“Once upon a time in the Wild Wild West, there lived a rancher and his wife. Every morning, just as the sun was coming up, the rancher saddled his horses and fed the cattle while his wife baked biscuits. Biscuits with butter, biscuits with honey, biscuits with jelly. . . .Yes, those breakfast biscuits were plump as pillows, soft as clouds, and tasty as a big Texas barbecue.
Then one day, just as the sun was coming up, the rancher’s wife decided she was tired of making biscuits.
So she measured and mixed, and she made gingerbread dough.
She rolled that dough flat and cut out the shape of a boy—but not just any boy. He had boots on his feet. He had a hat on his head. And he had a big belt buckle made of spun sugar.
He was a Gingerbread Cowboy!”
~ The Gingerbread Cowboy, by Janet Squires
Davy-do has had a thing for Gingerbread Boy stories ever since around Christmas, when his Kindergarten class did a theme week all about the spicy little man. So, when we discovered this book at the library last week we couldn’t wait to read it. We were not disappointed. The illustrations are fun and the book reads so well….I could practice my southern Texas twang with reckless abandon. It’s good enough of a book that they boys beg, “AGAIN!” as soon as we finish reading the last page.
Very fun. I love to read out loud to my kids. We’ve also read Jack and the Beanstalk, Stone Soup, Little Red Riding Hood (the violent version in which the Grandmother and Riding Hood both get eaten and the Woodsman has to kill the wolf and slice him open to rescue them, quite shocking!), Bambi, and The Tale of Tom Kitten lately. Sitting together in Daddy’s big chair by the fire, reading, is warm and cozy. The minutes fly by as we lose ourselves in book-land.
Do you have any favorite read-alouds?
Good to be Home 
My all time favorite book is the Three Trees. I read it to the kids all the time, but always on Christmas eve and on easter. Such a great book. oh, and now I am in the mood for yummy home made bisquits. The kids will be eating good this morning
Blueberries for Sal has always been one of my very favorites…as she picks the blueberries and drops them into her empty bucket they make a sound of ker-plink, ker-plant, ker-plunk.
We love to read…If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, If you Give a Pig a Pancake, If you Give a Moose a Muffin, Polar Bear, Polar Bear What Do You Hear and I think our favorite is Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See.
Oh and any one of the 102 pop up books we have….
Have a great day,Shanda~
I think I have a new favorite book! Thanks, Davy-do!
I always liked And to think it all happened on Mulberry Street. And then, when I met the future Mrs Hat, she lived on Mulberry street! Still makes me smile. So have you this morning, friend, and I appreciate it very much.
Old Hat
What a cool book! I would love to hear your version of a Texas Twang. LOL! It always sounds so funny to hear people imitate mine.Gotta run to go bake some biscuits!~A REAL live Texan~
“Guess How Much I Love You” by Sam McBratney is one of my favorites.
Dasha’s still a little too young for most good read-aloud books, but she loves “Goodnight Moon” before bed, and Carl had great fun reading through the Winnie-the-Pooh stories to her when she was first born. Oh, and she also likes hearing Kate Greenaway’s poetry–“Under the Window” and “Marigold Gardens” are both favorites.
That sounds like a fun little book. I like to make gingerbread men cookies. Thanks for sharing alittle bit of your day with your children. {{Hugs}}
Kelly
Right now Naomi is in LOVE with GO DOG GO! She knows the whole book by heart and sometimes during the day I ask her “Naomi do you like my hat?” and she responds by saying “no I DO NOT like your hat!” it is so funny have a great day ~A
I’m going to have to look that book up for my little cowboy. 🙂 Jacob prefers for me to “make up stories”….he says, “Make up a nice story about a nice boy and a lady that makes cookies!” ….but what he REALLY means is- start telling a nice story and then make it scary (like a black bird comes into the kitchen and steals the cookies) and then a big giant catches the bird and puts him in a cage…on and on we go….and the “scarier” the story the more excited he gets- (he’ll hide under the covers saying NO mommy!! Make it nice! Make it nice!!)….and as soon as I go back to my normal voice and make it “nice” he’ll start adlibing “scary” back into the story! (LOL)Lovely pics. Is your camera fixed?
Oh my gosh, that book looks adorable. We like Silly Sally, The Napping House, The Little Mouse, the Red Ripe Strawberry, and the Big Hungry Bear, We’re Going on a Bear Hunt, Brown Bear, Brown Bear, Jamberry, and Goodnight Moon. My 7 year old is a huge fan of Curious George. My favorite book to read to my kids is a book that I received in 1976 called “A Time to Keep” it was written and signed by Tasha Tudor. It is my most treasured book.
