Forget Goodnight Moon. I’m here to tell you that the most hypnotic, soothing book ever written is Maurice Sendak’s Chicken Soup With Rice: A Book of Months. There is no eating of chicken soup going on in our mostly-vegetarian household, but nearly every night I knock my daughter out with this collection of twelve sweetly surreal little rhymes. This copy survived a similar role in my own childhood. Researching the book just now, I notice that Carole King evidently made it into a song, but I refuse to listen to it! I just don’t want anything to displace the way it has always sounded to me.
I suspect you won’t often find this on the Golden Book rack at your grocery store, although it was reprinted in 2008. Another gem from my 1970’s youth, Little Mommy paints a scandalously outdated portrait of motherhood. And yet I read it to Sonja all the time. She is not at all confused or suprised by its cliches, because it perfectly mirrors our own day-to-day existence. I’m at home washing dishes, clothes, and babies, and Daddy is off at work. I was once a modern woman – how did this happen? At any rate, the pictures are gorgeous… …so I just try to provide a little context as I read. Also, the little girl looks just like Sonja. I am a new convert to The Pigeon. Many friends have tried to hype the Mo Willems Pigeon books to me, but Don’t Let The Pigeon Drive The Bus was read to us at a library storytime in a very uninspired manner, and I just wasn’t having any more of it. And then, after battling later and later bedtimes with Sonja, I picked up Don’t Let The Pigeon Stay Up Late. Although it does nothing to help her sleep, we have a ball re-reading this page a bazillion times: