If little boys are made of snips and snails and puppy-dog tails, what's a canine-loving sugar-and-spice girl to do? Write a book! Bernadette Peters returns to Davies Hall this week for a concert on Friday night, part of the Symphony's Summer in the City series. Then on Saturday, she gets up close and personal, signing copies of Broadway Barks, her brief but charming children's book named for the charity she founded with Mary Tyler Moore a decade ago.

"It was fan-tas-tic!" says Peters, savoring the memory of the recent Broadway Barks gala on Shubert Alley with each syllable. "Ten years. I can hardly believe it." Set in the heart of Broadway, the annual adopt-a-thon for homeless Big Apple cats and dogs is a free, outdoor event hosted by Peters and Moore, featuring appearances by an array of Broadway stars. "Over 100 animals were adopted again this year. People really get now that it's for the animals, and not just about celebrity-watching."

The project was born while Peters was in Annie Get Your Gun. Her company led that year's competition in fund-raising for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS. "We were so excited, we thought, 'What can we do next?' Someone suggested animals, and I knew that my friend Mary would be so on board for this." She's now working toward the goal of having New York emulate San Francisco's "no kill" policy of animal control.

The book is another part of the campaign to spread the Broadway Barks gospel, and raise funds for the organization. "I never wrote anything before in my life!" she exclaims, followed quickly by, "Did you hear the song?" On a two-track CD included with the colorful volume illustrated by artist Liz Murphy, Peters reads the text and sings "Kramer's Song," a sweet lullaby inspired by the events in the story. It was Peters' first foray into songwriting as well. "The publisher said we should have a song, and I thought, 'Who's gonna write it?' I was on a plane thinking about lullabies that I really love, and it just came to me. Music and lyrics at the same time." Asked if she ran the tune by friend and frequent collaborator Stephen Sondheim, she blushes. "He wanted to hear it, and I just didn't have the nerve."

An occasional visitor to the Bay Area, the two-time Tony winner and Grammy nominee is delighted to be coming back to town. "People laugh at me when I say this, but I love the weather there. I love the breezes that happen." She's also breezy when asked if she plans to return to the Great White Way. "There's stuff in the wind," she hums but, with her usual circumspect nature, won't go further. A Broadway baby who's been working professionally for over 50 years, Peters has sung for the best of them: Loesser, Herman, Hamlisch, Bernstein, Comden and Green, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Rodgers and Hammerstein, and most notably in recent years, Sondheim. She's also eager to embrace new talent, noting Adam Guettel, grandson of Richard Rodgers and composer of The Light in the Piazza, as someone to watch. "I think some of the new writers have been confused for a while. They think they should be Steve [Sondheim], and they're not. But it'll happen. They'll find their voice. It goes in phases. I mean, Steve used to be criticized for not writing like Jerry Herman." She pauses. "I like that there's always room for someone's creativity [on Broadway]. I saw In the Heights, which is a very different kind of show, and I love that that kind of creativity is given room to flourish. That's the way you find the next Sunday in the Park or the next Chorus Line ," she says.

The conversation soon veers back to four-legged matters. Peters seems more joyful telling puppy-dog tales than plugging career considerations. She mentions almost as an afterthought that she'll be appearing in an upcoming Lifetime cable movie with Harry Connick, Jr. Clearly her current leading man, who inspired her storybook, is Kramer the shelter dog Peters adopted with her late husband, Michael Wittenberg. Another Peters adoptee, Stella, a pit bull, will get her own book next year, admonishing readers to not judge a book (or a breed) by its cover. Peters relishes the storytelling opportunities. "That time that a parent and child have at bedtime, reading and singing to them, it's so special and wonderful. I hope that children will learn about the joys of adopting a shelter animal from hearing the story."

Bernadette Peters, Summer in the City, Davies Symphony Hall, Friday, July 25 at 8 p.m. Tickets ($20-$85): www.sfsymphony.org, (415) 864-6000.

Peters signs Broadway Barks at Books, Inc., 2275 Market St., Sat., July 26 at 2 p.m.