Frost Book Review – A Winter Animal Story

Eva received a copy of the Frost book to review last week, reissued and redesigned with a dazzling new cover! Frost is written by bestselling author Holly Webb and award-winning illustrator Britta Teckentrup. A perfect, read aloud, heart-warming winter tale full of wondrous animal adventure.

Frost Book Review

Frost Book – Eva’s Thoughts

Eva really enjoyed the illustrations throughout the book. Frost, a cute fox gets Cassie to follow him. She transports back to the Frost Fair on the frozen Thames which sounds really exciting too. She finds out Frost is a big sister and helps feed them with sausage rolls. Eva thinks this is lovely of Cassie as Frost needs her help.

Frost & Cassie - A Winter animal story

Frost 

Cassie’s neighbours all complain about the foxes hanging around the flat she lives in, close to the river Thames. Cassie thinks the foxes are beautiful though and has a favourite fox! A small fox with a white tail-tip Cassie calls Frost is her favourite. 

One night Cassie spots Frost looking cold and thin so she decides to sneak him some food. Frost wants her to follow him and leads Cassie towards the river where she feels the world change around her! She finds herself back in the 17th century- at the time of the Frost Fair on the frozen Thames. Cassie is thrilled by the sights and sound of the famous fair, then she glimpses a fox with a white tail-tip! 

Frost wants Cassie to follow him again, can she find a way to return Frost to his countryside home? 

New Series! – Our Favourite Books This Week

We decided to start a new series of Our favourite books this week back up for summer! The girls are always discovering new books at the library as well as books we are sent to review and those we discover in shops.

New Series! Our Favourite Books This Week

New Series!

Things got a little busy over the last year so we haven’t had much time to cover our favourite books each week. Everything has finally calmed down and we have plenty of time for a new series again. We love to discuss and share our thoughts on the books we find again! We decided it was the perfect time to start a new series of ‘Our Favourite Books This Week’.

 

Eva’s Favourite Books This Week

With the library holding the summer reading challenge it has inspired Eva to look for a new series after reading all of the Harry Potter books. We came across the Araminta Spook series which Eva was instantly drawn to. She is very much like me and enjoys anything with magic, vampires, ghouls etc.

Araminta Spook Book Series

Eva picked up 3 books she had spotted from the Araminta Spook series to try. When we got home she quickly read them all, one after the other! She managed 2 in one night and the 3rd the next morning. Eva’s favourite book from this series was Skeleton Island because they find jewels and trick Nosey Nora!

You might also be interested in St Grizzle’s School for Girls, Gremlins and Pesky Guests

Eva was also sent a few books to review from Little Tiger this month and she has already read St Grizzles School For Girls, Gremlins And Pesky Guests which you can read a full review here. Eva absolutely loves the St Grizzles Series and eagerly awaits the next book!

Izzy’s Favourite Books This Week

Izzy’s favourite book this week is Let’s Dance by Ann Bryant and Jakki Moore. Izzy finds it funny that Dolly’s dancing makes Harry excited which annoys Meg, his owner. Eventually, Dolly convinces Meg that dancing is fun and she joins in!

Let's Dance

 

Our Favourite Books This Week

Cock-a-doodle-poo! is by far our favourite book this week. Eva has taken to reading the story exactly how Steve Smallman read it on stage! This has Izzy in hysterics every single time and it even has adults giggling away. I honestly never thought I’d find a book that talks about poo the whole way through so amusing but it is written fantastically.

Cock-a-doodle-poo! by Steve Smallman

Octopants is our second favourite book this week, it’s another funny book about an octopus hunting pants! Have you ever seen octopants in shops before? This book is so colourful and well illustrated as well as fun to read which the girls have been reading together repeatedly!


Octopants written by Suzy Senior & Illustrated by Claire Powell

What are your children’s favourite books this week? Have you read any of these?

 

St Grizzle’s School For Girls, Gremlins And Pesky Guests

St Grizzle’s School For Girls, Gremlins And Pesky Guests was kindly sent to Eva to read and review. This is the fourth book in the series, written by Karen McCombie, illustrated by Becka Moor & published by Stripes, an imprint of the Little Tiger Group. This hilarious series follows Dani and her entertaining adventures at St Grizzle’s.

