Sing your little one to sleep with all the different animal lullabies in If You Were My Bunny. This small board book is perfect for snuggling up with your child and turning the pages together until their eyes get droopy. Each page has a paragraph of text, as a narrator tells her own little one all the ways she would comfort them, show them love, and help them go to sleep- no matter what animal they may be. The narrator begins with bunnies, but moves on to bears, cats, ducks, dogs, and finally ends with a human boy and his mama. The pictures contrast greatly, as some use large amounts of white space and keep the color primarily on the animal, while other fill the pages completely with color and detailed backgrounds. The pictures looked sketched and filled in with watercolor.
For each animal, there is also a lullaby just for them, adapted from a familiar children's lullaby tune your little one will likely recognize. There is a key on the final page to direct parents on which tune to use for each lullaby; for example, the duckling lullaby is sung to the tune of "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star", and the Kitten Lullaby is sung to the tune of "Rock-a-Bye, Baby." Singing the lullaby, rather than just reading it, will make the book more fun and interactive for your child. Rocking your child while reading will help encourage them to close their eyes and drift off to sleep. This book can easily be read in sections, in any order, or all the way through on any given night.
I read this book to my niece when she was three years old. She wanted to hold the book with me, but it didn't take long before her arms were drooping with her eyelids. She hummed along with the songs she knew the tunes to, but was asleep by the final page. I've used this book a few times since as a bedtime story, and it usually works to at least calm her down enough to lay quietly and wait for sleep to come.
--Audra
