Big Bad Wolf 2019 Book Haul: Children’s Books Edition

It’s Big Bad Wolf again; the time when I burn all of Luke’s tuition money on books! Haha just kidding. Sort of.

So happy I was able to score a ton of amazing children’s books and I can’t wait to share them with you all here on the blog!

What is Big Bad Wolf?

Big Bad Wolf is a Malaysian book fair that comes to Manila yearly. Books sold are heavily discounted because they are taken from remainder stocks of various distributors. By heavily discounted, I mean dirt cheap! You can score wonderful workbooks for P100 or less and beautiful hardbound books start at P230!

Pretty sweet right? Now you know why I’m not really kidding when I say I burn money here. Haha. I just comfort myself with the fact that I don’t spend on tuition since Luke is homeschooled. Hehehe. Excuses, excuses!

Anyway, I was able to score passes for VIP day so we got first dibs on the selection! And without further ado, on to our haul! Take a peek into the pages of some of the books.

Children’s Non-Fiction Books

These are books that I will be using for Luke and Dylan as we homeschool. I know some of these books are still too advanced for them (Luke is 4 and Dylan is a baby haha!) but I didn’t wanna miss out on these great titles.

“The School of Art” (P390) and “Where Do Clothes Come From” (P160) are two titles that have really been on my wishlist so it was a no-brainer picking them up! Here are sample inside pages of both books, respectively:

“The School of Art” is more for older kids. There’s another title in this series called “The School of Music” that I was hoping to score but I didn’t find that in Big Bad Wolf.

This one is from “Where Do Clothes Come From.” I super LOVE the illustration style!

Next, Luke asked me for a few under-the-sea themed books so I got “Hidden World: Ocean.” (P290) I also bought another title from the same series called “Hidden World: Forest.” (P290) Below are sample pages from the 2 that I got:

Later on, I saw a 3rd book, “Hidden World: Animals,” (P290) but decided not to get it anymore. Maybe I’ll browse it again and see if I’ll complete the set; if and when I go back for round 2! Hehe.

This is from the book “Beautiful Beasts” (P290) Absolutely gorgeous life-like illustrations. Luke also asked for dinosaur books so this is what I got. The other dino books that I saw were too cartoonish for my taste.

And last sneak peek for this section, I bring you “Secrets of the Sea” (P390) If you’re familiar with books such as “Animalium” and “Botanicum,” it’s from the same publisher of those books. The style is also similar, which I am currently obsessed with.

If you can only see this book in person and hold it with your own hands, you’ll understand why I say it’s so worth the P390!

Activity Books

Another one of Luke’s requests was to get him a book about football (soccer) and sports. He also asked for sticker books. So I got him a couple of sticker books about sports. Yay!

“555 Sticker Fun Athletes” (P160) is the first book Luke got from my pile when I got home. He looooves it!

Surprisingly, I almost didn’t get it because I judge books by their covers (haha) and I didn’t like this cover but I’m happy I took the extra effort to flip it open and see that it’s actually pretty cute! It’s a sticker book with different scenes that cover different sports.

“Kick Off” (P230) is such an unassuming book but I loved it when I saw the inside pages. Geared towards kids who are a little older (or maybe it depends on the kid) but it’s such a cute football themed book where you are asked to design your own uniform, emblem, etc.

This is from the book “Hide and Seek,” (P190) which is an animal search. I like the illustrations. (At this point, you might be wondering: Am I buying books for me or the boys? Haha!)

“Maps: Activity Book” (P230) is an accompaniment to the book “Maps” which we have and love at home. Some of the fun pages in this book include making your own country and designing your own flag!

Story & Picture Books

My first few grabs of the day were from this set: “Pocket Full of Colors” and “Skit-Skat Raggedy Cat!” Both stories about 2 women I personally love!

“Pocket Full of Colors” (P290) is the story of Mary Blair, one of Disney’s most influential illustrators and one of my personal favorite illustrators of all time! I collect books with artworks! Trivia: She was the one who designed the ride “It’s a Small World!”

Luke loved this book and asked me to read it to him 3x straight. Haha.

“Skit-Skat Raggedy Cat!” (P190, what a bargain!) is a story about Ella Fitzgerald, this time, one of my favorite jazz singers! I love jazz and play her songs often at home, which is why Luke is pretty familiar with her music.

It’s a surprisingly pretty long for a children’s story book, but opens up a lot of interesting points for discussion (poverty, the music business, death of a parent)

Because of this book, “A-Tisket, A-Tasket” is our current soundtrack at home.

“The Pet Dragon” (P290) is a cute find. What’s unique about the book is how it features Chinese characters and illustrates how the Chinese words often have a connection to the word it represents (Example: The word for “prisoner” is the Chinese character for “person” inside a box)

The story is nothing amazing but it’s a good book to get kids interested in learning Chinese, which is what I need for Luke hehe.

Just for Fun

“The Lonely Planet: Instant Expert” (P350) can be a good reference for older kids and a good discussion book for younger ones. It features different careers and fields of expertise and talks about the basics of each.

I purchased both “Star Wars: Graphics” and “Star Wars the Force Awakens: Graphics” (Both P120) for myself but when Luke saw them he said “You want, share nalang (instead?)” Haha!

It’s a pretty fun book that designers and Star Wars fans (of which I am both) would appreciate!

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Did you like my haul? Did you get the same titles when you visited Big Bad Wolf Manila 2019?

If you haven’t been to The Big Bad Wolf sale yet, you better get going! Head on over to the World Trade Center at Pasay anytime it’s open 24 hours!) It’s here only from February 21 – March 4, 2019 so catch it while you can.

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Check out more book reviews and recommendations here!