2026 Blogging A to Z Challenge: Zoo
It’s the last letter of the alphabet! Letter “Z” for Zoo! But, we’re not absolutely done yet! Come back tomorrow for the 2026 Blogging A to Z Challenge Reflection post that includes links to all 26 posts from this month! That’s 234 board book suggestions all by different authors to explore! Plus, if you’re invited to a baby shower or have little ones in your life, they all make great gifts too!
For the last book list of this challenge, I’m sharing books about animals! And boy are there so many animal board books out there! I tried to create a collection of both fiction and nonfiction titles, both educational and silly to share with your little one. So whether they’re jumping like a frog, or wiggling their tail feathers like a peacock, I think that they’ll love pouring over these titles over and over again.
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2026 Blogging A to Z Challenge: Zoo
100 Animals: A Lift-the-Flap Book by Steve Jenkins
This padded word book showcases bright art to offer very young readers an interactive introduction to learning their first animal words. From the teal and green butterfly fish that lives under the sea to the brilliant blue macaw flying high in the sky, lift-the-flaps on each sturdy board page reveal how animals move, behave, survive, and thrive in their natural habitats.
Animal Portraits by Lucie Brunellière
Fabulous, large-format, 34-page, board book, full of bold, colorful, and appealing animal portraits, from mice to elephants, pandas to reindeer. Captivating and beautiful.
Animals Brag About Their Bottoms by Maki Saitō
All bottoms are wonderful! Don’t you agree? Each animal in this adorable book has a different reason for loving their behind—from cute and round to fashionable and striped! Talented illustrator Maki Saito makes kids laugh out loud with playful illustrations of the backsides of hippos, zebras, pandas, mandrills, and more of our favorite animals. Her traditional Japanese art techniques add a sophisticated, beautiful feel to a book about … animal butts! Kids will love reading along to this wonderfully silly and unusually empowering book.
Animals Lift the Fact by Emma Whitelaw
Discover the world of animals and lift the flaps on every page to discover fascinating facts about creatures, great and small! With beautiful illustrations throughout and more than 50 flaps to explore, you can find out more about this fascinating world we live in!
Animal Tails by Little Bee Books
In Animal Tails, little ones will be asked which tail belong to which animal. The pages of this book are filled with familiar, kid-favorite animals such as pigs, tigers, foxes, sharks, and more. Rendered in soft colors that make this an even more enjoyable experience for babies, each page includes embossed animal tails, creating a tactile experience for tiny hands. And on the last spread, all the animals appear with their correct tails!
Illusions in Art: Animals by Chiêu Anh Urban
Singing, tweeting, small and round.
Lion likes this whistler’s sound.
Look closely. What do you see? Could that be a bird nestled in the curl of Lion’s tail? And who is swimming by Whale? Or basking in the sun near Swan? Colorful spreads invite children in with a rhyme that contains a clue, while the bold, graphic design steers the eye to a negative space revealing a hidden familiar animal. Black-and-white spreads at the end depict the same animals again, further clarifying the concept of positive and negative space. Fun and enticing for even the youngest children and a delight for art-oriented parents, this interactive seek-and-find book begs for many repeat sharings.
I Need a Hug by Aaron Blabey
In I Need a Hug, a tiny porcupine just wants a cuddle. All of the other animals turn him away because of his prickly spikes. But finally the porcupine meets an animal who’s happy to hug — a snake!
Rich with author-illustrator Aaron Blabey’s signature rhyming text and unforgettably splendid illustrations, I Need a Hug is a sweet story about friendship and learning not to judge a book by its cover.
Perfect for Valentine’s Day or any day that requires a hug!
Peek and Boo! Day at the Zoo by Estrela Lourenço
Peek is ready for a fun day at the zoo, but can’t find her best friend Boo anywhere! Where is he hiding? Maybe the elephants have seen him? Maybe he’s watching the seals play?
Help Peek search for the small guinea pig as he has silly fun around the zoo. Can you find him before the day is over?
Rainforest by Sarah Dellow
Early readers will love discovering the animals hidden in this book. Just turn each page to make the vibrant patterns come to life! Perfect for developing early perception skills, stimulating the imagination – and simply having fun!
2026 is my eleventh year participating in the Blogging A to Z Challenge! This year, my theme is Board Books for Babies with a focus on providing book suggestions that parents and caregivers can share with, of course, babies, but also toddlers and preschoolers! Each letter of the alphabet will focus on a different subject and will provide nine titles for each subject. While there are dozens of classic board books out there, this list includes titles published in the past 5-6 years, so you’ll get to learn about new titles, authors, and publishers! Stop by daily to check out the new books and other posts that I’ll be sharing in April.
