Wednesday 5 March 2014

World Book Day: Touch and Feel books



Happy World Book Day!

Since we had the Mini Grumpy Egyptian, I have found there is less and less time for me to sit down with a good book and relax. It seems as though I'm constantly cleaning, feeding, changing or trying to entertain her. I believe it is really important to instil a love of reading in little ones from a young age and in order to make me feel as though I am still reading, have read to the mini one since she was born. In her play area there is a small tub of board books that she is able to access herself and a book is part of our bedtime routine. While classics like The Hungry Caterpillar and Inch Wincy Spider puppet books are regulars, the Mini Grumpy Egyptian's favourite stories are without doubt the touch and feel books.


Charity shops and second-hand sales have been great at picking up copies of the fantastic "That's not my..." series and our favourites are the monkey, dinosaur and Princess books. They are great for a curious ten month old baby as they are short enough to keep her interested and with lots of different textures to feel.

I have noticed though that there are a lot of bad touch and feel books out there that feel as though the author just threw a couple of random textures down without paying much thought as to whether they have anything to do with the story or feel interesting enough to touch. When they are charging £5+ for a book, they need to be much better than this. My least favourite are the touch and feel books that don't have a story and just follow a general theme such as animals.

Our favourite book however is one the Mini Grumpy Egyptian got for Christmas and that is the my First Gruffalo -  Touch and feel. It is brilliant and comes complete with stick wart, felt spikes, furry stomach and gritty teeth. We can read this a couple of times a night and the mini one is as happy reading it the third time as she was the first. If you were looking to introduce a touch and feel book to your little one, I would suggest this is a great start. The book itself feels solid, durable and fantastic quality. Despite a number of tugs on the felt spikes, they show no signs of coming loose.
The next book we plan to add too up collection is the Peter Rabbit touch and feel. Can you suggest anymore? What books did you read with your ten month old? Did you allow them to free play with the books at this age or wait until they are older.

50 comments:

  1. we loved the that's not my series when 6yo was a toddler

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  2. We used to love those 'That's not my...' books. We had loads of them at one point x x

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    1. I stupidly saw someone selling 20 or so of them in fantastic condition for £15 and didn't get them. So annoyed with myself now as the mini one adores them.

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  3. We used to have lots of the touch and feel books when my middle children were younger. I used to love touching them as much as the children!

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    1. Haha I know right! I am the same with the Gruffalo book. The sticky wart makes me cringe.

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  4. My oldests first book was That's not my teddy!

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  5. We have lots of the touch and feel books - I think they're lovely! I haven't seen the gruffalo one but that looks great!

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    1. Honestly it is amazing! A little more expensive than most of the touch and feel books I have seen, but we can read it over and over again and the mini one just adores it.

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    1. I got myself a Gruffalo notebook the other day, but haven't the courage to use it at an upcoming job interview!

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  7. Oh gosh those were the days, lovely post! Our daughter is three now but we loved the "that's not my..." series - this monkey one was one of the favourites. As was the touch and feel Gruffalo too. I say she loved these books, she's just got them out again!

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    1. Thanks :) Monkey was one of our bedtime stories tonight. I just love watching the mini one's face when she touches them. At first she does it so gently and then once she realises it feels different is all over it!

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  8. That's not my puppy was one of our absolute favourites when my children were small. The series seems to be endless!

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    1. There are so many! Some are better than others - That's not my car seems rather lame haha.

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  9. We love the Gruffalo, we've also got a couple of the That's Not My... books they're great :-)

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    1. I just love how they encourage the little one to be interactive with books rather than seeing them as something we just read.

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  10. We love the 'that's not my..' Books, we have about 12 of them now. One of my first ever blog posts was about those books http://wp.me/p4nkQU-15

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    1. Thanks for sharing that link. We love that's not my dinosaur. By we... I mean me ;)

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  11. Any books that are touchy-feely are great for babies - used to read them with my son all the time, and now with my niece x

    I recently posted: Things To Do For Free In Essex: Hainault Forest Country Park

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    1. Anything interactive like this can only be great for their development right!

