Peanut Butter and Jelly

Get ready to make yourself a delicious sJack and sing/read along with Sharon, Lois and Bram’s Peanut Butter and Jelly with story by Randi Hampton and illustrations by Qin Leng.

Everything you love about the song Peanut Butter and Jelly is packed into this new picture book so a new generation of readers can enjoy the sweet and delicious music of Sharon, Lois and Bram.

If you are a Canadian adult about my age, chances are Sharon, Lois and Bram made up a good chunk of your childhood soundtrack. Before the days of YouTube and podcasts, you would need to get out your cassette tapes and pop in your favourite music to listen to on those long car rides. Thanks to Sharon’s daughter Randi, children today can experience the joy of the songs and dances with their new picture books. 

Peanut butter and jelly is a childhood staple although nowadays its more like sunbutter and jelly so I love that the very end of the story includes all the different ways that nuts and/or seeds and fruit can be combined to make a delicious treat. It will be so hard for adult readers not to sing as they are reading, so go ahead and belt it out. What makes this books so much fun, it that young readers can help read the story along with their adult. This is a perfect book to use in a childcare setting or in a classroom as an active way to incorporate literature into gross motor time or physical education.

Qin Leng’s illustrations are magical! Using ink and watercolours, she invites us into the story along with a whole cast of various people and animals. There is something for everyone young and old. I particularly love all the detail she puts into the pictures. Readers will come back to the story often to do a little hunting through the pictures.