After sledding, Ty’s big wish to meet Santa comes true. He and Momma head out with pup Brownie past a snowpal, a group of singing polar bears, and dancing dolls and toy soldiers, all straight out of Ty’s imagination.

Ty notices that his North Pole snow globe resembles the freshly fallen snow in his own neighborhood. This installment of the Ty’s Travels early-reader series focuses on the magic of the holiday season. Vivid blended layers and gentle swirls outline the figures for a glowing effect that echoes the thoughtful tone of the story. Readers will pause to share in the happiness and sense of peace that bloom on the family’s faces the spirit of finding one’s calling in this expressively illustrated book honoring family and self-love.Ty and Momma explore a Christmassy winter wonderland. Engel’s painterly brush strokes in captivating scenes create textured grooves, an integral element transforming the hands and scenes depicted into sculpted lines and lively colors that appear almost tangible to readers. This sincere relationship of trust and care is beautifully captured in oil-painted illustrations, where quiet, personal moments within the kitchen are accompanied by an elegant, symbolic focus on hands. The grandmother reveals how her hands hold memories, love of family, and a life lived with purpose, all of which reassure Zoe that her own hands hold strength to shape the start of her own life story. ★ In this heartwarming story, Zoe, a young Black girl, shares reflective conversation with her grandma, inspired by Zoe’s observations of her grandma’s skillful, graceful hands as they bake bread together. With big brushstrokes, Engel’s thickly textured paintings lend a timeless feel to Lyons’s heartwarming portrait of grandparent-child love. When the bread is finished, the pair high five, and Grandma remarks upon the physical similarity between their hands, while also musing about the different life experiences Zoe is sure to have.

“I look at my hands, really look at them, for the first time./ I can see memories in every line.// Clapping games with friends./ Drawing my dreams./ Building and baking,” Zoe describes. You’ve got to get the rhythm”), Zoe’s grandma describes some of what her hands have seen and done-from dancing onstage to growing a vegetable garden early in her marriage-prompting Zoe to reflect on the future. While showing Zoe how to bake cinnamon bread like her mother taught her (“Ingredients are only part of it. ★ Hands and the stories they tell become the means through which a Black child bonds with a beloved grandmother in this expressive, painterly picture book.

Ty's Travels by Kelly Starling Lyons