Books, Books, Books...

I am reading a great book right now called 'Honey for a Child's Heart', by Gladys Hunt. It is all about the joy of reading to your children and loving books as a family. I just loved this quote from C.S. Lewis in Chapter 3: "no book is really worth reading at the age of ten which is not equally worth reading at the age of fifty".

She also has a wonderful list on the top ten ways to raise a Non-reader:

1. Have the TV on at all times, and have a computer and TV in every room

2. Keep the place neat: no books or magazines in sight

3. Never let your children see you reading a book

4. Never take your kids to the library

5. Never read stories aloud after age 2

6. Never talk about ideas while eating meals

7. Keep the lights down low. Buy only 40 watt lightbulbs (darn those spell checkers!!)

8. Schedule your children in every activity you can think of so they don't get bored

9. Never play any table games together

10. Absolutely no reading in bed or good lamps to make it easy to do so.

Well my own parents sure didn't take her advice!! Thanks mom and dad :-)

I can remember many nights staying up very late in bed reading as a child (I had the coolest strawberry shortcake lamp that you could turn on for reading so it was dimmer).

I also have fond memories of my mom taking me to the library with her while she looked in the grown-up section and I was allowed to pick out as many books as I wanted in the kids section. We both usually came home with handfuls of books each!! (and we both often ended up with large fines too LOL...)

It wasn't until I was grown did I ever wonder when she had the time to read the stacks of books she would check out each week.... Now I know she doesn't sleep at night and can read faster than the river flows over Niagara falls :-)

Anyways... I am enjoying the book immensely. There is also a great book list at the back for suggested reading and I am looking forward to going through it. We just have to start working on my little boy and getting him to broaden his horizons from Trains :-)

Oh- and the picture at the top is of little Elizabeth and her great-auntie who spoils her with great books. Half of our book collection is from her, and she has a great eye for picking out good children's books. I think it's because she hasn't quite grown up yet (and that's why I love both her and my cousin Jenny).