Bird Watch by Christie Matheson

This cute little book is an interactive way to introduce little ones to bird watching in general. 

The watercolor paintings are detailed and delightful. 

I really like bird pictures. 

This front page lets readers know what birds are going to be hiding in the following pages. 

Each page has birds to find and count. 

While easy enough to find that readers will not get frustrated, the pictures have a nice level of detail. 

Sparrows!

Even at night, there are birds to find!

This is not a plot driven book at all. But avid birders will enjoy reading this one to their kids. 

A Child's Day: an Alphabet of Play by Ida Pearle

This delightful alphabet book has bold colors, geometric shapes, and heaps of adorableness. 

I love it! 

Aren't they adorable?! 

I sort of want this little girls outfit.

Ice skating and jumping

There are a nice mix of skin tones here, which is great!

Cooking and reading/sleeping. 

Seriously, this is the cutest thing I have seen in awhile. 

Pretty in love with that pool in the swim picture! 

Inside Outside by Anne-Margot Ramstein & Matthias Aregui

(I do not know what was going on with the lighting on my camera for this one, but it is wonky. So don't think the book has some weird, yellowish color scheme. That's just me!)

I love this book! It is an oversized, wordless look book that gives a lesson on perspective.  

Inside the egg and outside the egg.

Cave

This one took me a minute, because I thought they were the same thing. But then I saw the difference of the cage lines.

A boat on a stormy sea.

I don't know what this style of illustration would be called, but it reminds me of Hergé's illustrations in Tintin. 

Inside and outside a whale. 

This reminds me of Burt Dow, Deep Water Man

Ski lodge

Driving slow through the southwest

The beating heart inside a bungee jumper. 

Isn't it fun? The bright colors, the cartoonish style of illustration, and the perspective shifting pictures are great for looking at again and again. 

Seasons by Lexbolex

This book is terrific. This author/illustrator won the Golden Letter award for best book design in the WHOLE WORLD. I didn't even know there was such a thing. Must go search up a list of winners....

Okay, don't bother. It appears to be a very European thing that US publishers don't participate in and seems to be very.... well abstract. It is more about the book itself, not the content as much. So if you are interested in the book as a design statement, you would love it. If you are just looking for lovely illustrations, they don't seem to be as plentiful or important. 

But I love these illustrations!

They remind me of vintage travel posters.

We are almost at this point of spring. About five buds on the apple tree have opened. SO EXCITED.

Lexbolex works with silk screen, which explains the layered look of different objects and the lack of intricate detail.

This makes me think of 1950's road trips to National Parks in the summer. 

Any book with geese in v-formation is sort of a favorite of mine. 

This was an interesting book because there was only one word per page, but 180 pages in the book. So it feels way too thick to be a picture book, but that is what it is. 

Imagine! 180 pages of this sort of delight. 

I am very thrilled that spring is just hitting it's stride, but this picture makes me look forward to winter a teensy weensy bit. 

But not enough to want to skip over spring and summer and fall at all.

Interestingly, this book goes through a year and a half, not just one go through of each season.

Cows! Calves!

It is warm for the first time in forever and breezy. And this is how I feel! 

First thunderstorm of the season last night. And I totally slept through it. Boo! But yay! for sleep!

Pretty partial to farming things.

I really tried to not take a picture of every single page. But it was hard. 

A world of Cities by James Brown

This is a terrific oversize book about... surprisingly, the cities of the world. 

Each city has a two page spread with limited color palette, which makes the colors they do use, pop.

I am pretty sure that if I was an actual book/art reviewer, I would have a great set of words to use in discussing art, but since I am just a pretend book reviewer, I will just stumble along with weird phrases. 

Around each page, small facts are wedged into the design. The white band around each page is even filled with information.

These pictures remind me of vintage travel posters. 

I have always been interested by this giant statue. Why so big? 

Love this quote.

Seriously, so much reading on each page.

Stockholm! I went there! I went there!

Okay. But there are a lot of orange and brightly colored buildings in Stockholm. It made me wonder why American buildings are all so monochromatic.

Paris, the city of lights

I know I put too many of these pictures in, but they were all so COOL. 

Toronto, our neighbor to the south. One of our friends just moved to Toronto and we now ask her how things are going "down there." We are so north, we are even north of (parts of) Canada. 

And the interesting endpapers.