Reading with the boys

Shel and I are HUGE readers. ( I have read 111 books this year!!!)

It has always bothered me that as much as we like books we could never interest our boys in sitting and having us read to them. It was part of my "dream" of having kids that I reluctantly had to let go of when I realized there was no way our boys had any interest in being read to and in fact trying to sit and read with them was a complete exercise in frustration. Pre-kid days I had visions of curling up with books and reading to my sons and sharing with them the joy I had in having books read to me as a child. When we finally HAD children and they never stopped long enough or paid any attention to books whatsoever, I set that dream aside and mourned a little at what was not to be.

Imagine my surprise when all of a sudden, THIS year, THIS month, they have both expressed an interest in having us read to them before bed. I am THRILLED beyond words, and so we have begun our journey into the world of book reading and cuddling with our boys to read a book, or two or three.

Shel ordered this book from the library this week and CJ brought it to me as soon as he found it. I was excited to read it to him as we are right in the middle of celebrating the Christmas season in our house.  I have to say I was very disappointed in it. The illustrations are AMAZING, but the story leaves something to be desired. For the first half of the book the dinosaurs are all doing naughty things - shaking presents and being destructive. The second half of the book explains that this is not what dinosaurs REALLY do at Christmas and proceeds to show them being kind, singing sweetly and so on.  I would much rather read a book that didn't have the initial focus on being bad around Christmas and even if the point of the book was to say that the dinosaurs really were NOT bad - the ideas were already out there on HOW they could have been.

So while I am thrilled to be reading to my boys and will continue to do so, I doubt we will read more in this series.