Two books celebrating snow!

Waiting for Snow
by Marsha Diane Arnold; illus. by Renata Liwska
32 pages; ages 4-7
HMH Books for Young Readers, 2016

themes: winter, friendship, humor

Hedgehog found Badger staring at the sky.
"What are you doing, Badger?"
"Waiting for snow..."

It's winter and not one single snowflake has fallen. Badger gets tired of waiting. He decides to wake up the sky. He tries dancing. He tries other things...

What I Like LOVE about this book: the illustrations that show some of the things badger and his friends do while waiting for snow: origami, scrabble... there are more, but I don't want to spoil the fun you'll have when you read this book.

Pizza-Pie Snowman
by Valeri Gorbachev
32 pages; ages 4 - 7
Holiday House, 2016

Pinky had a job to do for Mommy - to get a pizza with all their favorite toppings. He made a poem so he wouldn't forget...

Off he goes, through the snowy landscape to the Pizza shop. He doesn't stop when his friends try to entice him into a snowball fight. He doesn't stop when he gets covered with snow - in fact, he doesn't even notice. Because Pinky is on a mission.

What I like about this book: the humor! Pinky is so focused on remembering the list of toppings that he doesn't stop to investigate when he hears people talking about a walking snowman. He doesn't stop to find out about the talking snowman. Until later, after he's delivered the pizza to Mommy - then he wants to go see this wonderful, unusual sight.

Beyond the Books:

If you were waiting for snow, what kind of things would you do to wake up the sky? Would you sing a special snow song? Make noise to loosen up the clouds? Dance? Come up with some ideas for making it snow. Here's a video of the Northern Utes doing a snow dance.

Make up a game that you could play while waiting for snow.

Create a rhyme for things you have to remember. Like pizza toppings, or ingredients for cookies, or things you need to take to school, or....

Build a pizza pie snowman - if you've got snow. If you don't, then draw a picture of one. Or make one out of pizzas.... be creative!

Today is PPBF (perfect picture book Friday), an event in which bloggers share great picture books at Susanna Leonard Hill's site. She keeps an ever-growing list of Perfect Picture Books. Review copies provided by publishers.