 

St Grizzle’s School For Girls, Gremlins And Pesky Guests


You might also be interested in St Grizzle’s School for Girls, Gremlins and Pesky Guests

A flood closes the village school so Dani’s fun & quirky headteacher Lulu invites the staff and pupils to join them at St Grizzle’s school. Dani & her friends can’t believe it, they bump into sneery Spencer and his annoying friends in the village enough as it is! Now, they will have to share lessons with them too, what could be worse?


Inside page of You might also be interested in St Grizzle’s School for Girls, Gremlins and Pesky Guests

It doesn’t take long for pupils to clash, there are constant pranks and even the teachers aren’t getting on! To top it all, St Grizzle’s school show rehearsals are underway and it’s turning into a disaster!

Eva’s Thoughts

The story is about Dani and her friends having to share St Grizzle’s School For Girls with the  Twittering primary school children. The Twittering primary school children try to make the school more sensible. My favourite part is when they were at Twittering primary school for their school fair. It is a really funny book with lots of silly pranks!

Twittering primary school fair

St Grizzle’s School For Girls, Gremlins And Pesky Guests is available on Amazon for £5.99. You can also find it in Waterstones and WHSmith.

If you haven’t read any of the St Grizzles series before you can read our previous reviews here:

St Grizzle’s School For Girls, Goats And Random boys – Book Review, St Grizzles School For Girls, Ghosts And Runaway Grannies, and St Grizzle’s School For Girls, Geeks And Tag-Along Zombies.

We love this series and think it’s a great book for children aged 7-9 years like Eva, who really enjoys quirky, funny story lines.

Do you know someone who would love to read this too?

Little Tiger Party At Kidzania London

We attended the Little Tiger Party at Kidzania London on Saturday and it was fantastic! Having attended Little Tigers Birthday party last year we were really excited to be invited this year too. The girls love Little Tiger books & they couldn’t wait to find out about new books & meet the authors and illustrators. Surprisingly Izzy remembered last year’s Little Tiger Party, the books & activities we took part in. When I told her we had been invited she was so excited!

Little Tiger Party at Kidzania

 

Little Tiger Party

The Little Tiger Party (#TigerPBParty) was held at Kidzania in London where they recently teamed up to create a Little Tiger Library. The library is within Kidzania, giving children a chance to discovers new authors and role play as a librarian too. We arrived a little after 9.30am and greeted by a lovely breakfast buffet. We soon moved into the Kidzania Theatre where several authors & illustrators were ready to tell us about their books.

Kidzania globe

Blue Monster Wants It All

Blue Monster Wants It All! By Jeanne Willis

First up was Jeanne Willis who Izzy mistook for the queen! Jeanne read her book ‘Blue Monster wants it all’ a fantastic story that leaves children with a positive message. Blue monster isn’t happy with anything and thinks he needs a new everything. Even as a baby he wanted everything new from a new pram to a new cuddly toy. I got so absorbed into the storyline that I accidentally forgot to get a picture of Jeanne Willis reading to us, oops!

Blue monster throws away anything old and demands a new replacement. He even get’s rid of all his old toys, family and even the sun! All in search of something newer, shinier & better only to find you can’t buy new friends and family. When Blue monster realises this he quickly repairs his old broken plane and flies back home to his old family! It’s so easy to get caught up with having to have everything new, especially for children these days. I love that there is a story like to help remind children of what is actually important! Such a lovely way to start the Little Tiger Party.

Octopants

Suzie Senior & Claire Powell talking about their new book - Octopants!

We then learnt the origin of the second book, Octopants written by Suzy Senior & illustrated by Claire Powell. Poor Octopus has no underpants and can’t find any, no matter how hard he tries! Luckily he eventually comes across a solution! This is a fun, colourful book for kids and both girls really enjoyed both the book & the presentation.

