It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and Jen Vincent of Teach Mentor Texts decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kid lit focus. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kid lit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

It was an especially good week for picture books. Here is what jumped out of the book stack this week....

This House, Once by Deborah Freedman (Atheneum Books for Young Readers, February 28, 2017) - Deborah Freedman is on my automatic buy list. I love her beautifully illustrated quiet stories.

Animal Ark: Celebrating Our Wild World in Poetry and Pictures by Kwame Alexander; Photographs by Joel Sartore (National Geographic Kids, February 14, 2017) - I am not sure what I was expecting when I opened this book but I found so much more. Engaging poetry with jump off the page photographs. Pick this one up.

Life On Mars by Jon Agee (Dial Books, February 28, 2017) - An act of kindness and some humor and a boy and an alien and chocolate cupcakes. What's not to love about this?

Little Fox in the Forest by Stephanie Graegin (Schwartz & Wade Books, February 28, 2017) - A gorgeous wordless picture book filled with imagination.

Little Penguin Gets the Hiccups by Tadgh Bentley (Balzer & Bray, 2015) - Oh this one would be a fun read aloud. Don't know how I missed this when it first came out but I did. Glad to have found it now.

Ferocious Fluffity: A Mighty Bite-y Class Pet by Erica S. Perl; Illustrated by Henry Cole (Abrams Books for Young Readers, 2016) I was looking for this one last year when it came out but I missed it. Finally got a chance to read it, and when you do, you will never look at a classroom pet in the same way again.

The Bad Guys: Episode 2: Mission Unpluckable by Aaron Blabey (Scholastic Press, February 28, 2017) - Finally got my hands on Book 2. Though not a picture book, this illustrated graphic novel hybrid is a winner in my book.

Alex Award Challenge: This year I challenged myself to read at least half of the 2017 Alex Award Winners. My second Alex Winner is Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire (Tor, 2016). I just started the book, but will report back.