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35 days until Christmas said the sign when I went to the supermarket today! Time to start stressing about Christmas presents not bought and fitting the many parties in. At least it means we can start reading Christmas books! I have always loved the tradition of having books that are just read at Christmas and I can remember dragging them all out of the shelves when I was little and reading them at night by the tree.

One recent Christmas book that I love is Mortimer’s Christmas Manger. Mortimer is a mouse who lives in a house occupied by a family, he occupies a hole that is cold and just not very comfortable. It’s when he ventures out to look for a new home that he comes across the manger and nativity scene that the family have set up beside their Christmas tree. Mortimer promptly moves all the statues out of the little barn, including rolling the baby Jesus out of the manger and snuggling himself up in the hay. He loves his new house but is annoyed that each day the family reassembles the Christmas scene; that is until he hears the family reading the Christmas story together and realises who the baby is and what he means to the world.

© Jane Chapman

Although this is a story essentially about the nativity, it is done in a very gentle and subtle way, it’s not in your face and is quite a lovely quirky introduction to the traditional Christmas story. I love its humour, with Mortimer rolling baby Jesus out of the manger every night so he can sleep in the hay and Jane Chapman’s illustrations are just so divinely cute that Mortimer is irresistible.

||Karma Wilson’s gorgeous website||

||Mortimer’s Christmas Manger available online from Amazon||

When I was little we lived for two years in the UK, and amongst the books of my childhood are many very English books. Ernest Owl Starts a School and Postman Joe are two such books and are part of the Blackberry Farm series by Jane Pilgrim, first published in the early 1950s. They are amazingly timeless stories, and the pen and watercolour illustrations by F. Stocks May are beautifully vibrant. The illustration style is very realistic, and detailed. This accuracy makes the lovely additions of clothes on Mrs Nibble the rabbit, and her children, very charming. (Curiously, the rabbits, squirrels and mice are the only animals who wear clothes, although Ernest the Owl sports spectacles and Postman Joe a satchel.)

The books tell stories of life on the farm which is owned by Mr and Mrs Smiles and their children, Joy and Bob. But the main stars of the show are the animals, which include typical northern hemisphere robins and squirrels as well as the all the usual farm crew.

In a sign of the books’ era, Postman Joe tells the story of the arrival of a new animal to the farm: the Large Red Animal - an animal which breathes out smoke as it crawls along the lane. The illustration shows that this animal is in fact what we know is a tractor. Through the illustration of the family standing proudly around the Large Red Animal, and from the other animals’ reactions, you can immediately relate to the novelty of such a vehicle.

Of course there are plenty of baby animals among the residents of the farm, which is why Ernest Owl decides to start a school. I think Ernest was a very progressive teacher for the 1950s, because he structured his lessons for individual learning needs, and even designed tasks to suit personal motivations of his students: Mary Hen was taught to count marbles so that she could tell how many eggs her mother had laid! And meanwhile the bunnies learnt to write the letters of their names.

I love the way the narrative in these books includes lovely asides. When we are first introduced to Mrs Nibble’s three little bunnies, we are told they had been ‘in bed with the measles, but they would soon be better.’ Jane Pilgrim includes some gorgeous details which make the scenes believable, such as the pot-plants which are used for stools in Ernest’s school.

A few years ago, a collection of the Blackberry Farm stories were re-released in a compendium, The Complete Tales of Blackberry Farm, which is available from Amazon. This format doesn’t seem nearly as nice to hold in your hand - especially a small hand - as the individual volumes, but happily ensures a new generation of children will know and love these characters.

Written in 1977 by Shirley Hughes, Dogger is a timeless classic, especially in my heart. Dogger is about a toy dog, “a soft brown toy dog…with his fur worn in places because he was quite old. He belonged to Dave.” Dave takes Dogger everywhere and he is his special toy. Dave’s baby brother Joe is teething so he likes hard toys to bite and Dave’s big sister Bella (I love that name) takes seven teddies to bed every night but Dave only wants Dogger.

One day Dogger goes missing and turns up for sale on the toy table at the school fete. A little girl buys him much to Dave’s horror and he cries and cries until big sister Bella comes to the rescue swapping her lovely big new teddy with the little girl in return for Dogger.

I think what I really loved about this picture book was the reality of the story for me. My little brother had a toy Snoopy that he loved carrying around with him and I can remember cramming my bed with teddies, making sure each one was snug. Bella’s kindness has really stuck with me all these years, such an incredible thing for a big sister to do, to give up her wonderful new prize to get Dogger back.

Warmth radiates from Shirley Hughes’ illustrations, I love Mum with her cool ’70s head scarf and the ‘Darlek’ costume at the fancy dress parade. The double page spread of an aeriel view of the fete is mesmerising, the bunting flapping in the breeze and fresh sponges on the cake table. Her illustrations actually barely need words because the expressions of the characters are so perfect that they convey every emotion, this is equally apparent in her wordless picture book Up and Up, which I posted about here.

But don’t for one minute think that this book is outdated; Dogger is endearing every time I read it and I hope in a couple of years Ned will really enjoy it too. (It is quite texty so will probably be better for him when he is over two). I also know he will identify with Dave and his special toy, Ned has Hutch! This is an old photo of them together when Hutch looked new…

Dogger won the Kate Greenaway Medal, awarded for distinguished illustration in 1977. If you love/loved Dogger too, read this wonderful interview Shirley gave to the Guardian last year about the real life Dogger.

My dear friend Nicci, who has impeccable taste in kids’ books, recommended Follow the Line by Laura Ljungkvist in a comment on this blog.

The latest book in the same series, Follow the Line Around the World was released in the US in May and is due out in Australia next month.

