Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity is the sequel to Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale. Both books have won Caldecott Honors.
In Knuffle Bunny Too, Trixie has grown up a little bit. She’s learned how to talk, and talk, and talk. She and her daddy walk through their neighborhood to get to her school. Trixie is very excited because she is taking her one-of-a-kind stuffed toy Knuffle Bunny to show and tell. She’s very excited to get to show Knuffle Bunny to her teacher and friends. But then she sees Sonja. Sonja is holding a stuffed animal that looks just like Knuffle Bunny.
The girls are not happy. They pout. They argue over the pronunciation of Knuffle. Trixie insists on Kuh-nuffle and Sonja insists the words is pronounced Nuffle. (According to the author, Mo Willems, knuffle is pronounced with a hard K sound, it means “snuggle” in Dutch. So Trixie is right.) Their teacher takes the bunnies away. The illustration is hysterical. She’s got each bunny by the ears and they look very surprised.
At the end of the day, the girls are reunited with the bunnies. Trixie plays, eats her dinner, and at “half-past bedtime” goes to sleep. A few hours later, Trixie wakes up. She’s realized that she has the wrong bunny. Her parents try to explain what 2:30 a.m. means. But then the phone rings. The voice on the other side says “We have your bunny”. The fathers make arrangements to trade bunnies. The girls and their daddies race out to trade bunnies. The girls become best friends.
As a funny epilogue, you see the girls the next morning with their tired looking fathers. The girls offer each other their bunnies to play with. The looks on the father’s faces are priceless.
I can see why these books won the Caldecott Honor. Every illustration says so much, the tired looking fathers who need a shave, the wide awake little girl eyes in the middle of the night, and the expressions on the Knuffle Bunnies. Mo Willems shows so much with his illustrations, I notice more and more details every time I read the book. It’s also nice to see books with the fathers actively parenting.
Also See:
Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale – Mo Willems
A Stuffed Knuffle Bunny at Amazon