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Can books fly? Yes, they can! (Review of Flying Books Subscription)

June 28, 2016

Those of you who have followed me from Day One would know how much I advocate reading.

Some years back, I did a series on Teaching the Kao Kids and how to raise readers (you can read the first post here, second one here & third one here). I’m also known as a mom (still!) who refuses to throw an iPad or mobile to my kids to keep them entertained. Till now, my friends whom we dine out with are pretty amazed that my kids still take out books to read while waiting for food to come. I’m really glad to have started on the right footing with the boundaries on technology and heartened that the kids have fallen head over heels with books.

I pretty much rely on book lists from these sources: flavorwire and huffingtonpost, and I try to buy books that have been recognised by the Caldecott Medal (and its respective Honor Books). The kids and I often enjoy these reads when I purchase them online from Open Trolley, Book Depository and occasionally, The Groovy Giraffe.

But getting books and replenishing our library often requires a regular exercise of me getting updates from my go-to-sources and searching for them online (plus comparing prices and wait time) and this can only mean that our collection can get quite stale if I get too busy to support their voracious reading appetites.

So boy am I glad to learn that books can fly to us if my schedules get busy and the kids want to be reading new titles.

You heard me right, books can fly to you, regularly and thoughtfully.

Flying Books is a book subscription that curates books for your little ones and sends them to your doorstep. The books are selected based on the little one’s age group and come from a carefully handpicked list of best published children’s books. The format of books vary between board books and picture books (either paperback or hardcover) and will always take into consideration of the age group of the child they are sent to.

I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Nicole Martins who founded Flying Books and learned that her dream of bringing stories to children to ignite their imagination was the reason for starting this business. Nicole works out of Trehaus which I co-founded, and we get excited just talking about our dream of having our children loving to read. I’ve also asked her if parents like me who buy A LOT of books for my children were a good fit for her curated subscription service, and she answered me by letting my children experience the ‘Siblings – One Time Gift Packgage‘ for myself (customised for 3 instead of 2 kids, though). I was mainly concerned about having repeats (which Nicole says would be avoided because an email would be sent out to the parents to ensure that the child will be getting a surprise in the mail and not an existing title) and that the books would be suited for my three children who were at very different reading milestones.

And what a surprise we got when we received our Flying Books delivered to us.

What's in the parcel?

What’s in the parcel?

It’s like Christmas coming early with all the prettily wrapped up presents.

Christmas came early!

Christmas came early!

After we unwrapped the books, we found a personalised letter introducing the books that the kids have received.

When I learned what the titles they received were, I instinctly knew that the selection was age-appropriate and helps in developing their reading milestones: Nat would get some texture play and a colourful story read to him; Becks could try blending words to help in her reading complete with lots of visuals; and Ben could definitely take off on his own, reading an exciting sequel to a book he’s previously read and loved.

Such details to fill the parents in on what her kids would be getting!

Such details to fill the parents in on what her kids would be getting!

Nat received Sharing a Shell by Julia Donaldson; Becks got Don’t Let the Pigeon Stay Up Late by Mo Willems and Ben received the sequel to Drew Daywalt’s The Day the Crayons Quit, which was The Day the Crayons Came Home.

Flying Books (11)

Books to read, hooray!

 

Wasted no time in reading

Wasted no time in reading

The books had extremely good mileage for the entire month. The kids exchanged their books frequently and bugged various storytellers in the house to read them aloud, namely me and their father, and occasionally Ben who is great doing voices.

We thoroughly enjoyed the glitter from Sharing a Shell, particularly the littlest who was kinda obsessed with rubbing every page (never too old for some sensory experience!). We had a good time role-playing the narrator who’s tasked to not let the pigeon convince us of staying up late. And there’s nothing not to love about Oliver Jeffers’ illustrations of the flustered, whiny, frustrated crayons in Daywalt’s The Day the Crayons Came Home and we had many nights of laughter with both the quitting book and the coming home book.

We love the crayons most, definitely.

Altogether now, rubbing the glitter on the book

Altogether now, rubbing the glitter on the book

We’re thankful that Flying Books lets us experience so much reading pleasure from these titles, and I’ll be the first here to recommend this to parents with young children at various age groups (take the Siblings package!) because it saves you the trouble of handpicking books for your kids in line with their development and literacy skills. Although the subscription service currently only curates for 12 months to 6 years, I am confident that a 7 or 8 year-old can still enjoy the titles meant for a 6-year-old.

Or gift them (buy one-time packages) to a child whom you know would love to receive exciting titles on a special occasion. How’s that for a really thoughtful birthday present?

And for those who wish to make reading a lifelong habit for your kid(s), Flying Books is a good way to start. It’s all the guess work done for you, which means you don’t have to constantly check for the latest popular published titles and rifle through bookstores. Plus, I know Nicole goes to great lengths in curating only the best for your child because I watch her work passionately every day, which means that you’ll always be promised quality and awesome books!

