year and birthday for trees!) so our bookshelf is filled with books about trees. There are so many wonderful tree inspired books I wanted to share them in a blog post. Whether or not you celebrate Tu BiShvat these are great books. They are perfect for Earth Day, Arbor Day, or just because you want some books about trees!

Do you have a toddler who loves construction? I do! This blog post goes through some favorite books about construction that are loved by our toddler! Some are Montessori-aligned and some less so, but all of them are well-loved by my construction-obsessed toddler.

If you’re about to welcome your second (or third or fourth or…) child, congrats! Welcoming a new sibling is such an exciting but huge transition. One of my top tips for easing that transition is to read books about a new sibling. This blog post shares my favorite books about welcoming a new sibling. My preference, especially when using books to prepare for a big event is realistic books- bonus points for real pictures. These are our favorites including ones we used to prepare my son and a few that have come out since then.

Looking for the best Hanukkah books for your baby, toddler, or preschooler? This post shares some of our most beloved Chanukah books. These are absolute favorites and ones we treasure each year in our home.