Octopants written by Suzy Senior & Illustrated by Claire Powell

We learnt the Octopants song which was pretty funny! We helped to come up with some new pant ideas for the octopus, from chicken pants & dinosaur pants to unicorn pants. There were several amusing suggestions leaving Claire to figure out how to turn the idea into pants.

Look Out! It’s A Dragon!

Look out, it's a dragon! By Jonny Lambert
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Next up, Jonny Lambert author of ‘Only Lonely Panda’ came on to the stage. He told us about Saffy the dragon in his new book ‘Look out! It’s a dragon!’ and how he created her. Jonny uses a process called scratch & tickle where he adds paint to his image and scrapes & dabs it with various items until he is happy with it. When he created Saffy he then tore a piece of card to create her belly & finishing the process. This gives Saffy a lovely texture & depth throughout the book.

Jonny Lambert explaining the 'Scratch & tickle' process.

Jonny also showed us how to make a 3D cardboard dragon, this led to Izzy having a slight hissy fit. Izzy thought the dragon story was written because of her Cardboard box dragon. Of course, this meant she wanted to be a helper on stage! She was quite upset at not being chosen but she was very pleased to catch up later on with Jonny. She found him in the Little Tiger library helping children colour & cut out their own dragon & they sat drawing for a while!

Jonny Lambery & Izzy colouring & drawing together.

Saffy isn’t like the other dragons & wants to find a lovely new home. She comes across one and tries to make friends. Everyone is scared of Saffy though as dragons have quite a reputation though & they tell her to go away. When the other dragons come along and ruin their lovely home, Saffy rescues everyone and takes them to a lovely new home.

Cock-A-Doodle-Poo!

Cock-a-doodle-poo! book - Little Tiger Books

The last book, Cock-A-Doodle-Poo was read out by author Steve Smallman who had all of us giggling! Who knew there was so much poo on a farmyard or just how funny a book about poo can actually be!? Rooster is causing a lot of mess & havoc on the farmyard, especially for farmer Jill, but apparently, poo can even be life-saving!

Cock-a-doodle-poo! being read by author Steve Smallman at the #TigerPBParty

Kidzania London

After the party, we were kindly gifted tickets to explore Kidzania London, a huge indoor roleplay place for kids. There are so many jobs for children to try out, they earn Kidzo’s for each job.

Emergency Ambulance - Kidzania

Children can spend their well-earnt Kidzos on activities such as abseiling or riding around in various emergency vehicles or spend them in the final gift shop before leaving. You can even save your Kizos for your next trip and save up for something special!

Renault Formula E

Eva changing a Renault Formula E tyre- Kidzania

Eva was happy to go off and try out a few jobs starting with changing a Renault Formula E wheel. Unfortunately I’m not too sure what else she learnt in the Renault garage, I did ask a member of staff and explained I was there as a blogger and hoped to write about it before we went in but as Izzy discovered at the same time I couldn’t go in with her, I didn’t get a chance to find anything out.

Surgery

Eva performing surgery - Kidzania

Eva really enjoyed performing surgery too & overall she really enjoyed Kidzania, other than the music being a little too loud for her liking. We will look into seeing if they hold quieter days so she can try out a few more activities. I think if we had known how big Kidzania was we would have organised a friend to pick us up so we could do a full day and try everything!

Water Aid science laboratory - Kidzania

Parents aren’t allowed in the activities & the doors are closed which is great for children’s independence but unfortunately, Izzy was put off immediately. She was eventually persuaded by the open water aid centre where she learnt about using clean water and how to make bubbles which she loved! Izzy is really interested in germs & washing her hands regularly so it’s not surprising she enjoyed this activity.

Lovabella Baby Centre

Izzy caring for Lovabella dolls in the baby centre - Kidzania

Thankfully we lost her again when she spotted the Lovabella baby centre! This was the only activity she was happy to do alone. She really enjoyed herself and was happy to go in alone which was a huge relief!

Lovabella Baby Centre - Kidzania

Izzy also considered surgery but seeing the dummy & apron she had to wear put her off, seeing Eva perform the surgery even more so. By next year I’m sure she will love it though and happuly go into each activity alone. I can see us investing in annual passes as a gift for the girls in the future. I imagine once they are used to the venue I will be able to happily sneak off to the parents garden and leave them to it!

