47 Books

My current tactic in getting my son to sleep during naptime is to read him one book and then act like I want him to go to sleep immediately... and then act like he's convinced me to let him read a few more books before he has to lay down and close his eyes. Then I go downstairs and take a 15 minute nap on the couch while pages are being studied and carefully turned upstairs. After I've heard four or five thunks from books hitting the floor of his bedroom, I tiptoe upstairs, peek into his room, and gently tell him it's time to sleep. Then, as I'm tucking him under his sheets and giving him a peck on the forehead, he informs me how many books he just read. Yesterday, it was "forty-seven."

Yes, I can proudly say that I'm raising a couple of fellow book-lovers here. Mathematicians? Maybe not so much.

Sarah is still a little too "busy" for almost anything other than the most basic board books and our Sandra Boynton collection (she caught on to the humor of Blue Hat, Green Hat when she was, like, six months old - I swear!). However, I have recently discovered that the "little momma" in her will happily sit through any number of readings of Eloise Wilkin's Baby Dear, one of my own childhood favorites. We have a compilation of Wilkin's books, Eloise Wilkin Stories, and Sarah is captivated by the sweet pictures of babies and little boys and girls and all the normal everyday things that populate their lives. She has even learned to say "baby" - which is, I think, her third official word. (Hi, Daddy, Baby. Yep, that's about it.)

Before naptime (and throughout the day), Luke enjoys any of a number of books from his huge and ever-growing collection: the Berenstein Bears, Little Critter, Richard Scarry, Little Bear, Dr. Suess, and Sesame Street are among his favorites right now. But at bedtime, we have really been trying to stick with stories from his Beginner's Bible. Those stories are just right for him now, and I like the fact that they are a little more detailed in scope (and significantly closer to Scripture) than some of the other kids' Bible story books - but still widely illustrated and simple enough for a preschooler. I am really thankful to have access to so many resources that make it easy to impress Scripture onto these little hearts! 

As for P and myself, we are about to start a study of C.S. Lewis's Till We Have Faces that is being conducted at a local private school. It's a little ambitious for me these days to tackle a whole book in four weeks' time, but perhaps my Big Girl reading skills will surface for the task. Or maybe I'll be the one in the study group who's always comparing Lewis's characters to Elmo and the Cat in the Hat....