Goblins Gonna Get You

Lily loves her library books. We pick out a huge stack each time we go so we have new books to read at bedtime (for a while at least) every night. Lily goes through them pretty fast. She could sit through reading all of them at once if someone was willing to do that for her. We would probably lose our voices in the attempt. Mike is so awesome - he reads her 2 or 3 every night, and some of them are pretty long.

(Lily probably had another stack with her over on the couch)

Anyway, I try to get some seasonal themed books for Lily at appropriate times through the inter-library loan. It's so nice to be able to reserve books online and just go pick them up from my spot on the shelf when they come in! The down side is we don't always know just what they're going to be like before we pick them up,  and don't always take the time to look them over before bringing them home. (Did I tell you the story about the bed wetting book? Lily did not have a problem with that until the night after Mike read her that book. Message: Lots of kids wet the bed-you can still go to sleepovers-it's okay... Luckily it must have been a just a fluke or ironic coincidence.) Well, with Halloween coming and the girls dressing up like witches I reserved a bunch of books along those lines. This book of Halloween poems, innocent though it may seem, turned out to be maybe not such a good idea...

Lily has been afraid for some time of going to the bathroom alone, or into the next room, or sometimes even just across the room by herself to wash her hands or fetch things. Sometimes it's probably stubbornness or laziness, or wanting a little extra attention, but sometimes it's genuine fear! You've got me why. But... as a kid I had a pretty overactive imagination...and I think we can safely say Lily has, too.

Well, things were getting better. With a little extra coaxing and a bribe or twenty-two - Lily had finally gotten in the habit of going to the bathroom on her own. SO nice for busy parents who would rather not have to stand guard for imaginary monsters. But...since reading this book Lily has been a little extra clingy, and I swear Sierra has been too (though I am sure it's not for fear of ghost or goblin in her case). I feel like I am attached to my kids at the hip right now...and it's throwing my back out.

Lily is imagining this green goblin sitting in the little plum tree in our backyard waiting to play with her. I have to admit - it is kind of creepy. It probably didn't help that when I read it to her I put a little extra inflection in my voice to set the mood (it's habit!).

Who thought a children's library book would create so much drama!? This ghost poem was pretty creepy too.

It really brings it home to kids the idea of the unseen. Look at the terrified expressions of the little girl and her cat. ...My poor little Lily and her overactive imagination! I still feel guilty for that time I jumped out and yelled Boo! at her when she was like two and she burst into tears! Honestly, she can be a pretty dramatic little girl!

Isn't this a cool Haunted House picture? I printed out a few copies of these for Lily and her cousin to draw their own monsters and pumpkins on today. I have to say I do love these illustrations! :)

On a side note - since we have been talking goblins here... Anyone else remember a children's Halloween song that went: "Goblins gonna get you if you don't watch out....Goblins gonna get you if you scream and shout!"? I think there were some "Oooo---"'s in there too. I don't remember all the lyrics, but my brothers and sister and I loved that song when we were small - we had a record of it and now we can't find it anywhere. So fun - I'd much rather have that to play than any creepy haunted house sounds on Halloween!

We Love to Read

Lily has loved reading with us since she was pretty little. She will just keep going as long as your voice holds out if you let her! At first it was just a few simple board books over and over until we got so tired of them we had to buy more... but Lily still had her favorites. She loved this book Mike bought her called The Escape of Marvin the Ape:

I have this video from last April of Lily at the zoo watching the ape - Mike told her it was Marvin. He was like her celebrity crush! :)

That's a fun book because as you keep reading it you start to notice there are little things hidden in every picture. You can usually find Marvin and the police, but there is a black cat and an ostrich hidden in every picture - and they are often pretty tough to spot! I like that they don't mention it so it becomes like your own special secret discovery (Now you're in the know!).

I'm really excited now that Lily is getting interested in books that I remember loving as a kid! You know how some books just capture your imagination and stick with you? Lily was 'reading' The Little Red Hen Sunday morning so I caught a clip on video. It was so cute to hear the phrases she most remembered from reading it, and at some parts actually doing different voices for each of the animals! I wish I'd gotten more.  (Edited for excessive page turning)

Lily also loves the Frances books. She got a collection of them for Christmas - we already had two not in the collection so when she opened it she was all excited -"Frances!". I loved Bread and Jam for Frances when I was a kid! (I was a picky eater too),

and Bedtime for Frances - though the illustration of that bathrobe on the chair did look menacing! I love how these books teach different lessons in a natural, non-threatening way so that it's just part of the story, and I love how much

Scary Bathrobe (this doesn't so it justice)

Frances with her made up songs is like a real little kid. Her parents are pretty true-to-life too! I can read those books over and over again, and I am. I need to search out some more of my old favorites to add to our collection...like Morris' Disappearing Bag, Sylvester and the Magic Pebble, Frederick, and so many more. It's so fun to share these things with Lily! And let's face it - I don't get to read many books of my own choosing these days! Mike reads to Lily most nights, too. Reading aloud is such a fun way to spend time together - I wish we did it even more. We read some Harry Potter and other good read-aloud books together before Lily was born. I like to do voices. Mike is pretty good at them too -- but he has to be really into the book. I hope someday our teenagers will be cool enough to enjoy reading aloud with their parents!

New Favorite Author

   Not that she usurps the place of my old favorite authors, but she has a place of her own right up at the top. I just recently discovered the books of Maud Hart Lovelace and am loving the children's literature. I have yet to get to her adult fiction - the children's stuff is so good. It's kind of like L.M. Montgomery in that it's still interesting to adults though geared toward youth. At least it interests this adult. I am kind of a kid at heart though, and I love hearing about the turn of the century - early 1900's where so many things were changing...the telephone and the horseless carriage and tons of other new things were just being introduced into and changing people's lives and women were gaining increasing respect for their contributions and achievements intellectually and artistically. What an exciting time!
    Anyway, just thought I'd share - it is so exciting for me to find a 'new' author I love so much and look forward to sharing with my children. I don't know how I never heard about her before. I love re-reading books because they don't consume me as much as a new book - so I can put it down and do other things. I read the last Harry Potter book in one day and had to go to a picnic in the middle of it - torture! I have read my L.M. Montgomery books so many times I have had to take a major break from them, because it got to the point where I knew too much word for word and couldn't get into them anymore.