Visiting is always fun when it involves cute, cuddle baby animals in an easy-to-handle board book. Readers get to go along with the main character, a fun cartoon boy sporting messy red hair, a purple shirt, poka dotted shorts, and boots as he visits all of his young animals friends. The colorful, furry characters are very prominent against an all-white background. Along with teaching animals and colors, the book also teaches the numbers up to six; one brown fowl, two red calves, three black kittens, and so on. The story unfolds in one sentence per page, and is filled with rhymes and repetition.
Repetition of the main lines, "Let's go visiting. What do you say?" encourages your little one to join in once they've learned the line, or perhaps even answer the question with an animated "Yes!" Your little one will likely want to handle the book, turn the pages, and touch the different animals. You can practice naming them as your child points, and as they get older you can switch roles and have them name the different animals while you point. You can do the same with colors and numbers. This is also a great naptime story, as it starts simple enough, builds in excitement and characters, but in the end all of the animals curl up with the young boy and they fall asleep cuddling in the hay.
I first read this book to my friend Dano when he was about 11 months old. He liked holding the book and helping me turn the pages. Each page he would point to the dog and say excitedly, "Da!" as that is his favorite animal (and word). I tried to make it more interactive by including him in the story, so instead of "one brown fowl" we visited "one cute Dano."
--Audra