On a recent trip to the grocery/everything-in-the-world-you-might-ever-need, store (a.k.a. Super Wal-Mart), my Madilyn was told she could get a *surprise* if she behaved throughout the shopping trip. Hey, I'm not too proud to bribe a three year old to be good on a grocery shopping trip! Madi has plenty of silly, cheap, played-with-once-and-tossed-aside toys. Madilyn's surprise would be a book, which she was thrilled about. Every night at bedtime, we read two books with our nightly tuck-in and kisses. We've both memorized the Humping Ladybug (see my recent Epinion on "Ladybugs and Other Insects" http://www.epinions.com/content_361804435076) and her "Finding Nemo" ("Nemo is lost..so I swim and I swim..my journey begins, as I search for him..."OY!) books, so it was time for something new.

Of course, the first several books that Madilyn picked out had nothing to do with having a good story line, or looking like an interesting book. The first several she picked were those parent-dreaded toys/stickers on the front page books. Does anyone actually read those particular books to their children?? I know with us, the toys or stickers are removed to be played with, and the books may as well just disappear at that point.

After some serious coaxing (and threats of getting NOTHING AT ALL), Madilyn was given the choice between "Brown Bear, Brown Bear" and "Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed", by Eileen Christelow. Since her nick-name happens to be "Little Monkey", she thought that book looked the coolest.

The main thing I liked about the book is that the pages weren't jam-packed with words. For bedtime stories, we like short and simple books. If the books are too long, not only does it just delay sleep-time, but she's usually so tired her attention span is almost non-existent. There is only one sentence on each of the fourteen heavy cardboard pages. That's a huge plus.

The illustrations in the book are cute. They are sort of pencil drawn, nothing really elaborate. No real bold colors. The book mainly draws the attention to the repetition of the story as opposed to having colorful, busy pictures to look at.

After about the fourth night of reading this book, Madilyn decided she wanted to read the book to me. We read the words, then count the number of monkeys that go along with each sentence. For example, after "Five little monkeys brushed their teeth..", we count each of the five monkeys that are brushing their teeth. I find it interesting that there are always, "One, two, three, six, eight.." monkeys.

The story in Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed is simple enough. The monkeys get ready for bed, say goodnight to their Mama, then start goofing around, jumping on the bed, falling off, bumping their heads...Mama calls the doctor, he says for the little monkeys to stop jumping on the bed..do they listen? Nooooo...so each page is minus one monkey, until all five monkeys have fallen off and bumped their heads, causing poor Mama to stay up the whole night making phone call after phone call to the doctor. Of course, after Monkey number five bumps his head and Mama calls the doctor yet again, the doctors getting a little ticked off at this point. He actually yells at Mama, the whole sentence in bold letters, "No more monkeys jumping on the bed"!

We read this story every night, and though it gets somewhat repetitive itself (thank GAWD there are only five monkeys, not 100), the book is very cute and just long enough to keep Madilyn's attention, and just short enough for me to not get too annoyed with the repetition.

Recommended:
Yes