Chicken for Dinner? Dinnertime for Chicks by Janee Trasler

"DINNERTIME, CHICKIES. LET'S ALL EAT

WASH YOUR WINGS AND HAVE A SEAT."

If only it were as easy as their nannies, Cow, Pig, and Sheep, try to make it sound. But it's not so simple to get lively young ones to sit down and eat a proper dinner.

Cow's Tex-Mex tacos are too spicy and Sheep's noodle dish is too drippy. The Chickies insist that they'd prefer something more...um... "chocolate chippy."

But Pig insists that vegetables and meats come before sweet treats, and soon the Chickies are smacking their beaks and chowing down.

PASS THE PEAS...
PASS THE SPUDS AND BROCCOLIS!

Will their tummies have any room left for dessert?

Janee Trasler's dining outing for her darn cute little Chickies, Dinnertime for Chickies (HarperFestival, 2014), has all the appeal of her earlier toddler treats, with a poofy, padded cover, polished pastel palette, and deceptively simply comic characters. Trasler gets a lot of expressive faces out of circles, dots, lines, and a few squiggles, and her vivacious verses are just as memorable. Little listeners will pipe up to finish the clever punchlines the second time around, and the Chickies may even inspire some kids to eat their peas and broccolis when it's their dinnertime.

Trasler's companion board book stories include Bedtime for Chickies, Pottytime for Chickies, and her latest hot and tasty, A New Chick for Chickies.