diane recommends Where Did They Hide My Presents: Silly Dilly Christmas Songs by Alan Katz

I was always excited when my mom took the Christmas books out from the closet and set them on our bookshelves, and I was always even more happy when she--on occasion--would let me read them. The one book that I always went for first was Where Did They Hide My Presents: Silly Dilly Christmas Songs. I read this every season, and still, never got bored of it. I even started to memorize it, still pulling the book out to look at the pictures, and remember some of the songs I was missing. One of the songs that I still remember today was about a kid and his parents who were shopping.

"At the malls
No parking spaces
Ma Ma Ma Ma Ma
Can't we go home?
Millions cars
Ten parking places
Ma Ma Ma Ma Ma

Can't we go home?"

When he finds out that they are shopping for him, the poem continues as he begs to stay.

The poems are really fun and easy enough for little kids to sing. The pictures contribute to the hilarity of the book with exaggerated proportions and general silliness.

Where Did They Hide My Presents: Silly Dilly Christmas Songs

by Alan Katz

Illustrated by David Catrow
published by Margaret K. McElderry Books
2005