Kevin Henkes

Seven-year-old Billy Miller starts second grade with a bump on his head and a lot of worries, but by the end of the year he has developed good relationships with his teacher, his little sister, and his parents and learned many important lessons.

Penny instantly loves the doll her grandmother sends her, but finding the perfect name for her is a challenge.

Four-year-old Sal cannot find a gift she recieved from Santa, her new baby sister still does not have a name and takes up all of Mama's attention, and her brother Billy is annoying, but Sal finds her own strenghts over an eventful Christmas season with her family.

The week of her tenth birthday, Alice and her parents go to Sanibel Island, Florida, just as they do every year, but this time some of the people who are always there are missing and some new people have come, which unsettles Alice, who wants things to be exactly the same as they alway are.

Penny has a new sled, but will it ever snow?

Five animal toys wait for marvelous things to happen.

"It's the first day of school, and Chrysanthemum is sure that it's going to be absolutely perfect. Just like her name. Chrysanthemum. But her classmates have other ideas. "If I had a name like yours, I'd change it," says Victoria. But when a teacher with an equally precious and priceless and fascinating name comes to her defense, Chrysanthemum's school days go from absolutely dreadful to perfectly delightful." -- Back Cover.

Fascinated by the colors, shapes, sounds, and movements of the many different birds she sees through her window, a little girl is happy to discover that she and they have something in common.

Illustrations and easy-to-read text introduce such basic concepts as adjectives, adverbs, daytime, and nighttime as they follow five elephants marching from dawn to dusk.

"Animals and children alike watch as the world transforms from the dark and dead of winter to a full and blooming spring"-- Provided by publisher.