Carmela D'Amico

All Ella wants to do is help her mom in anyway at her family's bakery. But, Ella is just too small to do anything important. All she's allowed to do is sweep the floor, not anything important like helping take out macaroons from the oven or slicing a piece of pineapple pie for a customer. It's only when Mr Banjo, the delivery man, leaves a cake behind that Ella has a moment to shine and show her mom that she can be a big help.

This was a very cute book with illustrations that reminded me of The Adventures of Babar (Although, it could have been also been the fact that this book's characters are elephants). This husband and wife team worked really well together to create a story and characters that were both really fun to read about. I enjoyed the illustrations particularly. I just thought they were so cute and they are still enticing me to draw Ella riding her cart filled with cake.

Ella has one main obstacle she has to confront. You would think it would be her being too small but really it's two words: Belinda Blue. Belinda Blue is a very inconsiderate, pushy elephant who doesn't take no for an answer. She puts Ella in positions that have her compromising the arrival of her cake delivery. I think Belinda brings up a great conversation for parents to talk to their kids about bullies or people who only think of themselves. It would have been nice to see Ella tell Belinda how she feels about her actions but maybe in another one of Ella's books.

I noticed Ella only seems to have one parent. I haven't read any other books about her so I don't know if it is true. If Ella has a single parent I think that's really inspiring and shows diversity in the way families can be different from one another. Her mom being a single parent and a business owner? I loved that about this book.

I would recommend reading Ella Takes the Cake. It was a very cute book that is a conversation starter. I would also recommend reading Ella's first book, Ella the Elegant Elephant, before this one since there was reference to Ella's lucky hat and of course so you can understand the basics of Ella's life in Little Village.… (meer)

Ella, an elephant, explores various talents so she can perform in the school talent play. Along the way, Ella learns about hard work and perseverance. The book was a good story to help motivate students who quit or don’t continue to try after they have failed. The story is very relatable that way, but it is written with the intended audience in mind, which is a young emerging reader. The book would be good for either a read aloud or an individual read for a student for students to learn about talents that everybody possesses.… (meer)

When Ella, a little shy elephant girl, wears her grandmother's lucky hat to school she is bullied for being different. The other elephant kids don't invite her to play at recess and she's left to eat alone at lunch. Until one day, Belinda (resident mean girl) asks Ella to play ball but instead of a fun game of catch Belinda throws the ball onto the roof. After rescuing Belinda from falling and getting seriously hurt, Ella goes back to school and gets a warm welcome. Just one kind act from Ella (granted she essentially save Belinda's life) showed the class just what a great person she was and they stopped bullying her. Just because Belinda was mean to Ella, it did not mean Ella had to be mean back. It's a great lesson for kids to learn at any age.… (meer)

This book is about a little elephant girl who is nervous about her schools upcoming talent show. She try's out lots of talents but nothing seems to work. She offers to help put on the talent show instead. Throughout the next weeks Ella fixes peoples consumes, makes posters and medals, she helps people practice their talent, and she helps everyone's talent go smoothly. t the end of the show all of the contestants applaud Ella for putting on such an amazing show and for being talented at many things. This book is a good example of fantasy because elephants are acting like humans, it holds together, it is believable, and it is relatable on many levels.… (meer)