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  12. We've got one of those books, they are great x

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    1. I love them. Have been keeping an eye out in the charity shops for some recently. Hoping some good copies appear soon.

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  13. That's not my... book are well loved in our house too!

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    1. Yay! What are your favourites?

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    2. We are stuck on the hamster, fairy and reindeer ones at the moment!

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  14. We love 'touchy feely' books and I don't think you can beat the 'That's not my...' series.

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    1. You need to have a look at The Gruffalo one. It is great!

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  15. My daughter has been dressed up for world book day :)

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    1. I was tempted to dress the mini one up for Rhyme Time today, but my local library wasn't doing anything to mark the occasion and she is only 10 months old so decided to contain myself. For this year at least!

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  16. We had loads of the Thats Not My... series when my two were babies. Just got rid of them all now and they've been replaced with Thomas and Friends books. Aahh.

    I'm running a blog hop over here: http://imcountingufoz.com/blog/world-book-day-6521 for World Book Day - I'd love for you to link up x

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    1. Got to love a spot of Thomas! My brother is trying to get the Mini Grumpy Egyptian to become a fan of Fireman Sam. Isn't working so good. Have linked up :) thanks for the comment x

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  17. F would have loved My first Gruffalo when he was little, here's hoping for another little one so I can buy it. x

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    1. I say buy it anyway! It is so much fun :)

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  18. My 2 year old still loves these books :)

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    1. I hope the mini one loves them for years to come :)

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  19. Oooh, we loved the 'That's not my...' books. ...Dinosaur was a particular favourite, but ...Tractor too :D

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    1. Dinosaur is great! We have lots of dinosaurs in our house - I was a Jurassic Park addict as a kid - so that book was a must buy!

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  20. The Usbourne "That's Not My..." books are great and I haven't heard of the Gruffalo one so I will definitely look out for it. After "That's Not My" we moved onto the Usbourne "Noisy" books as the little one liked to press the buttons as we read along. Sometimes the buttons can be tricky to press and you might need to help but they were a real hit in our house. Puppet books are also great and we love "Snuggle Bunny" for bedtime cuddles. There is so much choice x

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    1. Puppet books are good too aren't they. We have Very Hungry Caterpillar, Hickory Dickory Dock and Incy Wincy Spider ones. I do like the noisy books too, but find it irritating a lot of them don't have a way for you to replace the battery later on. M&S did a great range of noisy books (Wheels on the Bus, Row Row Row Your Boat, etc) around Christmas where you can change the battery when it runs out. x

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  21. We still love the touchy feely books and have a lot of them from animals to trucks. LO is into lift the flap books now. He's always since a baby had a low shelf so he could help himself and still does that now.

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    1. We have started to look at lift the flap books, but I don't think the mini one is really able to appreciate them just yet. Will keep trying :)

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  22. I love touchy feely books and we have "thats not my monkey too" - eliza still loves it now

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  23. We loved all our touchy feely books. J still likes to read them once in a while. The 'That's Not My...' series is just brilliant for little ones.

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  24. We always had a basket of board books on offer for the kids when they were babies. It's great for kids to get used to books and learn to love them from when they're tiny.

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  25. I've read to all mine from birth as well and they all have a love of reading. We're nearly drowning in books in this house and I still plan on going to the charity shop on Monday because they've reduced all their books to 20p each! I'm so excited!

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  26. I ALWAYS allowed mine to play with books. Despite being a destructive little pair of monkeys, because I read to them loads I think they realised that books were precious - so we've never had any problems with ripping pages etc.

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  27. I love hunting charity shops for new books... makes our collection bigger at fracture of a price... and helps others at the same time :-)

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  28. Touch and feel books were key when we were trying to get Miss J interested in books. For JD it was pop up books that captured his early interest. He ripped them all to shreds with over-enthusiastic grabbing, lol, but he loved them.

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