(suggested) interest age: 6 month+
(suggested) reading age: with parent/other
“Your watch has ended, Parti Prysur”
Well, I need to apologise to the library for the state of the book I just returned, because this copy has really been through the mill. I brought it home for the little one, who was about eleven months old at the time. Safe to say, it went down well, if perhaps a little too well…
My son now has a good collection of books, and we've put them all on a forward facing shelf in his bedroom so he can go and pick his own books. Sometimes I mix in library books with his to get a little variety. Out of all the books out there, this was the one that got the most attention.
For almost a whole month, this book was given a lot of attention on a daily basis, whether by sharing the book with us or as he “read” it on his own. (I obviously use the word read in inverted commas because he mainly just looks at it, explores it and occasionally chews it!)
These type of board books are pretty resilient, and they need to be. It came with us in the car, to the park, in the pram, to the cafes. – everywhere. But, after a whole month of intense usage, and with pieces hanging off, the poor book had to come out of circulation and up to the book clinic upstairs, for me to try and fix it before returning it to the library. Just so you can imagine, the book clinic is similar to a scene from a war movie, where all the injured soldiers come after returning from the front lines. Tired and broken. We now have a big pile of damaged books awaiting repair.
The fact that the cover is hanging off isn’t an indication of the book's weakness or manufacture quality, but rather, a sign that the book has been appreciated and loved by a young child.
He was enjoyed and manhandled thoroughly for a solid month. And then, all of a sudden, the book was discarded and is no longer ‘flavour of the month.’ His attention has turned to new and exciting books, leaving Busy Party/Parti Prysur lying alone in the corner. It’s fifteen minutes of fame over for the time being.
So what’s the appeal?
Babies love and books with flaps, pull-outs, felty textures or anything like that. Things that move and can be moved basically. He very quickly got the hang of using the yellow finger tabs to move them. It was amusing to watch his fine motor skills improve while playing and experimenting with the book. Even just picking up the book, holding it and turning the pages is good practice. For some reason he was fascinated with this page (below) and would often chuckle to himself moving the piñata from side to side. No idea why.
Given how much he enjoyed Parti Prysur, we've bought more books like it, including Yr Awel yn yr Helyg and Ailgylchu Prysur, but so far he hasn't been as taken with those. I. not sure why he became so attached to this particular one, because they’re all quite similar. The colours maybe or just a simple case of right book, right time.
Another advantage with this series is that they’re bilingual books, and therefore make good gifts for any parent, whether they speak Welsh or not. A good chance to practice if nothing else.
By the end, the poor book was worn out, and looked worse for wear despite my DIY sellotaping attempts. Now it’s gone back for some respite on the library shelf. Until it gets called up for another tour of duty somewhere else that is…
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