Giveaway & Discount Code, courtesy of Flying Books

  • And just for readers of this blog, Flying Books is doing a giveaway of 3 x Flying Books Gift Package (one-time package) to be sent in July to 3 special kids!

Participate using the Rafflecopter app here:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Giveaway ends 17 July 2016. Please note that Flying Books curate books for 12 months to 6 years only. Winners will be notified via email and information about your child’s age will be collected by Flying Books so that the age-appropriate gift package can be delivered to you.

  • Flying Books is also offering a 5% discount off the 3-month subscription plans (for both regular & siblings) in addition to the published discounted rate. Use the promo codes MOTHERKAO & MOTHERKAOSIB respectively when you check out.

~~~

Happy reading!

“You can find magic wherever you look. Sit back and relax, all you need is a book.” – Dr Seuss

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18 Comments

  • Reply Kaye Wong July 15, 2016 at 12:32 PM

    My child’s favourite title is ‘Cinderella’. I wish the book ‘The Smartest Giant in Town’ will fly to my child so that we can read it and use it to illustrate that inner beauty is more important than outer beauty. Thank you for the giveaway 🙂

  • Reply Kaye Wong July 15, 2016 at 12:30 PM

    My child’s favourite title is ‘Cinderella’. I wish the book ‘The Smartest Giant in Town’ will ‘fly’ to my child so that we could read it and use it to illustrate to my child that inner beauty is more important than outer beauty. Thank you for the giveaway 🙂

  • Reply Siaw Hoon New July 15, 2016 at 11:31 AM

    Books that I would like to ‘fly’ to my two children: The Adventures of Squirky the Alien.
    Read up a lot of good reviews about these books and written by Melanie Lee, a local author.

  • Reply Siaw Hoon New July 15, 2016 at 10:59 AM

    We love Julia Donaldson, Eric Carle and Hugless Douglas books.
    My 6 yo son love The Smartest Giant in Town, What the Ladybird Heard, Sharing a Shell and The Very Hungry Caterpillar…
    My 5 yo son love The Rainbow Fish, Stickman..

    Thank you for the giveaway.

  • Reply Eileenchua July 14, 2016 at 2:48 PM

    Favourite title : The very hungry caterpillar by Eric Carle

  • Reply Shauna July 12, 2016 at 5:45 PM

    hi Elizabeth, thanks for sharing this awesome news on your blog! My son’s favourite is the Giving Tree. He is five years old this year. Hope to win the giveaway!

  • Reply Julius Chen July 10, 2016 at 12:41 PM

    Our boy’s favourite title is ‘Corduroy’ by Don Freeman because he loves teddy bears. Please fly a book to us for our bedtime reading!

  • Reply Jessie Lee July 9, 2016 at 11:26 PM

    Gruffalo has been one of my girl’s favourite. Thanks for the giveaway, we would like to have Humphery Tiny Tales Playful Puppy, this is the left out title that she hasn’t read in the series. We ordered from book depository.com n it was lost in the mail.

  • Reply Justina July 7, 2016 at 10:23 AM

    Thanks for the giveaway! My 3.5yo is a huge fan of The Gruffalo 🙂

  • Reply Louis Lee July 3, 2016 at 5:40 PM

    My kids love books by Dr Suess, Eric Carle and Julia Donaldson. Their all time favourite is Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson.

  • Reply Meiyan June 30, 2016 at 12:37 AM

    Favourite title is the rainbow fish series. Thank u so much!!

  • Reply Jacqualine June 29, 2016 at 9:06 PM

    My son is especially amused by Goodnight Moon and even though we have been reading the same book for a while now, he still enjoys me reading it to him!

    My kiddos love heartwarming, funny stories so we would love to see what Flying Books can surprise us with!

  • Reply Keith Tan June 29, 2016 at 4:50 PM

    My boy love The Gruffalo. I hope to win this to add on his story book and have variety of interesting story to keep him busy. Thank you.

    • Reply Keith Tan June 29, 2016 at 4:53 PM

      I hope Don’t Let the Pigeon Stay Up Late by Mo Willems to fly to your child because he always stay up late and I’m curious on what is the story about it. Thank you.

  • Reply Theresa tay June 29, 2016 at 4:12 PM

    My elder one loves books from Julia Donaldson – room on broom, Gruffalo while the younger one loves rod Campbell books especially dear zoo. We hope to read sharing a shell!!!

  • Reply Jingxian June 29, 2016 at 3:17 PM

    Currently it’s Meet The Wakersaur!
    I would love the boys to fly to Where’s Wally world where it is so colorful. It will be fun to search for Wally while enjoying the sights.

  • Reply Carol Lim June 29, 2016 at 3:09 PM

    My three boys love titles by Julia Donaldson, Oliver Jeffers and Arnold Lobel. We would love it if Flying Books could fly either one title by one of these two fav authors, or ISH by Peter H Reynolds. Thank you very much!!

  • Reply Serena June 29, 2016 at 11:28 AM

    Favourite title is Sharing a Shell by Julia Donaldson! Thanks for the giveaway!

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