Saffy the dragon signed by Jonny Lambet to Eva & Izzy

Overall we had a fantastic day at the Little Tiger Party and can’t thank Little Tiger & Kidzania enough for having us. To really top the day we came home with a signed copy of each book & one of Jonny’s Saffy artworks he used on stage to explain scratch & tickle, which we absolutely love! I love that the girls both told everyone to sign Izzy/Isobella as Issobella, it became a little joke, Izzy Issobella! An amusing memory for the girls to look back on. Little Tiger parties are the best, we really enjoy these events and hope to get invited to the next one too!

St Grizzle’s School For Girls, Geeks And Tag-Along Zombies

Eva’s been reading St Grizzle’s School For Girls, Geeks And Tag-Along Zombies. Written by Karen McCombie and Illustrated by Becka Moor, this is the 3rd book in the St Grizzle’s Series. Available in paperback for £5.99 this fab book is published by Stripes, an imprint of Little Tiger.

St Grizzle's school for girls, geeks and tag-along zombies

St Grizzle’s School For Girls, Geeks And Tag-Along Zombies

We join Dani back at St Grizzle’s School for a third time as she discovers mixing her new and old life isn’t as easy as she thought. A shy new student suddenly disappears at St Grizzle’s, making life harder for Dani. Along with her friends, Dani has to unravel a truth about this shy tag-along zombie! As always with St Grizzle’s it sounds like a wacky story just from the title.

Previous Books

Having read St Grizzles School For Girls, Goat and Random Boys & St Grizzle’s School For Girls, Ghosts and runaway Grannies, Eva though this sounded fantastic. As a fan of boarding school series such as Malory Towers as a child myself, I can totally see the appeal.

Karen McCombie has written yet another fantastically funny storyline for Dani and her friends and had Eva absorbed from the first page. With its humour and references to YouTube Bloggers, zombies and chaos it kept her entertained until the very last page.

St Grizzle's School

Eva managed to read St Grizzle’s School For Girls, Geeks and Tag-Along Zombies in one day. She sat there giggling her head off turning page after page. I love seeing Eva unable to put a book down, truly engrossed the storyline and characters. We will definitely be waiting impatiently for the next book in the series. I am sure Izzy will eventually come to love the St Grizzle’s series too.

Has your child read any of the St Grizzle’s School series yet? Do you think it may be a series they could enjoy?

 

Fang-Tastic Friends – Vlad The Worlds Worst Vampire

Eva received Fang-Tastic Friends, the second in the Vlad The World’s Worst Vampire series this week. Written by Anna Wilson, Illustrated by Kathryn Durst and published by Little Tiger, Fang-Tastic Friends is a great sequel which Eva loved. This hilarious and charmingly illustrated paperback for kids is just £5.99.

Fang-Tastic Friends - Vlad The World's Worst Vampire

Fang-Tastic Friends

Vlad is back on another Fang-tastic journey full of hysterical yet relatable moments giving a comical twist to common issues children face. Vlad’s main focus is making friends and fitting in at human school. Vlad’s parents take a trip to Transylvania, leaving him with Grandpa Gory giving Vlad a chance to sneak off to human school. There’s a catch though, whilst Vlad stays with Grandpa Gory he has to complete, and master a list of vampire challenges to impress his parents with or there’ll be trouble!

Engrossed

Eva couldn’t wait to sink her teeth into this Fang-tastic sequel and join Vlad and his Fang-Tastic Friends. In fact, she was so excited she ended up reading the book in one sitting, sneakily staying awake until gone 9 pm! Having really enjoyed Vlad The Worlds Worst Vampire, which she regularly re-reads I wasn’t too surprised Eva had become so engrossed in the story. I was very much the same at her age.

Worried

Vlad is worried he won’t make any Fang-Tastic friends at human school but he soon makes friends with Minxie. Minxie quickly finds out Vlad is a vampire but she keeps his secret. Continuing to practice his vampire challenges, Vlad feels stressed that he can’t get the hang of mind-control.

