Your favorite kids' books that no one else has heard of

[citymama]

What are the books that you've loved for your kids but rarely ever seen elsewhere? So, not Goodnight Moon and Brown Bear, Brown Bear, but less known books that get a lot of love in your household. Bonus points if you haven't seen them in the kids section in the library either!

I'm pretty bored of our toddler books, so I'm looking for recommendations for books I may not have heard of!

I'll start off with a few.
For toddlers:
--The Great Escape of Marvin the Ape
--Handa's Hen - Eileen Browne
--Handa's Surprise (both books set in Kenya about a little Kenyan girl; both my kids have LOVED these. I've never seen them elsewhere.)
-- A Was Once an Apple Pie, verse by Edward Lear, illustrated by Suse MacDonald (both my kids have started to make nonsense rhymes at around 18 months, thanks to this book!)
--Mommy's Bed/La Cama de Mama - we have this in Spanish. It is about 3 kids and their mom, who I'm pretty sure is a single mom even though the book doesn't overtly say so.

For 3-5 year olds:
--Fly High, Fly Low - Don Freeman (set in San Francisco)
--Ernst - Elisa Kleven (or anything by her; her artwork is amazing)

What about your favorites?

[hillview]

He Came with the Couch
http://www.amazon.com/He-Came-Couch-...3538747&sr=8-1

ALL the Mo Willems books (bet you've heard of this!)

Not a Box
http://www.amazon.com/Not-Box-Antoin...3538918&sr=1-1

The Napping House
http://www.amazon.com/The-Napping-Ho...3539015&sr=1-1

Click Clack Moo
http://www.amazon.com/Click-Clack-Mo...ef=pd_sim_b_85

[lovebebes]

anything by Charlotte Zolotow. Her books are a treasure.

I especially love:

"When I have a little girl"
"I like to be little"
"Over and over"
"I have a horse of my own"

[elbenn]

A few books that we love that are not very common:

Cake Girl
http://www.amazon.com/Cake-Girl-Davi...3553099&sr=1-1

I Am the King
http://www.amazon.com/I-Am-The-King-...3553061&sr=1-2

John, Paul, George, & Ben
http://www.amazon.com/John-Paul-Geor...3553137&sr=1-1

[Seitvonzu]

my child also LOVES john, paul, george and ben her daddy (a revolutionary period fanatic) loves it too

our "weird" book is
The Book of Beasts
http://www.amazon.com/The-Book-Beast...3569702&sr=8-2

i bought it at the library. it is LONG. words and words and words. lucy would have us read it EVERY night for a while-- between about 2.5 and 3. i have NO idea why

Mary and the mouse, the mouse and Mary
http://www.amazon.com/Mary-Mouse-The...3569766&sr=1-1

we also have when i was a little girl... ours flips over and it's "when i was a little boy" -- my little girl loves both sides (plus it's like getting a bonus book because we can't read one with out the other!)

we have tons of beatrix potter-- "lesser knowns" we like include "ginger and pickles" and "two bad mice"

i feel like we have lots of weird books-- often i pick them up from the "for sale" rack at the library

[gobadgers]

The mood is silly in our house right now so these books are popular. I don't think any are rare but they were all new to me in the past month or so. I'm on my phone so can't link right now, sorry.

Duck on a Bike - David Shannon

Interrupting Chicken -

Tacky the Penguin

Falling for Rapunzel

[SnuggleBuggles]

My Monster Mama Loves Me So
http://www.amazon.com/My-Monster-Mam...3575491&sr=1-1

[hellokitty]

The Monkey King folktale. This is a famous Chinese folktale, so Chinese ppl know of it, but your typical American doesn't. My mom read us these books in Chinese. The English version is very abbreviated compared to the Chinese version, so I've read a few different ones to my kids, who love the series (they were very excited to meet monkey king at epcot at WDW!), but I feel like the story was so much better in Chinese.

Barbapapa series. Theses were some of my favorite books as a kid. I found one at a thrift store a couple of yrs ago and grabbed it up. My kids love it too. It was ahead of it's time with its environmental message.

The Happy Hollisters Series. I read this when I was in 5th grade one summer and LOVED it. It's a mystery series about a family of brothers and sisters. I have not been able to locate these books, I only found the first one at a random used book sale. HOWEVER, I have an online friend who found almost the entire set, by accident for a few bucks at a library used book sale. She got the set, b/c she remembered me raving about it. So far, it doesn't look like her kids are into the set, so she said she is going to send them to me when she gets a chance! I'm super excited about it, lol.

I also love the Danny Dunn and Encyclopedia Brown series as a kid.

[ett]

We really like "Quiet! There's a Canary in the Library" by Don Freeman and lots of his other lesser known books. I've found probably 10-15 of them in the library.

The Hairy Maclairy series by Lynley Dodd.

Press Here by Herve Tullet

The Blueberry Pie Elf by Jane Thayer

Where is the Cake? and Where is the Cake Now? by T. T. Khing (great wordless books)

Who's Hiding by Satoru Onishi

The Dot/Ish/Rose's Garden by Peter Reynolds

[connor_mommy]

This was my favorite when the boys were younger: http://www.amazon.com/How-Kind-Mary-...3580409&sr=8-1