What We're Reading Now

I love to read and love even more passing that love on to my children. There are so many books that I've just been dying to share with my kids: Little House on the Prairie, Anne of Green Gables etc.

In fact I've been pretty impatient waiting for E to get old enough. Two years ago I tried Anne of Green Gables but she found it boring without pictures. So imagine to my surprise when she stumbled on an old copy of My Side of The Mountain by Jean Craighead George.  (Sorry to the School library for not returning it umpteen years ago)  Not only was she not bored but extremely interested in learning all about this boy surviving in the wild. While I may have paraphrased some of the scenic descriptions and skipped overly descriptive passages so as to not lose her interest, she was pretty eager to hear of his adventures.  Even I enjoyed rereading this book. 

From there we moved on to Little House on the Prairie. She just loved hearing about the olden days and how they built their homes and survived on the land.  Although I do find it a little difficult explaining to her about the Indians and all the fighting and prejudices that went on.  She's a little young to grasp why people do what they do and I'm half afraid that the next time she sees a  First Nation person, she's liable to pop out with something insensitive like "Hey, did you know white people shot Indians and Indians scalped people?"  Okay.. I didn't use the word scalped and I'm pretty sure that didn't come up in the book but you get the drift. I don't believe we should edit our history because it is what it is and we need to learn from it but still, when it comes to explaining the old west to your 7 year old, you end up on shaky ground.  Teaching a child about being politically correct and sensitivity is a mighty long road full of pitfalls and traps.  It's hard enough trying to get them not to stare at someone with a disability and to NEVER point out the fat or hairy person.  (Thanks to my nephew who embarrassed my 16 year old self at the waterslides by repeatedly referring to the hair man behind us as a gorilla).

But I digress.  I think she may still be too young to get into the Anne of Green Gables series but we're getting close. I know she will love them after all her mother rereads the whole series about once a year.

Thanks to the school library we've been introduced to the Magic Rainbow Fairies series by Daisy Meadows. We started with the Rainbow set and she liked them so much I bought her the Rainbow Party Fairies set. They are simple yet sweet stories with just enough black and white sketches of the fairies and the two girls helping them to keep E interested.

Best of all I find them to be interesting enough for me so that it doesn't put me to sleep while reading them. Okay, they're not so great I'm going to run off and read the rest of story before she gets home from school but it doesn't make me yawn.  Plus it gives us plenty of one on one time every day. No matter what happened during the day, good or bad, bedtime reading routines allows us to reconnect.  It's like wiping clear the slate for the day.  Especially when we've had a "bad" day.  When I read to her I'm letting her know that I still love her no matter what and to quote Martha Stewart... "It's a good Thing"

***please note this wasn't a book reading recommendation and not sponsored in any way but merely a reflection on reading progression with my oldest. ****