Books

Not a lot going on today. I did volunteer to help set up the Book Fair at Gage's school today at 3:15, so I'm looking forward to that. Anytime I can look at, organize and admire books is a good time. And, after the last book fair, when I volunteered to help take it down and pack it all up to send back, Mrs. Schmidt gave both Emma and I a free book for helping! (That was all she had to do to keep me volunteering to help with the book fairs!) I haven't been a huge fan of books all of my life. I do remember when I was younger, loving the Little House on the Prairie books, and there was a series called Sweet Dreams that I enjoyed reading, and also Judy Blume. After graduating high school, when I entered nursing school, there was no time to read anything except the nursing textbooks. After that came work, and still I didn't take time to read books until I was introduced to the John Grisham books. Those I loved. I discovered it had to be a really good book to grab my attention and keep me reading. Before having kids, I remember learning about how important books were to kids and how much smarter they can be when you read to them. I started collecting Disney books at that time for my future children. When Gage came along, I had those books, and some books we received from my oldest sister, Kim. She sent me a whole series of books she had for her children, Ryan and Sara, in the mail. I remember getting that package and it being so heavy. We were thrilled to death when we opened it to find all of these wonderful books. The best part was that Ryan and Sara both had written their names in the covers of these books where it stated, "This book belongs to". I couldn't wait for Gage to get old enough to write his name so I could have him write it right alongside Ryan and Sara's signatures inside the covers of these books. Now, Emma will get to do the same thing. When we have outgrown the books, my plan is to box them up and keep them until Ryan and/or Sara have children and I will send them back to them. I can't wait. I also have a bunch of books from my sister Jari Jo, and I plan to do the same thing with them. We now have so many books in this house, it's almost embarrassing. I know Gage's and Emma's teachers love me when they send home book orders because they get all kinds of free things for every dollar I spend, and I know that a wonderful hardcovered children's dictionary has made its way into Gage's classroom because of me and my purchase of the entire Harry Potter series in hardcover edition! (His teacher told me so!) I can always rationalize why I should buy them. You can never go wrong spending money on a book because it's going to make your children smarter, right? May is a sad time for me, because that means 3 whole months of no book orders coming home. I remember taking those same book orders home from school when I was young. My Mom would get so mad when we would bring them home. I remember begging and begging to buy books. I do remember always getting to pick out a 95 cent poster! (I'm sure I got occasional books too, but I remember the posters). I always think of that when the kids bring home their book orders. Emma brought 2 of them home today, in fact! :-) I've been stocking up for summer reading! Our good friend, Juanita, brought us over several books that were being eliminated from the middle school library where she works and there are several good titles that I can't wait to start reading. I don't know what I'm going to do when the kids are reading to themselves and don't want Mom reading to them anymore? I hope that time doesn't come.

On a completely different note, I wanted to share this link with you. This link will take you to the blog of a friend, of the woman who had Audrey Caroline. This is a 3-part video series that has been posted on You Tube of them being interviewed by this friend's pastor, and it is such a wonderful story. I hope you can take about 25 or so minutes to watch the 3 videos posted on Jessica's blog.