It's all in the family-toddler time. It's a busy day with everyone in the family wanting one thing or another. Baby wants Mama, Cat wants fish, Daddy wants supper, Pup wants dish. Lively illustrations are matched with easy rhymes. A just right read-aloud for toddlers. 18 months & up

Age: Toddlers. Award Year: 2013. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.

Young preschoolers will relate to this little story about Pip who is so happy to have a big red balloon. But then, the inevitable happens and it is Posy who comes up with a clever way to cheer-up Pip. Spoiler alert: Posy and Pip have good fun with bubbles that are supposed to pop. 2 ½ & up

Age: Toddlers. Award Year: 2013. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.

Tiptoe Joe has a surprise. With his happy smile, a charming love of a bear in red tie-up sneakers, shares his excitement as he invites all the animals of the forest to come see his secret! It's a short, sweet, and lively read-aloud with a repetitive refrain paired with the sounds animals make when they follow Joe. Suspense builds as the crowd grows and they reach Tiptoe's home where his wife holds their little secrets in her arms. 2 ½ & up.

Age: Toddlers, Preschool. Award Year: 2013.

We like books you can sing with babies and toddlers. This metallic covered cardboard book is sturdy enough for repeated sharing and little hands that will want to turn the pages with independence. The familiar Rain, Rain Go Way rhyme needs no introduction to grownups and children alike. 1 & up

Age: Infants, Toddlers. Award Year: 2013. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.

Great illustrations of barnyard animals by the late Simms Taback. Printed on sturdy stock, this is a good lapbook for hamming it up and playing around with animal sounds. A good knowing and naming book to share with toddlers, who will love the "magical" motion of the hologram duck on the cover and making animal sounds.

Age: Infants, Toddlers. Award Year: 2013. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.

As always, Maisy's pop-up action is simply splendid as the illustrations trace the steps in making a garden. Pull the tab and see Maisy dig the ground and discover the worm below! Pull the next tab and Maisy plants the seeds in a row. Pull again and Maisy is watering the plants. Turn and pull to see the seedlings pop up! Pull up and help Maisy tug the weeds out of the garden. At last, there is a crop to pick and finally on the last page some beautiful sunflowers that open. Young science for the youngest lapsitter. 2 1/2 & up

For follow up fun, try planting some seeds indoors that can be moved outside when the ground gets warm. Or try making an avacado pit or seeds from an orange sprout on the windowsill.

Age: Toddlers, Preschool. Award Year: 2013. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.

Big bold illustrations of familiar farm animals are featured in the playful book with cutout holes that allow a partial view of the animal hidden on the next page. The text offers a clue to help the little listener guess who will show up when the page is turned. Based on the original game and always popular game of I Spy With My Little Eye, this is a fun way to introduce toddlers to knowing and naming, color concepts and animal sounds. It includes letter names. For young toddlers we suggest skipping the letter names—use the sound the letter make as a hint or skip the letters altogether for young listeners. That's something they can grow into.

Age: Toddlers, Preschool, Early School Years. Award Year: 2013. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.

A cardboard picturebook for toddlers. There is a cutout in the middle with a smiling pink-cheeked face. But with every turn the creature with that face changes from star to fish to sun to dumpling and so many other familiar things. Each is told good night. Toddlers will soon like "reading" this book since the repetition makes for easy imitation. They may not recall the names of each of the pictured items, but they will like pretending to be able to read. 1-3

Age: Toddlers. Award Year: 2012.

A collection of babies and toddlers from all over the world, all doing what babies and toddlers do. Each new pair of children introduce us to some new locale, new actions, new ethnicities--but always the alternating pages show how they all have ten little fingers and ten little toes. We loved the original and now this bilingual edition, done on sturdy cardboard stock for independent beginning page turners.

Age: Infants, Toddlers. Award Year: 2012.

As always those five silly monkeys are into their mischief making. This time out they have had too much icky sticky ice cream mixed with sloppy gloppy mud. So into the tub they go. Will this do the job? Well, yes, until they start slurping their soupy supper. Poor Mama! The rhyming is playful as always, making this another fun read-aloud. Printed on sturdy cardboard pages that will survive less than gentle little hands. 2 & up.

Age: Toddlers, Preschool. Award Year: 2012. Click here to purchase the product on Amazon.com.