The Book Basket's Author Feature: Lois Ehlert
Good books to share in April
Happy Spring!
Sometimes it takes a bit of genius to keep your little people’s hands amused. What am I saying? All of the time it takes some genius to do that. The books I’ve gathered this month might inspire your little ones to do some cutting and pasting of their own. Once you’ve gathered these titles, pull out your colorful cardstock and scissors, and let the kids imitate the artwork on these pages. Little kids will love the shapes and simple language; older ones will enjoy seeing what the pictures are actually made of. Ehlert’s illustrations frequently use things like yarn, hardware, and everyday household objects to form her images.
I’ve wanted to feature Lois Ehlert’s work here for a long time because she uses the most basic shapes and colors to produce something magical. You may have seen her before on my autumn list or this list of Keller favorites (she illustrated Chicka Chicka Boom Boom). You’ll find the titles below more specific towards spring, but stay till the end for some of our other season’s honorable mentions by Ehlert.
The earth laughs in flowers. – Ralph Waldo Emerson
Waiting for Wings. As you might have guessed, this title is all about butterflies. The book shows all the stages of butterfly development, from egg to full-grown butterfly. It also features different breeds of butterflies and flowers. This one would be a great companion to planting a butterfly garden!
Planting a Rainbow. Red tulips, orange poppies, yellow marigolds, green ferns, blue hyacinths, and purple irises make a rainbow! This book takes the reader through the stages of planting bulbs, seeds, and seedlings of all colors, resulting in a rainbow to enjoy all summer long.
Growing Vegetable Soup. This title is very similar to Planting a Rainbow, except this time around, we’re growing vegetables of all shapes, colors, and sizes. At the end, we have a pot of delicious homegrown soup to enjoy!
Color Farm and Color Zoo. Color Zoo won a Caldecott Honor in 1989. Both of these titles have a unique progression through the pages. As the reader turns the page, a new shape is revealed on the left, while a new animal is revealed on the right.
Here are some other Ehlert titles for you to enjoy at other times of the year:
Red & Green (a Christmas title)
Nuts to You! (all about squirrels)
Holey Moley (all about moles)
Snowballs (the joy of a snow day)
Rrralph (for the love of a noisy dog)
A note on purchase links: I’m a happy supporter of independent bookshops, so the links I provide will almost always go to my affiliate link at bookshop.org. For my local readers, I heartily recommend you buy them through our favorite, Goldberry Books, but you might have a shop closer to you. Of course, you can always find these selections on That Big Website That Ships Quickly, But Not As Quickly as It Used To, and Remember How They Sucked Us All In By Being a Bookstore to Begin With? I’m also a big fan of saving money and patronizing your local library. Happy reading!
😊Brought back precious memories for me.
It’s only within the past month that I paid attention to who illustrated Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, and realized I’d been paying attention to her for years—we still have the board book Color Zoo. I’ve loved it since it was gifted to us for our firstborn.