As the weather gets cooler and the holidays approach, it’s a good time to hunker down with a blanket and think about home. The home is the backdrop of childhood adventures, the cradle of familial love, and the place where children first begin to learn, grow, and develop. It’s the perfect theme for children’s picture books.
Here is a list of picture books to read to your children that focus on this topic, instilling traditional values—such as a love of home—through fun stories.
1. ‘The Little House’ by Virginia Lee Burton
In this classic children’s book, a little farmhouse enjoys its “life” in the country, watching the children that live in it play throughout the changing seasons. But as time passes, the city expands and the house is abandoned. It grows sad that people race by without noticing it.
But eventually, enough time passes that the great-great-granddaughter of the man who built the house finds it and moves it into the country again. This book contrasts hustle and bustle with a more home-centric life, as well as the concept that sometimes you have to move to be home.
2. ‘Homeplace’ by Anne Shelby
This beautifully illustrated book follows one family through seven generations and shows how one house became a home to each family that lived there, adapting to changing times and each family’s needs. The detailed pictures provide young readers with much to get absorbed in. The depiction of old-time crafts and skills, as well as the rich natural world backdrop, is particularly charming—and educational for children.
3. ‘This Is Our House’ by Hyewon Yum
“This is Our House” tells of an immigrant family moving to a new city. The little girl narrating the story relates how her grandparents came from far away, but found a sense of belonging in their new house. She tells stories of her mom growing up there, and now how she lives in the same house with her parents and grandparents. The book emphasizes how family memories can live in a house. The same street that supported her mother’s first steps is where she also learns to toddle. The kitchen where her grandmother cooked to nourish her children is where her mother now feeds her. This is a good book for children who live in a multigenerational home.
4. ‘Hello Lighthouse’ by Sophie Blackall
When we think of homes, many of us think of a traditional house or apartment. But some homes very much shaped the lifestyles and routines of the families who lived there. “Hello Lighthouse” gives wonderful insight into what life and home meant to a lighthouse keeper and his family. Beautiful, poetic text compliments gentle, whimsical pictures.
5. ‘Farmhouse’ by Sophie Blackall
This book is based on the true story of the author buying some land with a tumbledown house on it. She tells the tales she learned of the family of 12 children who lived there. It has a bittersweet ending because the house is eventually abandoned, but the author asks readers to tell the stories we have so they will continue to live on.
I love how this book features a large family, which can be hard to find in modern picture books. My wife resonates with the family’s farm life. Although the book characters are of a previous generation, the story still contains many similarities to the lifestyle of modern farming families.
She particularly likes this line: “Cows that lived in the barn behind the house and were milked twice a day no matter the weather, at dawn and at dusk by one child or another, who shivered and grumbled as they crossed the yard or liked being alone with a flaming cloud, depending on the season, the day, and the child.”
This book is written as one long run-on sentence, which mirrors how time passes continually. One memory blends into another as the children grow up. The illustrations reflect the story, since they are compiled of things that the author found in the house, such as old scraps of wallpaper and pieces of fabric layered in with her own drawings.
6. ‘The House of Grass and Sky’ by Mary Lyn Ray
This could be the next part of the story for a book such as “Farmhouse.” When the last family moves out of this home, it wishes for someone (especially children) to come bring life to it once more. Different families look at it, but they all find something they don’t like until one family decides that it’s the perfect house for them. They restore the house and start making their own memories in their new home.
7. ‘Let’s Go Home’ by Cynthia Rylant
This delightful book goes through each room of the house and describes what it is used for and what makes it cozy. The illustrations are charmingly chaotic, with lots for little ones to discover hidden in the pictures.
8. ‘Home in the Woods’ by Eliza Wheeler
Eliza Wheeler tells the story of her grandmother and her family in the Great Depression. Marvel (her grandma) has just lost her father to cancer, and, because of the hard times, she, her mother, and her seven siblings move to a tarpaper shack in the woods. It describes the peculiar life’s hardships and joys. Plus, the illustrations become more brightly colored as her sadness starts to fade and she learns to love her new life. It beautifully portrays how a home can still be happy no matter your place or circumstances. Even a humble home can be a happy one.
This booklist is just the beginning of stories that highlight the home, but hopefully it will help you and your children enjoy the cozy season and reflect on the gift of simple, beautiful home life.
