I love bringing my little boy to the library. It makes a great outing trip and it satisfy his need to read new books frequently and my limited budget. A variety of books to call his own  however, seems to contribute to his love for reading. Many books that we have since he was just a few months old continue to intrigue him in different ways at different stages of his development and make for great bonding time for us.

Here are some tips for selecting books that will last for some years for your baby.

• Look for good quality board books
  If you start your kid at 6 month old, it will still be some time before the book is not in danger of being torn and bitten by him. So get something that can withstand the abuse.
• Look for books with colourful pictures
   Yes, they don't red the words yet and but vibrant colours and pictures itself is enough of an attraction. Describe the pictures to your child as you read the story so they will learn that the pictures offer hints on what the stories are about.
• Choose books with rhyming sentences and word patterns
  Young kids love sounds with rhymes, repetition, repeated words. Books with these qualities tends to get the child to want to read it over and over again.
• Choose books with topics that your child likes
  Go with their interest be it cars, animals, Thomas the train or cakes and goodies. Can't go wrong there.
• Choose books that your child can interact with e.g. flip a flap books touch and feel books or pop up books.
  The reading experience can be extremely fun with these. They also get to play memory game with flip a flap books and their little fingers get practise in motor skills too.
• Get books that you don’t mind reading again and again …and again.
  Kids love repeating the same book again and again. My son when through phases where he will choose the same book for bed time reading every day for months. So be kind to your self. Get one that you like.

Here are some of our favorites:

We got  "Where Is Baby's Belly Button? " by Karen Katz  when he was six months old but he still looks for it now at three and a half years old. Besides the beautiful illustration, this is also a flip-a-flap book. For each page, the child get a question e.g. Where are baby's ears? And then you get to flip over the parts of the book to review the parts of the body. A great way to learn parts of the body with a young child.

Pat the Bunny (Touch and Feel Book) by Dorothy Kunhardt
I bought this book even though I felt the drawing is not very remarkable as I read a review that babies love it. The review prove to be right. My baby ask for this book every night until he is almost two. It is more than touch and feel too, with a mini book within the book and activities like peek a boo hidden in one book.

The Going-To-Bed Book by Sandra Boynton is a cute and funny book with lots of actions and rhymes with bed time activities such as brushing teeth weave in. It is one of those books with enough details to last the child till he is older but simple enough for them to enjoy at a very young age. It's one of those books that I don't mind reading over and over again.