A Cozy Summer Day - Perfect Picture Book Friday #PPBF

2 minutes ago
4 min read

The adorable animal community from A Cozy Winter Day is back. This time for a special summer day spent with family and friends in Acorn Village. It's another gorgeous, snuggly-time inducing picture book. A wonderful book to treasure on its own or as a pair. An absolutely perfect book to encourage everyone to relish simple summer joys.

Book cover - a river does an "s" curve at the bottom with young bunnies in innertubes floating on the river, while a mama bunny holds a baby and another reads on the shore. In the upper background four houses sit in a wooded glade.

A Cozy Summer Day

Author/Illustrator: Eliza Wheeler

Publisher: Nancy Paulsen Books/Penguin Young Reader Group (April 26, 2026)

Ages: 2-5

Fiction

Themes:

Community, seasons, summer, animals, and friends.

Synopsis:

New York Times bestselling author Eliza Wheeler’s companion to A Cozy Winter Day welcomes readers into sun-dappled scenes of a cozy summer in Acorn Village, bringing the joys of summertime to refreshingly vivid life.

The animals of Acorn Village love spending summer days together. As soon as the sun comes up, they slip into shorts and sunsuits and run outside to enjoy an abundance of cozy activities, whether it’s putting up a playhouse, snacking in the strawberry patch, partaking in a picnic, or napping in a leafy nook. And when the day heats up, who can resist cooling off in a sparkling swimming hole before drying off in a cozy sun-kissed towel. When the sun disappears from the sky, it’s time to gather round the campfire to share stories and marshmallows and fall asleep under the stars.

Eliza Wheeler’s enchanting illustrations capture all the magic of long summer days outside, and readers will feel right at home as they pore over each and every cozy, comforting scene.

Opening Lines:

Summer Cozy sounds like the chatter of

neighbors starting their day in Acorn Village.

Dad and Pop help the McPaddy's

tend the garden, where

veggies grow ripe and tall.

Pat and Meg are ready to play.

What I LOVED about this book: I fell in love with Acorn Village and its inhabitants in Eliza Wheeler's earlier picture book A Cozy Winter Day. If you haven't seen it, there are amazing spreads of the inside of the bunny's tree house. The end pages are delightfully detailed and perfectly enframe the narrative of the book. The fun "roll call" of the villagers is again provided on the dedication/copyright page. And it is so fun to see how the bunny kids have slightly aged since the first book.

In this book, the entire village spends the day outdoors. I absolutely adore the soft colors of the cute cottages and fun individual feel of each house in the village. There are so many little details in every illustration that each time through readers will find something new. And maybe even see some similarities to their own lives. The wonderfully lyrical and sensory language leads the reader along the animal's cozy and companionable summer day.

Internal spread - view of acorn village with a porcupine strolling past two hedgehogs in their yard, mother & father beavers and rabbits tending a garden and two beaver kits standing in front of a tree house and waving at two bunny kids.

Text & Image © Eliza Wheeler, 2026

As the adults tend the garden, pick berries, and make lemonade and ice cream, the kids set up a cozy campsite, paint, and make sandcastles. After a short siesta to beat the day's heat, it's time for a yummy community picnic. It's nice to see the owl, Hilda Hollow (the 'reclusive' author in the previous book), joining in the community activities in this book.

Internal spread - dressed in summer clothing, seven bunnies, two beavers, two chipmunks, an owl carrying a basket of berries, and a porcupine with an ice cream cart all enjoy a picnic.

Once they are through, the kids are invited to take a trip to the otter's swimming hole. Eliza Wheeler's playful illustration of the animals traveling along the meandering brook on a paddle board, little motorboat, floatie rings, and an inflatable lounge chair "through the sun-dappled forest," is absolutely stunning. I love the otter's paddle boat home and all the little details of their exciting swimming hole. What an enticing place to spend a summer day! Cozy and cool indeed.

Internal spread - on the left a bunny and otter swoop down a water slide into the swimming hole, as a small chimpunk with arm floaties stands on a dock and two bunnies and a beaver swim. On the right, the otter's mom sits on the boat's deck watching an otter on a paddle board, a bunny swinging into the water and a beaver swimming.

After exploring some of their personalities, on the journey down the river and in the many ways to splash, play, and float away the afternoon, the whole crew gathers their gear and heads for home through an ingenious and gorgeous spread which shifts through the gutter to set the movement of time from the late afternoon's setting sun to twilight and the rising moon. Check out this image in Eliza Wheeler's interview on Monday. Or, of course, in the book itself! Interestingly, the little yellow boat is also wheeled and can navigate back up the forest trail - a perfect vehicle for a little bunny otherwise shown in a wheelchair.

As the kids crest the hill, the readers shown a fun glowing view of Acorn Village nestled below, with the adults all waiting around a roaring campfire. Eliza Wheeler leads the reader through the most wonderful couple of communal, cozy spreads and the most perfect ending which invites the reader to immediately start the book again. It's a great bedtime, or any snuggle time, book about the joys of a cozy summer day spent with family and friends.

Resources:

help set up a picnic for family or friends. What foods and drinks would you have at your picnic?

if you can, set up camp in your yard, or set up a tent or blanket fort in your house and camp out for a night. Draw a picture of write a description of what your cozy campsite would look like?

what do you like to do on a summer day? Write a description, list, story, or draw a picture of your best cozy summer day.

try some fun summer games and activities.

If you missed my interview with Eliza Wheeler on Monday, find it (here).

This post is part of a series of blog posts by authors and KidLit bloggers called Perfect Picture Book Fridays. For more picture book suggestions and resources see Susanna Leonard Hill's Perfect Picture Books.