Thursday, September 22, 2011

Books I Can't Wait to Read to the Girls

The girls and I read books together all day long. They love books, and will sign again for me to read books over and over again.

I never grow tired of this.

Just as with my garden, I want to cultivate the girls' love for books--for stories.

Recently Brad and I have been reading from The Big Picture Story Bible and The Jesus Storybook Bible while the girls drink their milk before bed. (Both great books!)

Doing this with them has brought back a flood of memories for me. When I was a little girl, I'd curl up on my papa's lap and listen to him read The Hobbit, The Chronicles of Narnia, The Wind in the Willows, Anne of Green Gables, to name a few.

I loved that he did that.

In fact, when I was hospitalized in the ICU--on a ventilator and unconscious, he sat and read to me every.single.day. I was 27 years old.

Once I woke up, and they took that terrible thing out of my throat, he still came and read to me. That was precious to me--I felt loved and cherished. Even in the stark hospital environment, his reading conjured up feelings of warmth.
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A few weeks back Jennifer at Twinside Out made a list of books she wants to read to her children one day. Her list made me excited!

I began making this mental list of all the books I want to read the girls one day--I want to pass on that precious legacy of reading aloud to my children that my papa gave me.

Here's my list so far:

The Hobbit
Anne of Green Gables
Wind in the Willows
Little House on the Prairie Series
The Chronicles of Narnia
The BFG
A Wrinkle in Time Series
Dangerous Journey: The Story of Pilgrim's Progress

I'm sure I'm missing some important ones.
    
What's on your list?

5 comments:

Brad Jenkins said...

Anything by Stephen King. I'll be responsible for getting up with them in the middle of the night, so don't start worrying yet.

Mary Cavalier said...

I read to the girls a lot when they were little. Some that I loved reading to them -
Dr Seuss- my favorite was A Wocket in my Pocket.
Elsie Dinsmore series

And at Christmas I read them
The Best Christmas Pageant and when they were older we read A Stranger at Christmas by Carol Lynn Pearson

I also read several of the American Diaries with them and quite a few American Girl series books.

And - for Brad - we tried some Goosebumps books - did not work well :-)

Melissa Ann said...

I love how the only book on your list I'm not familiar with is "Dangerous Journey" because it's Christian based.
Little Women
Little Men
Anything By Judy Bloom
Number the Stars
The Giver
The Best Christmas Pageant Ever
Just about anything by Avi (newer author I think around '99-00, but he's fantastic!)
If Brad wants a scary one, Witches by Ronald Dahl is fantastic :)
The whole Lord of the Rings Series
I'm sure there are others as well ;)

The cool thing is: you don't have to wait. We've already read Little House on the Prairie and a couple of the Chronicles of Narnia in our house. I just read aloud a chapter (or more if I'm engrossed) while they play or sometimes sit with me for some of it. Sure, I don't keep their attention, but they're hearing the language :)

championm2000 said...

I loved Little House on the Prairie..brings back so many memories!

Sara said...

Great choices, Julia. I have so many fond childhood memories of the books on your list! The Anne of Green Gables serious was definitely a favorite (though I don't think I will be reading much of that to Si...)