Monthly Book Roundup - What we have been Reading in September.

Its time for my monthly book round up again. Each month I write about new books that I have introduced to Lily at bedtime and what we think of them. We always read around 4-5 books a night and most nights we end up reading the same ones. I find reading the same books helps Lily relax and she does grow fond of the stories each month and gets excited when I get them out to read each night. 

You can read all our other monthly roundups here.

This month I struggled to read some of these books to Lily, she grew bored of a couple of them quite quickly and so we have already started reading some of next months and a few nights we only read one or two from the five below. As she is getting older I think she is wanting a little more variety in stories and so I may have to start doing 2 monthly round ups in the future. 

So here they are, this month we have been reading 5 new stories. 

1. The Greedy Goat - By Petr Horacek
Lily quite enjoyed this story and it was one of the ones she would happily listen to each night. The story is a really simple story of a goat that keeps eating strange things that don't belong to it. For example the farmers pants. The goat gets really poorly and turns different colours. Lily loves this part as she is really interested in colours at the moment and so makes me repeat this part a few times. The story then goes through the days of the week, with each day the goat getting a little bit better until its finally well again. I don't think its the most exciting story for us as parents to read but Lily seemed to enjoy it and so it obviously has appeal to children. I won this story from a Toppsta Giveaway. 

2. Get into Bed - By Virginia Miller 
This was Lily's favourite of the bunch and she would want me to read this each night and I can see her carrying on wanting me to read it. I really don't mind reading this one as its a really nice story about bedtime and is very easy to read. Any story that is about going to sleep I like as I like to think stories do have a influence on our children. This story is so close to home because just like Lily most nights, Ba does not want to go to bed. He fights this by saying Na! Until he is so tired that he gives in and goes to sleep. One part of the story that me and Lily enjoy is the parts where it says "He snuggled, He huggled, He cuddled". I love to act that part out as I read and I give lily a really nice big squeezy cuddle. Lily always ends the story by saying "Shhh" because Ba has gone to sleep. Such a lovely story and I would recommend this for bedtime reading. I picked this story up at a car boot sale but a quick google and you can find it to buy.

3. Goodnight Everyone - By Chris Haughton When I first started reading this one both me and Lily enjoyed it. But unfortunately we both got bored of it pretty quick. The story is about a jungle of animals who are all really sleepy, but bear is fighting going to sleep and instead wants to play. They all yawn in the story and go to sleep and bear is the last one to fall asleep. The story doesn't have many words on each page and the illustrations are quite dark, especially if you are reading with a dimmed light like we are. I think the idea to the story is that it is meant to make your child sleepy to with all the yawning and talk about sleep but that didn't seem to work with Lily. I think we read it for about a week or so and then the odd night she would want me to read it to her but it definetly wasn't one she had to have each night. I won this story from a Toppsta Giveaway but have seen it in stores.

4. I Love my Grandpa -  by David Bedford
For most of the month Lily loved this story and would want me to read it each night. Its a really sweet story where baby bear is frightened to swim in the water and grandpa bear teaches him that its not scary. Its lovely to read a story with a grandfather figure in it and to read about the love that they have. I also think its great because grandfathers can be really good for children to look up to and teach them things in life. I definetly think we will be reading this one again in the future and I would recommend getting this one if you are looking for a nice story about grandpa. I got this book from The Works after searching for a grandpa book myself.

5. Norman, the Slug with the Silly Shell -  by Sue Hendra
I picked this book up after spotting it in a charity shop. We had read one that was by Sue Hendra before that we loved and reviewed here and so when I found it I grabbed it straight away with the hope it would be also good. I actually have been quite disappointed with this story compared to the other. It had a similar silly theme to it but I didn't find the story line as good. In this story Norman the slug wants to be just like all the snails he see's and is disappointed he doesn't have a shell. So he goes out to find one and ends up with a doughnut as his shell. A bird ends up stealing him wanting him as a yummy treat. Norman escapes using his slime and then decides instead of becoming a snail he wants to be a bird as flying is fun. Lily's favourite part of the story was doing the colours of the birds on the last page. One thing I will say about this story is that the pages are so colourful and illustrations great. But they were not enough to keep Lily interested in this story and most nights she didn't want to read it. 

Which book do you like the sound of the most?