The concept at the heart of these books is one of those deceptively simple ideas that is very, very clever. The illustrations are based around a single continuous line that winds its way through the entire book to form a multitude of objects: buildings, faces, vehicles and animals. As a wise commissioning editor once taught me, sometimes the simplest forms of expression are the subject of a great deal of effort and thought. I’m sure that principle is true for the artwork in these books.

As a reader, you can’t help but obey the book’s title, and follow the line with your finger across each double-spread as it forms skyscrapers, sailing boats, fish, trees and more. Behind the main line sit flat shapes in bold retro colours, filling in selected detail. A typewriter font and lovely matt paper add to the retro impression. Sometimes I hold a book in my hands and am just so happy to count it as my own, and Follow the Line is one of these! As Nicci commented, this is a book that bears repeat reading, and will be especially appreciated by design-conscious mums and dads.

The author’s website illustrates the line in motion and is good fun.

Don’t forget to enter our current competition to be eligible to win a gorgeous book backpack – entries close shortly!

One of the things I used to love about working in bookstores was when new boxes arrived from publishers. It was like Christmas every month, the anticipation and the joy of finding out what was inside.

Now I get that feeling when I walk into a bookshop to see what is new on the shelves and also when I’m browsing the internet, checking out other peoples blogs for new and exciting books.

A couple of days a go I came across Suzy Lee on Amazon. The book is Wave and it is wordless.

Suzy Lee is amazing and I must now have Wave on my bookshelf; have a look at her website here to learn more about this very gorgeous artist.

Wordless picture books are of course an art because the whole story must be conveyed convincingly in the illustrations. They are very important in education for prompting children to learn how to interpret stories and also to recognise a beginning, middle and end in story telling. Wordless books are great at home as well; younger children can enjoy explaining what is happening in the illustrations and older children can take it further by imagining alternate endings and additional plot lines. Wordless picture books are rewarding.

weheartbooks top 5 wordless picture books

1. Up and Up (Shirley Hughes)

I love Shirley Hughes and one of my favorite books as a child was Dogger, or David and the Dog as it is known in the USA (I’ll post about that one another time). She is one of the best known children’s author/illustrators in the world. Set out in comic strip style Up and Up consists of black line drawings against a sepia background. The story of a little girl who longs to fly, it is purely magical as you follow her journey: she gets her wish and off she goes up and up. Her personality is infectious and she always makes me smile as she drifts along until she is finally rescued by a man in a hot air balloon. There is so much to look at in this book which makes it a great tool for encouraging children to make up their own stories. It doesn’t even have to be about the main character, you could make up different stories for the others she meets along the way. Ages 3+

2. The Arrival (Shaun Tan)

Well I just think this award winning book is incredible, in fact Shaun Tan is incredible. The Arrival depicts the journey of a man who leaves home for a strange, fantastical land in order to support his family. The hundreds of drawings Tan worked on for this stunning book are partly a reflection of his own father’s journey to Australia and his struggle to fit into an alien culture. More than a book The Arrival is an awe-inspiring artwork; every time I pick it up I find new and amazing elements that I had missed before. Ages 8+

3. The Snowman (Raymond Briggs)

Regarded as a cult classic this picture book tells a story in pictures - 175 frames to be exact - of the one night friendship of a boy and his snowman. The boy lovingly creates the man out of snow and when he looks out of his window that night he discovers the snowman is alive. They take each other on a tour of their worlds, the boy of his house and the snowman of his wintery world. In the morning when the boy wakes up the snowman is gone, he has melted and all that is left are pieces of coal. This book is all about the joy of exploring and discovering new things, it is about new friendships and then the fond memories of those friendships. This book really does give children the opportunity to imagine their own ending to the story. 4+

4. Sunshine and Moonlight (Jan Omerod)

These are favorites of mine from childhood, I can remember borrowing them from the school library numerous times. In the last few years they have been re-published and are just as beautiful as I remember them way back in primary school. Sunshine follows the progression of a little girl’s day as she gets up out of bed and begins her daily routine. My favorite scenes are when she hops into bed with her parents while they read their morning papers; everyone in this house has a routine and they all fit into each other’s. Toddlers can compare their routine in the morning before childcare/preschool with this little girl’s. Jan includes so much detail that this is perfect for beginning discussion with children about their own routines. Sunshine won the Australian Children’s Book of the Year Award in 1982. Moonlight is similar to Sunshine but of course follows the routine on the other end of the day; cleaning teeth, bathtime and bed. Ages 2+

5. Tuesday (David Wiesner)

Reading Tuesday is like watching an M. Night Shyamalan film; it is weird, quirky, funny and enthralling. On this particular Tuesday around 8 in the evening a strange thing begins to happen, suddenly frogs/toads start to invade the town levitating on lily pads and seemingly having a great time. The frogs eventually return to their rightful homes BUT the big surprise is what is going to happen on the following Tuesday? Tuesday won the prestigious Caldecott Medal and Wiesner’s amazing speech is here. I love this quote from that speech

Fortunately, kids know funny when they see it. If, after reading Tuesday one evening before bed, they look out the window and see frogs flying by—well, we should all be so lucky.

Wiesner’s art is incredible and I can guarantee that parents will love this as much as their children. Ages 4+

Although we have used some very classic choices here there is also room for a special mention for the fantastic wordless books by wonderful Australian illustrator Gregory Rogers, The Boy, the Bear, the Baron and the Bard and sequel Midsummer Knight. Ages 6+

What a sweet surprise!

My good friend Nancy, a collage artist you must visit, has given me this "You Make Me Smile" award. If she hadn't given it to me I would have been sending it to her. She brings light and laughter to all with her creative and delightful collages. Since she already has this I am passing it on to Sherry and Amy whose blogs always bring a smile to me and so many others. All of these Blogs deserve a visit and you will not be disappointed.