Oh how FUN,I will have to see if our library has that book. One of my little’s favorite books is the Gingerbread Baby.
Anabelle always loves hearing Goodnight Moon and the Princess and the Pea 🙂
I have fond memories of reading Goodnight Moon MANY times! I always liked Never Tease a Weasel, and Alexander’s Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.
What a fun read! Yes, we still love to snuggle and read together…but I think the story book days were so much fun! “Good Night Moon” was a long time favorite, I too love “A Time to keep” by Tasha Tudor, “Winken,Blinken,and Nod”, “The Little Engine that could”, “Blueberries for Sal”,”A squirrels Tale”, All the Beatrix Potter books, and many little golden books! Happy reading!
We love anything Dr. Seuss in this house, and, of course, anything that has anything to do with horses or ponies. Did I say anything enough?
That sounds like a great book! It looks like Davy Do liked it to:)
Whooo that sounds like a good book, I hope our Library has it. I LOVED reading to Brianna. We started right at birth up till she was about 13, then she read the Lord of the Rings by herself and now reads 4 to 5 different books at a time. I’m looking forward to grandchildren!As for my favorite silly read-a-loud book : “Somebody and the Three Blairs” by Marilyn Tolhurst!
We love to read together “really long books.” You remember we did the unabridged Pilgrim’s Progress last year. We all loved Old Yellar and Treasures of the Snow. Now, we are working through the Chronicles of Narnia. Those are our favorites so far. We are on The Horse and His Boy now.
Picture books are hit and miss; the older ones read them to themselves, Princess reads them to her younger brothers, and Sweetie Pooh climbs on my lap with his library books every afternoon or so. I am drawn to those with excellent illustrations as well as descriptive, colorful vocabulary. Can’t name them all! But have you read “Farmer Eno and His Cow”?
“Crictor” (the boa constrictor) was always a favorite around my house as well as “April and Amanda”, and “Stand back said the elephant I’m going to sneeze”
a Texas twang huh???! I would love to hear that! Sounds like you are having loads of fun with the children. I haven’t read to the boys in a while. I think I might try it! Hope you are feeling well dear friend.
If you can do a good Spanish accent you MUST buy Skippy Jon Jones books. Absolutley HILARIOUS. They are about a Siamese Cat who thinks he is a Chihuahua and he goes on all these cool adventures–if you read aloud with an accent it is the BEST!!! I read them to KK and Jay and they were almost crying they were laughing so hard…
I did not now that Red Riding Hood had a violent version. Someone gave us some Amelia Bedelia(SP?) books. We think these are very funny. We also enjoyed reading “Milly Molly Mandy” story books–these were so sweet. Picture books “They didn’t use their heads” “If Everybody Did”My Children also like the Little Butterfly books–we had to get these used as they are out of print.”Super Helping Hero” “How many Jawbreakers” “God Helps me be Brave” The Lord is my Shepherd”We also like the Little Jewel books. http://www.rodandstaffbooks.com/list/Little_Jewel_Books/
I love reading to the kids! We need to go get some fresh books!
“I could practice my southern Texas twang with reckless abandon” that is so cool Shan! I love reading Dr. Sues books outloud to kids. They are fun! Thank you, by the way, for your gift. I LOVE IT! I love you too, Elisha
I was reading a few posts down about your camera..Try E-bay or amazon for a nikon lens. Especially if it was a “kit lens” you can easily replace those for CHEAP. Because it is Nikon and you can get a huge variety of lenses for them. You should consider a 50mm 1.8f/ they take amazing shots and they cost maybe 70 dollars. I often dread the death of el-camera-o on my end but so far i’ve gone about 50,000 shots and its STILL alive.. 😀 but mine is an olympus…. anyhow Looking forward to the baby’s arrival!!!
I somehow missed this post! That book looks fun. I am going to see if our library carries it. We are always reading here. Some of our favorites are “Joseph had a Little Overcoat”, “Tikki, Tikki Tembo”, “Llama Llama Red Pajama”, “Where the Wild Things Are”. When I taught school I really enjoyed reading “The Boxcar Children series” and “Junie B Jones”. Oooh books – so yummy!!
We have lots of favorites… right now we are reading ” A Child’s Treasury of Beatrix Potter Stories .” All the animals little escapades are hilarious to our 7 year old and our 18 month old giggles right along with us! ha Also our 7 year old reads a lot of the Boxcar Children books.