It’s spooky season! We love decorating for the various seasons/holidays as well as incorporating festive toys and books for our daughter.
Getting themed books is one of our toddler’s favorite ways to celebrate a holiday or season. We’re pretty picky with toys and like to keep them to a minimum, but our philosphy on books is that you can never have too many! We also like that they don’t take up too much space, are affordable (we buy mostly second-hand) and are educational. They also provide an activity we can do together or that our daughter can enjoy independently.
We have a huge collection of Halloween-themed books and want to share what some of them are! We will also point out some of the hits and misses, which may help you decide what books to get. For reference, our daughter is about 2 and half years old. Scroll to the bottom to see her top 3 favorite books – we saved the best for last!
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This board book isn’t explicitly Halloween, but it has to do with spiders, so we’ve included it on our daughter’s Halloween shelf. The book contains the words to the song “the itsy bitsy spider”. What really sets this book apart and is the finger puppet aspect. Our daughter has been LOVING this book for months and months now. She loves it when we read the story and have the spider act out what’s happening. She also likes talking to the spider as well as moving the finger puppet herself. We definitely recommend this book! It’s also perfect if you’re looking for a book to keep out year-round.
It’s Pumpkin Day Mouse features the famous character from If You Give A Mouse a Cookie. We couldn’t resist getting this book when we saw it at our local thrift store! This book stands well on it’s own, even if you’re not familiar with the character (which our daughter isn’t). We love the simple story and the fact it gives us an opportunity to count together and talk about (and make) different faces. In this story, mouse has 7 pumpkins and paints different faces on each one. Though this isn’t our toddler’s top pick, we still recommend this book. It’s perfect if you want to bring in some spook-free Halloween into your child’s book collection! No ghosts, no witches, just a “scary” face painted on a pumpkin.
Happy Halloween, Curious George is another book we picked up from the thrift store. Each page has a different mini-story with rhymes. Unfortunately, the stories just don’t capture the attention of our daughter. This book is a ‘miss’ in our house but if your child is a Curious George fan, it may be for you!
This Eyewitness Skeleton book is another book perfect for Halloween. This book (and those similar to it) are perfect Halloween themed books for Montessori environments. Our daughter has looked through this book a couple times, but it isn’t her favorite. There are tons of great pictures and images and lots of facts. It’s definitely over her head, as it’s geared towards older children, but we still get value out of it.
We picked up this Monster’s Inc. book from the thrift store. It was originally part of a “Me Reader” set, which reads the stories aloud. Any Monsters Inc. book would be a good addition to your Halloween book collection. We tried introducing the Monster’s Inc. movie to our daughter (we’re huge Disney fans), but she just wasn’t too interested. However, she has requested the Monsters Inc. book several times.
TOP 3 FAVORITE! This book is one of our toddler’s favorites! It’s a touch a feel and she’s been enjoying this book since before she was 1. We used this book to introduce her to Doc McStuffins. We love the whole Doc McStuffins brand. We love that this book features diversity and the message that the “scary” things associated with Halloween are just pretend. This book is pretty wordy, but our 2.5 year old daughter sits through it everytime!
TOP 3 FAVORITE! Where is Baby’s Pumpkin? is another one of our toddler’s top 3 favorite Halloween themed books. It’s a lift and flap book where the reader helps the baby look for her pumpkin before she can go trick-or-treating. The baby is dressed up like a black cat and the book features Halloween icons like bats, a friendly ghost, witch’s hat, and candy apples.
TOP 3 FAVORITE! Peek-a-Boooo! is a lift and flap book that our daughter loves. It features standard Halloween characters such as a witches, ghosts, monsters and bats. Her favorite is probably the last page where they’re all hiding in the haunted house and she gets to open each window/door to find them.
Thanks for reading! Check out some of these articles you may enjoy!
