Six-time Children's Music Award Winner, Mary Lee Sunseri, shows us what fun natures little critters can be in this 19-track bug-filled sing-along. Mary Lee captures the ears and hearts of listeners with her jovial voice, gentle guitar playing, recorder, dobro, and small percussion instruments. The songs are upbeat and familiar, with a few songs that may be new to your little one. This CD is perfect for car rides or playtime.

One of Mary Lee's most endearing qualities is her love for music and a desire to share that feeling with your child. She takes old favorites and makes them new, like when she puts the nursery rhyme Little Miss Muffit to music with a relaxed tempo and just her voice and a recorder, or when she presents Shoo Fly with a dobro and switches to 'Skip To My Lou' suddenly for the third verse. Or when listeners can hear Mary Lee giggling during I Know An Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly when she gets to the later verses of the old woman swallowing a cat, dog, and even a cow. You can actually hear her smiling while singing throughout most of it, so watch your little one closely to see if they smile in response. The song ends with Mary Lee singing that the old lady swallows a horse, and then she cracks up and says, "Just kidding!" Mary Lee takes a more creative approach to most of the songs ,like when she uses the method of slant rhyming in Little Arabella Miller to rhyme 'Arabella' and 'catapiller', by pronouncing it 'catabill-a'. Creativity shines again in Butterfly Gals, which is really just the song Buffalo Gals slightly altered. The Butterfly Gals are called to put their six little legs, antennae, and wings in and out, then "come out tonight and fly by the light of the moon." The Insect Gift is also a familiar tune (Partridge in a Pear Tree), and Ladybug, Ladybug is the same tune as Three Blind Mice. Perhaps hearing the same tune with different words will encourage your little one to come up with their own song to a tune they already know and love.

Mary Lee's friendly voice and choice of songs with plenty of repetition encourage listeners to sing along. Your child can learn to count backward in Over In the Meadow, and there are fun songs about animals and numbers, such as two fish, three blackbirds, four water rats, and five honeybees. Or perhaps they would rather sing about "honey bees in cinnamon trees" in Big Rock Candy Mountain, and join Mary Lee when she throws her voice up to a lovely high note in the line, "the ice cream soda fountains." Kemo Kimo may be the most fun sing-along on the CD with silly lyrics like, "Kemo Kimo ee-i-o/ With a hay and a ho and a Willie, Billy, wink um In/ Come Sally singin', rumpa dumpa doo dum/ Sing along kitty won't you ki mi o." Kemo Kimo also includes singing the alphabet, which is a favorite of most little ones - not to mention great practice! If your child is more in the mood for movement, you two can march with the ants two-by-two and shake your body while you sing the "boom boom boom's" between each verse, or dance your own crazy dance to Jitterbug; "Just flap your wings, I love those things! You're my jitterbug!"

My three-year-old friend, Sam, loves the Mosquitoes! song. As soon as he put it together that Mary Lee was going to yell "Mosquitoes!" after each verse, he started joining in. Sam loves to be theatrical, so he throws his hands in the air and yells "Mosquitoes!" with all the sincerity of someone completely terrified...but then he laughs at himself, of course.

--Audra

Mary Lee Sunseri is the winner of two American Library Notable Children's Recordings and four Parents Choice Awards. She has produced and performed 16 CD's of traditional and original music. Mary Lee has performed with the legendary Burl Ives, opened for Bill Cosby and Lily Tomlin, recorded the title song to Walt Disney's movie The Apple Dumpling Gang, recorded nursery rhymes for Mattel Toys' See 'N Say, toured as a member of "Randy Sparks & The Back Porch Majority,"and appeared in the MGM Elvis Presley movie The Trouble with Girls.

Mary Lee received her certificate of study in Musical Theatre from London Drama School with distinction in singing. She performs at festivals, concerts, folk clubs, and corporate and academic groups. She is a frequent performer at public schools and　libraries throughout California, Massachusetts and Washington, and gives workshops on music and infant brain development.