Rating: 
Summary: Feeling Special!
Review: "I wish we could do what they do in Katroo . . . ." Thus begins Dr. Seuss's amazing conception of the birthday party EACH person should have. Guided by the special brainy bird, the Birthday Honk Honker, you will find yourself in the middle of a marvelous day. You are awakened by the bird, "Wake Up! For today is your Day of all Days!" He then heads for your bed. "He knows your address . . ." and quickly comes to give you the special birthday handshake. This involves touching your right index finger with his equivalent digit while you touch your left big toe with your left index finger (while he mimics the same motion). Throughout, Dr. Seuss makes it clear that just being born and being you is all that is required to deserve such classy treatment. "If you'd never been born, well what would you do? . . . be? Why, you might be a WASN'T." Your day includes a trip through the Birthday Flower Jungle while being carried in a boat through the air by Funicular Goats. The flowers smell like licorice and cheese. For lunch, you eat hot dogs, rolled out on a spool, for an endless meal. With so much mustard on you, cleaning off in a Mustard-Off pool is required. You sing loudly, "I am lucky!" And that's before you go to the Birthday Pal-alace with its 9,403 rooms to play games in. You get to make such a mess that it will take 20 days just to "sweep up the mess." Then, you meet drummers, strummers, zummers, and of course, plumbers. Dr. Derring's Singing Herrings spell out, "Happy Birthday to You." Then, you get the most amazing cake. And all of this because, "There is no one alive who is you-er than you." Now, you might wonder about the wisdom of reading this book to a child. Whatever you do cannot match up. Well, Dr. Seuss thought of that point also. As he reminds us in the end, "So that's What the Birthday Bird Does in Katroo." "And I wish I could do All these great things for you!" As you can see, the book is set up to convey your deepest conviction that the honoree (usually your child) is well worth whatever the positive limits of imagination can bring. But, of course, being a mere parent, you cannot do that much. Whatever you do will naturally be received with greater enthusiasm, realizing its symbolic intent. A fun way to use this book would be to create birthday elements that build on it. For example, you could draw a birthday palace, and buy one of those games as a gift that contains hundreds of variations in it. Then, you could attach your drawing to the gift. With good imagination, your child can feel like she or he has had such a day. Carrying on with that theme, you could reenact other parts of the book. You could dress up like the Birthday Bird and give the handshake in the morning, for example. If it's a weekend, you could have hot dogs for lunch (if your honoree likes them). If it's a week day, you could have them for dinner. You get the idea. There's another message here, too. Each other person deserves this princely treatment as well. That must mean that being a person is pretty special. I know of no book that stakes out such a strong statement in favor of each person. Be sure to build on this lesson to help you child learn to respect, appreciate, and eventually care about everyone! "And I wish I could do all these great things for you!" And I do so wish. Happy Unbirthday!
Rating:
Summary: Worlds Best Affirmation!
Review: After one reads and delights in Dr. Seuss' book, Happy Birthday to You!, one will see the giving of birthday cards in a much colder and more sterile light. This book should be given to anyone celebrating a birthday who could use a snack from a Hippo-Heimers back (and, quite frankly, who could not). It is a book for all ages through the ages, entirely timeless in its zany approach to that special day. It will have you shouting "I am I" which is the purpose of birthdays and even better is having someone with whom to share one's birthday to shout "We are we". A delightful book which should replace birthday cards and be attached to any gift or even be the gift itself.
Rating:
Summary: Forget Birthday Cards
Review: After one reads and delights in Dr. Seuss' book, Happy Birthday to You!, one will see the giving of birthday cards in a much colder and more sterile light. This book should be given to anyone celebrating a birthday who could use a snack from a Hippo-Heimers back (and, quite frankly, who could not). It is a book for all ages through the ages, entirely timeless in its zany approach to that special day. It will have you shouting "I am I" which is the purpose of birthdays and even better is having someone with whom to share one's birthday to shout "We are we". A delightful book which should replace birthday cards and be attached to any gift or even be the gift itself.
Rating:
Summary: My favorite book of all time ....
Review: Dr Seuss describes in dream-land all the wonderful things you could do, and the places you could go, with a special birthday bird that shows up to entertain you on your birthday !!!! This book has the type of imaginative pictures that most kids go absolutely CRAZY about. Camels with smorgasboards atop them, with chairs strapped to the humps that you could eat breakfast atop. Moutain swimming pools with multiple levels - things that we would LOVE to experience in our wildest dreams. My #1 favorite children's book out of about 50 books (including 10 Dr. Seuss) when i was a kid. There is no book that made me happier to read. It DOES NOT have to be your birthday for you to simple LOVE this book. Now that I have my own sons, I found another book with similar imagination : "Oh, the things you can think!!" but not quite as spectacular or wonderful as "Happy Birthday to You !!" by Dr. Seuss.
Rating:
Summary: Happy Bithday to you
Review: I got this book when I was 4. I have always loved this book since then. Seus again brings nonsense humor, and his great artwork to teach a child a lesson. I give this book 5 stars.
Rating:
Summary: Best Children's book ever
Review: I have loved this book ever since I can remember. It has positively ruined me for my birthday every year, I do absolutely nothing I don't want to do. I eat cake for breakfast if I want, and I never go to work that day. What a positive and creative book this is, it totally convinced me that everyone is worth spoiling rotten at least one day a year. And the pictures are so emotive and beautiful - that last image of the child bundled up safely on the flying platter is so comforting. Both my sons love the book and request it read often. The copy from my childhood is missing both covers now and some of the pages are separated, but we still love it!
Rating:
Summary: An Awesome Book about Birthdays for kids of all ages!!!!!
Review: I have loved this book since I was old enough to look at the pictures. It brings back great memories of my childhood and my family and all the birthdays we have celebrated together. This book is a classic and an excellent, different present for anyone who's having a birthday!! I have been searching for this book to give to my children for years.....now I have finally found it. Classic in all the Seuss ways, exciting, fun and thought inspiring, I recommend it for all of your friends and loved ones having a birthday! Start a tradition!!!!!! They will thank you, if not now, later in life!!!!! Just imagine celebrating your birthday the way they do in the book!!!!!! What a blast!!!!!!!!!!!! :-)
Rating:
Summary: Worlds Best Affirmation!
Review: I remember this book vividly from my childhood, and made sure to buy it and read it to my children. There is enough positive, personal affirmation power in this book to give a kid a dearly needed boost of importance and remind them that they have a right to be here, a purpose, and that the world is glad that they are here.
I also recommend If I Ran the Circus -and- If I Ran the Family !
Rating:
Summary: Truly a classic
Review: There was a rule in my family: you didn't officially turn a year older until "The Birthday Bird" (as we called it) was read to you. This tradition continued with my brother and me, even in college. This is a great feel-good book. As usual, Dr Seuss chooses an important, serious "theme" - having kids understand that they are important just because they "are" - and adorns it with tongue-twisters, great characters, and the outrageous celebrations of the Katroo Happy Birthday Associ-i-ation. Start a tradition in your family and have the Birthday Bird come to YOUR house each year.
Rating:
Summary: For kids of ALL ages
Review: This book isn't just for children. Its for anyone who wants to feel like a child. For my mother's 50th birthday, I got her a fairy princess crown and a fairy princess wand, then read this book aloud to all the guests as she sat holding her wand and wearing her crown. It was a lot of fun. Then I passed the book around for everyone to sign. You don't have to be a kid to enjoy Dr. Seuss.
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