Do you read to your kids?

When Logan was a baby, I read to him a LOT. I vividly remember sitting on his bedroom floor. He was only a couple days old, dressed in a diaper and strapped into his infant seat. He was jaundiced, so I had him sunbathing near the window, and I was reading--well, TRYING to read--"Guess How Much I Love You?" to him. I was a tired, hormonal mess and I was sobbing my eyes out trying to get through that story. That was, I think, the first time I read to him.

I continued reading to him every day, and he grew to love it. He would sit quietly on my lap, his hand tangled in my hair, and listen to book after book. Other moms were amazed at how long he would just sit there reading with me.

Even when we weren't reading, I had books on a shelf he could reach, and he spent a lot of time looking through them.

Logan was a really early reader, and I'm certain all the reading I did helped with that. Now, at almost five years old, HE reads books to ME more often than I read to him. I love that so much.

Along came Jordan. Poor Jordan. I was overwhelmed trying to deal with a jealous Logan and a new baby at the same time. I did NOT read to him a lot in the beginning. As a matter of fact, I just recently started reading to him on a regular basis.

Jordan would rather eat a book than read it, quite literally. He doesn't just taste them or chew on the board a little, he tears huge chunks out of it with his teeth and chews it up and swallows it. I am constantly saying "No no, Jordan. Books are for reading, not for eating."

But this week, I've been excited to see Jordan is starting to cultivate a love for books. He won't sit still nearly as long as Logan would at this age, but he does have some favorites he'll sit through, and like Logan did, he loves to turn the pages for me.

What I really love is that the one book that is his absolute favorite was also Logan's favorite. It's Eric Carle's "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you See?"

It's a book that Logan loved so much, I had to tape the spine together. Now Jordan is completely trashing it, but he is doing it by carrying it around, paging through it and, yes, taking the occasional nibble.





I read this book to Logan so many times, I memorized it when he was little and I'd recite it to him when he got fussy in the car, or when we were backpacking.

This will be one of the few books that I will never, ever be able to get rid of. This tattered copy of Brown Bear will likely be one of the things I look back upon with the fondest memories, and I'm thrilled that it will give me memories from both boys loving it so much.

What about you? Do you read to your kids?