H is for Hungry Caterpillar: our favourite book

I have been waiting for the letter H.

H is for (the) Hungry Caterpillar – our favourite book by Eric Carle. This is a very popular book and most babies begin their book love journey from this one. We have had our copy since #babyT was a month old. And have been reading to him since then.

Everywhere we go, the book goes with us

Not just in our home, but the Hungry Caterpillar is a very popular book across the world and it is even used as a reading book in preschoolers in the some countries. I came across this when I browsed google to see if any blog posts existed on this topic. 😛
So why am I writing a whole blog post about a  children’s book, which has been much loved and sadly, hated by some quarters? Because this book is so versatile.. it has grown with us. Like any good book, its relevance only comes forth with time and experience/ stage of life. Right from the time #babyT was a month old to today at 15 months, we have found something new to marvel upon and learn. 

When I started reading this to him, I would show him the bright images and the movement of the pages.. the flaps in ascending order of size would grab his attention and he loved looking at all the colours and shapes.

Love the colours on this page..

When babyT began eating solid foods, we read the book to him and showed him the various fruits that the tiny little caterpillar ate in this book.

Fruits ?????

Around #babyT’s first birthday he realised what one piece of chocolate cake meant. 🙂 And he babyT kinda liked it. 😀 He has always loved staring endlessly at the binge eating day page.. I think we have a party animal in babyT and a foodie at core. Just like mommyT and daddah.

The binge eating day page.. ?

We also tell him how he needs to eat his greens, so that he feels good and is healthy. Poor caterpillar has a tummy ache after his big day of binge eating and only eating a nice, green leaf can help him get better.

We have also started counting with the Hungry Caterpillar – 1 apple, 2 pears, 3 plums.. and babyT loves poking his fingers into the holes that the caterpillar bit through the fruits. 😀

Counting 5 oranges…

Now we are old enough to understand a little bit more about how things grow from small to big and so we have started explaining to babyT how the caterpillar started off as an egg, and hatched into a tiny caterpillar and then ate food, a lot of food to become a big caterpillar and then slept in a cocoon (hello night times 🙂 ) and woke up to become a beautiful colourful butterfly. <3

Down the line we will also use the book to learn more about days of the week as the book progresses from Sunday to the rest of thr week.

MommyT also shows #babyT  her collection of pics and videos of the time she used to breed these  little butterflies in a box at home. 🙂

and this is totally intriguing to babyT… to watch the little caterpillar eat and eat and eat..

Do you read the Hungry Caterpillar yet? I highly recommend it. 🙂