 Mind-Control

Vlad feels like he can’t master mind-control, even trying to call Flit his pet bat, doesn’t work. That is, until Boz a school bully keeps bothering Vlad & Minxie. Wishing the class tadpoles would leap out of their tank and on to Boz the bullies head seems to work at least! Eva found this hilarious! She found it even funnier when Vlad pictures Boz tripping, flying into the bike shed & Boz being covered in spiders, works too. Vlad is worried though as his mind-control only seems to work on Boz!!

Fang-Tastic Friends Back Cover

What Happens Next

Eva says she can’t wait to see what happens next and is totally hooked on this series. She hopes it isn’t too long until Fang-tastic Friends is followed by a third book in the series. Fang-Tastic Friends is fantastic, even I got a bit engrossed flicking through the book. This is definitely a series full of humour and issues children and young vampires face. We can’t wait to read more about Vlad and his Fang-tastic Friends.

Do you love the sound of Fang-tastic Friends too? Have you read the first book yet?

 

 

 

St Grizzles School For Girls, Ghosts And Runaway Grannies

St Grizzles School For Girls, Ghosts And Runaway Grannies is the second book in this hilariously quirky series written by Karen McCombie. With fantastic illustrations by Becka Moor this sure to have children aged 7-9 years giggling away! Eva recently read and reviewed the first book in the series, St Grizzles School For Girls, Goats and Random Boys which she loved. Eva couldn’t wait to get stuck in to the second book having read the first in the series.

St Grizzles School For Girls, Ghosts And Runaway Grannies

St grizzles school for girls, ghosts and runaway grannies

With Karen McCombie’s fantastic storylines accompanied by Becka Moor’s hilarious illustrations this book draws in young readers who are looking for something with a bit of humour. Eva loves anything a bit quirky and funny and this series really fits the bill. Who couldn’t love a book where the head teacher wears a unicorn onesie!? How funny!

St Grizzles School enters a short-film competition between the local schools and Dani is made director. Dani struggles to concetrate, whilst she has a ton of ideas there is too much weirdness going on!

Whilst students at St Grizzles work hard on the short-film but village school boys, Spencer and his mates are determined to sabotage their work. Granny Viv secretly takes up residence in the schools treehouse with Down boy the dog. Granny Viv has come to help Dani, much to her surprise! Can they finish their short film & win the competition? With ghost’s and runaway grannies accompanied by funny illustrations this book is sure to give you a laugh.

Granny Viv

St Grizzles School definitely has a great amount of appeal to young readers, think Mallory Towers & St Trinians. Covering friendships and video blogging, St Grizzles will appeal to the younger YouTube generation.  Eva would love to Vlog herself but there’s always something getting in the way (usually a noisy sister!). It definitely appeals to children aged 7-9 especially those with a quirky sense of humour.

Nibbles: The Dinosaur Guide

Nibbles: The Dinosaur Guide by Emma Yarlett is another fabulous book published by Little Tiger. A fantastic book for children aged 3-6 years. Nibbles: The Dinosaur Guide is a gorgeous hardback for £12.99. We received a copy from Little Tiger to review and I knew from the second I opened it we would thoroughly enjoy it! Who doesn’t love Monsters and Dinosaurs?? (We’re still a little unsure about the Dino Doo-Doo Nibbles though!)

Nibbles: The Dinosaur Guide

Nibbles: The Dinosaur Guide

Nibbles the book monster managed to escape from his first book back in 2016 and now he’s back munching his way through The Dinosaur Guide! Fantastically written and illustrated by award winning author and illustrator Emma Yarlett this excellent book is full of excitement.

Nibbles: The Dinosaur Guide

Nibbles, a wild book monster finds his way into The Dinosaur Guide! A book munching, mischief making monster, Nibbles needs to be returned to his cage. The Dinosaur Guide is full of fantastic information about different species of dangerous dinosaurs.

Somehow Nibbles keeps escaping whilst causing havoc, munching his way through dangerous dinosaurs throughout the book. He just about manages to nibble his way away from the terrible Triceratops, Diplodocuses and Velociraptors! Nibbles then faces the most dangerous of all, the terrifying Tyrannosaurus Rex!!

