You’re My Little Baby, keeps the classics coming from Eric Carle

Eric Carle is an institution. When people mention board books for infants The Very Hungry Caterpillar is one of the first that they’ll say. His illustrations are some of the first styles of art that kids will recognize. If Sandra Boynton is the queen of board books then Eric Carle is the godfather. Thankfully, this is a friendly competition and the only horses that’ll be seen will be at the farm or playing with other critters who are there to amuse crawlers. From the World of Eric Carle comes You’re My Little Baby. This board book has the hallmark look of classic Carle but adds touch-and-feel or other interactive elements that will further make those crawlers learn to love to read.

It is for the love of reading. If you can get your child to love to read they’ll be blessed with a hobby that can last a lifetime, enhance their grades, and introduce them to new worlds. When our oldest was crawling around on the floor he was especially keen on Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do you See? He would go towards that book wherever it was and thumb through the pages. One of our family’s favorite pictures of him as a baby was him simply looking lovingly at the book while he’s laying on his stomach.

That is the reaction that you want to see in a board book. You’re My Little Baby is classic Eric Carle that parents will save in their forever library for when their children are older and have kids of their own. The only thing that could prevent that is having the book chewed to shreds by teething small people. To that end, the high-quality construction of board books has improved since our oldest was reading them. The pages are still board, but they’re much stronger than they used to be and have a spine that’s just as durable. 

The thing to watch out for in interactive board books are the interactive elements. There are a couple of lift-the-flap aspects in You’re My Little Baby. I see a baby bear hiding behind a green bush and a mother cat who’s teaching her kitten to play with a ball. Both of these flaps are durable and built to last. The other pages have shiny, reflective touches on the animals, cotton that makes up the body of a lamb, and so forth.

As I write this, the same crawler who would seek out Brown Bear about ten years ago came into the room to get some water. He saw You’re My Little Baby open to the lamb, with its fluffy, cotton jammed belly, and said: “oooh, so fluffy”. He also gamely sat next to me and asked to read it. I don’t know why he wanted to read it. Regardless, I took it as a parenting win and chalked it up to them all but having to walk on books when they were babies. If you’ve got a newborn then do yourself a favor, load up on quality board books and You’re My Little Baby is a great place to start.

You’re My Little Baby is a touch-and-feel book from the World of Eric Carle on Simon & Schuster.

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