Children's books about the weather

Mini issue: Weather

You cannot live in a place like Wisconsin without being fully aware, at all times, of the weather. We think about it at night before we get in bed, and we think about it first thing in the morning (much can change between bed and morning). It is our main topic of conversation, especially with strangers (and it’s always okay to talk about the weather with total strangers — there is a direct correlation between mutual suffering and camaraderie). It determines how many days of school our children attend each year (there is no hell like the hell of extra school days in June), whether or not we can commute to work, even our chances of heart attacks (which increase greatly during snow shoveling). It affects everything we do, the decisions we make, the plans we conjure up only to accept when God laughs. To say that it’s an integral part of our lives is a laughable understatement.

So of course, in my family, we read about it, because we read about everything — that’s one of my main strategies in life, not just in creating a culture of reading in my home. (I have a whole post about this approach if you’re interested, but TL:DR: connect everything to reading and reading to everything.) I honestly don’t know how to go about doing anything without reading about it.

Here’s a roundup of children’s books about the weather (if I’ve reviewed any of them in the past, I’ve linked to those here) and two reviews of books that fit this category.

No list I compile is ever exhaustive, so if you have a weather book to recommend, your additions are always welcome — please leave a comment!

• The Weather Girls by Aki

• Weather: Poems for All Seasons selected by Lee Bennett Hopkins

• Windsongs by Douglas Florian (poetry)

• A Rainbow of My Own by Don Freeman

• Come On, Rain! by Karen Hesse

• Alfie Weather by Shirley Hughes (a four-story collection with a few poems, all about weather — and extremely lovable Alfie, of course)

• The Wind Blew by Pat Hutchins

• The Sun Shines Everywhere by Mary Ann Hoberman (poetry)

• This Beautiful Day by Richard Jackson

• The Fog by Kyo Maclear

• Thunder Cake by Patricia Polacco

• Seed Sower, Hat Thrower: Poems About Weather by Laura Purdie Salas

• Rain Talk by Mary Serfozo

• Snow by Uri Shulevitz

• Wet World by Norma Simon

• Worm Weather by Jean Taft

• Look at the Weather by Britta Teckentrup

• Who Likes Rain? by Wong Herbert Yee

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Micro review: Wind Watchers by Micha Archer (2025)

I received a copy of this book from Penguin Random House — all opinions are my own

If you’re unfamiliar with Micha Archer’s gentle, lyrical books, go not pass Go, do not collect $200, get thee to an open browser tab and remedy that situation immediately.

The loose, meditative narrative here follows three children as they play with the wind all year, puffing at petals, flying kites, watching the rain roll in, and more through each season.

Like Archer’s previous gorgeous titles — several of which I’ve reviewed, all of which deftly blends beautiful prose and her signature acrylic ink and layered tissue paper collages with the beauty of the world around us — Wind Watchers is a gentle, almost dreamlike paean to an oft-ignored source of natural wonder. If you’re looking to spark awe and appreciation, this poetic read is excellent for preschoolers and early elementary kiddos (though I wouldn’t discount the pleasure to be found here for older children and, ahem, adults).

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Gilberto and the Wind by Marie Hall Ets (1963)

This review first appeared in my 2021 special edition on spring — I’ve edited and updated it here

Speaking of the wind (and in Wisconsin we are frequently speaking of the wind): Gilberto is a little boy with his own hands full of the wind. It begins one morning when he hears the wind whispering at his door and proceeds to follow Gilberto and the wind as they have a whole day together. The reader sees other days Gilberto and the wind spend together — often but not always getting along — and the ways in which Gilberto and the wind are playmates of many moods.

Sometimes I don’t fully understand why Ets’ books are so compelling for toddlers and preschoolers (see my review of In the Forest in issue No. 11) but they are. This one is especially unique on the inside: Ets used dark pencil and white chalk on the background of what looks, in all honesty, like a brown paper grocery bag. It’s a surprisingly lovely meditation on the sincere and uncomplicated pleasures of childhood and weather — two things that even small readers connect to.

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Read good books and take good care 😘
Sarah