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Allow me to make your life a little easier

Guys, I think I’ve found the solution to a problem you may not have known you had.

A short while ago I started wondering, searching, asking, whether there were any quality Spanish book subscription services. Don’t get me wrong, I love scouring the depths of the internet and our local book stores (and forcing my mother to buy countless books in PR) for good finds, but sometimes it’s nice to have someone else do the work for you. So,  if you love Spanish board or picture books (or know someone who does), but you don’t want to spend the (sometimes crazy long) time it may take to find quality books, I found what you’ve been looking for.

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5 Books You Can Read In Any Language

I’m a huge fan of wordless (or nearly wordless) picture books for one big reason: you can read them to your child in whatever language strikes your fancy. Unlike books in English or Slovak, I don’t have to worry about translating the story. And I can choose how long to make the story last, depending on how much detail I go into in describing the images. My kids really enjoy these books and they love that they can ‘read’ them all by themselves, without having to worry they’re missing a vital part of the narrative in the text. They also like finding new things to talk about on each page, like a funny background detail we hadn’t noticed before.

That being said, Mr. OneDosTres dislikes wordless books–there’s not as much structure to the story and he’s sometimes not sure how to ‘read’ what’s on the page. So they definitely aren’t everyone’s jam. But I encourage you to give them a try! (This post contains affiliate links.)

Mr. Wuffles

This is the story of ant-sized aliens who land among Mr. Wuffles’ toys and find themselves the center of his attention. They are forced to leave their ship and encounter house bugs, with whom they work to outsmart the cat. What I most love about this book is how the story changes depending on who I read it to–E loves it because it’s about a bored and playful cat, while N loves it because it involves aliens working together with insects to outwit a common threat.

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Spanish Audio Books for Young Kids

I confess, we don’t use audio books that often, but in part that’s because the kids won’t let me play anything other than Let It Go (the song that won’t die) and the Mickey Mouse club theme song (they don’t even watch the show, have never watched it, but for some reason they are OBSESSED with this song) in the car and the Moana soundtrack at home.  But I’ve seen some requests for a good compilation of available audio books and recordings for kids and thought this may be a good opportunity to share some options with you. This post tackles Spanish audio books for younger kids (2-5), but I’ll add suggestions for older kids at a later date. (The following contains affiliate links.)

This old school cassette and book combo of Buenas noches, luna may be a good choice for younger kids.

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5 Inspiring Spanish Children’s Books

We are raising our kids in a monocultural area, so exposing them to books in their heritage languages is one easy way to ensure they are surrounded by a variety of words and stories.  I’ve struggled to find good original content in Spanish or about children who are raised speaking Spanish, so I thought I would share a few gems (with the caveat that one of the books below is a translation–but a good one! And another is currently only available in English, but the premise is too cute not to share.) (This post contains affiliate links, which means if you click on the link and make a purchase I may receive a small commission from Amazon. It costs you nothing, but allows me to keep the page and all our recommendations coming!)

El cabello maravilloso de Dalia is by Cuban American author Laura Lacamara.  Dalia wakes up one day to find her hair grown long, strong and luscious. She decides to grow something fabulous in her hair and what she does with it has my kids asking me to read this book over and over. I love this book, in part, because Dalia doesn’t succumb to the external pressure of what her neighbors think and continuously has her mom’s loving support. All of the characters are also female, which is fairly unique.

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10 Animal Books in Spanish for Preschoolers

Anyone who knows me knows (and for those of you who don’t, you’ll soon learn) that I love books. (I say love, my husband says obsessed…does it really matter how we label it?). They’re good for every occasion, are the perfect way to start and end a day, perfect for the car, on the road, at home. . .Throughout every nook and corner of our house, from the basement to the living room and up through each and every bedroom, we have books.  It’s no surprise that a lot of those books are in Spanish and Slovak, which we’ve selfishly accumulated over the years to avoid having to translate books from English to Spanish and Slovak.  The story just flows better when we’re not struggling to translate in realtime and it’s a lot easier to include stories that rhyme when the book does it for you.

In any case, today I present to you:  my top 10 (though I could go on and on) recommendations for books in Spanish featuring animals or about animals for preschoolers! (These are all affiliate links):

La primera luna llena de gatita   Our family loves this book. As a newborn, my now-toddler could stare at the black and white images for amazing, catch-my-breath minutes at a time.  And our preschooler loves being in on the joke that Gatita thinks she is chasing an enormous bowl of milk that is actually the first full moon she’s ever seen. The story is sweet and the simple drawings are wonderful. It’s one of my go-to gifts for any Spanish speaking young kid.

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