This book is hilarious and so much fun to read! We loved the nibbles on the corners of the pages and holes through the pages. The book is full of fun flaps to lift too. This is such an interactive story which kept Izzy’s attention throughout. Nibbles destroys chunks of the pages but there are still plenty of dinosaur facts to learn too!

I would definitely recommend this book, it is such a cheeky, funny, colourful picture book. It is bound to capture the attention of any child. Even older children will enjoy it, Eva(7) loved it as there are several amusing jokes throughout the story.

 

 

Our Favourite Books This Week – Week 3

The girls have picked out their favourite books this week again and have had lots of fun reading different books to pick from.

We missed the library last weekend so we went yesterday to return the books the girls previously borrowed and pick out a few more. After almost an hour the girls #LoveGrays tote bag was loaded up with quite a few books! Along with the other books we’ve picked up this week in town we’ve been quite busy reading through new & old books.

 

Izzy’s favourite books this week:

Izzy has been loving discovering a range of books at the library & this week chose a few lift the flap books & chose 2 of them as her favourites!

Busy building site is one of Izzy’s choices this week as she loves anything to do with building! She loves watching the digger’s & cranes when we go out so it was no surprise this was a favourite! Izzy loved the fact they build a school and you can see the classroom at the end. There were a ton of flaps to lift so it kept her quite busy especially pointing out all the things she recognised!

 

Izzy also chose Who lives a here? A lift the flap Gruffalo book discovering where each animal lives. Izzy loves lifting the flaps and telling me who she had found. We had to read this quite a few times! Her favourite part was finding the Gruffalo who is apparently her favourite out of all the animals in the book.

 

Eva’s favourite books this week:

Eva chose Abracazebra this week as her favourite book. She picked it up at the library at the last minute but seemed to enjoy it the most. Her favourite part was when Abracazebra came back on the boat. Eva loves reading stories like this to Izzy, they enjoy looking at the pictures together too.

 

Eva also chose The  Rabbit Who Want’s to fall asleep.. although she didn’t fall asleep haha! She loved it when Roger Rabbit met Uncle Yawn & loved that the picture from that page matched the front cover too! This one is off of our bookshelf and she’s read it quite a few times over the last month or so.

Our Favourite Book This week:

“Slowly, Slowly, Slowly,” Said the Sloth by Eric Carle was the girls favourite book & I had to read it to them  a few times although Izzy does get rather impatient at the end and likes to skip back to see what the Sloth does “Slowly, Slowly, Slowly,”. Eva likes that the Sloth is slow and doesn’t mind being slow.

What have your kids being reading this week? Have you picked up any new books?

Our Favourite Books This Week – Week 2

Carrying on with our favourite books this week the girls have again picked 2 books they have individually enjoyed and one I have read them which they have enjoyed too.

Izzy’s Favourite books this week:

Izzy got 2 new books this week from one of the pound shops, both are Little Miss books by Roger Hargreaves. She has Little Miss Helpful and Little Miss Trouble.. Izzy is definitely both haha!

I wasn’t surprised by Izzy’s favourite page in Little Miss Trouble. She giggled loads at this haha!

She thought it was funny when Little Miss helpful mistook the flower’s for weed’s.. not sure why but she was clearly amused!

Eva’s favourite books this week:

Eva chose Disney’s Toy Story and Disney’s The Little Mermaid and Spot from her bookshelf this week. It’s amazing to see her reading so quickly now. She will read several Disney books in a row now!

Eva’s favourite part of The Little Mermaid and Spot was when Ariel said ‘You’re a big hero’. She like that Spot had done so well.

Andy’s birthday party was Eva’s favourite part of Toy Story. She liked the toy’s using binoculars to watch the gifts being opened.

Our favourite book overall to read together this week:

They chose Disney’s Cinderella as their favourite book we have read together this week. Both girls have always loved me reading them Cinderella for some reason.

Izzy loves the blue dress at the end and the mice, Jaq & Gus! Eva loved the ending where the Prince married Cinderella and they lived happily ever after.

What are your children’s favourite books this week?