Let's Get Personal Challenge

I’ve always admired the ‘Friday Confessionals’ over at Once Upon a Story.  At Once Upon a Story, former classroom teacher, mother, and reader Maria spills mom confessionals about her real life including her school supply addiction, not so awesome parenting moments, and giving up on a pet project that just didn’t work out.  This time, she is asking readers and fellow Bloggiesta participants to share a bit of their life, too.  In her “Let’s Get Personal” challenge, she is encouraging blogger authenticity.  Because I always admire her Friday Confessionals (and often think, “Me too!”), I’ve decided to bare my sole and confess.

Saturday Morning Confessions of a 

                     Teacher, Mother, and Reader:

We keep our favorite library books for way too long.  I visit the library at least once a week.  Sometimes we are there 3 times a week!  We go for story times, always check out books, and often stay for playtime with educational puzzles and toys.  Out library generously allows 50 books per person.  In our family we usually range from having 40 to 50 books at a time checked out.  Sometimes though, we find a book we love.  We read and reread the book, pack it on trips to go see grandma, read it in the car, fall asleep reading it, and read it some more.  At the end of the 3 week lending period, sometimes we aren’t ready to return ‘our’ book.  We’ve renewed and kept some of our favorites for months.  (Months!)  If someone else requests the book we do return the book promptly, but you if we see the book returned to the shelf, we’ve been known to check it out again.  I have a mixed sense of guilt and pleasure enjoying the library like this!  Am I the only one?

I hide books from my three year old.  Do you have any read alouds that are tedious, boring, or just pain silly, but your child loves the book anyway?  When I get to that point, I admit that I hide the book or ship it off to grandma’s house.  Several months ago a book came into our life about a lion hunt.  Oh, I knew the sing-songy rhyming lion hunt that is a favorite with preschoolers, but this book was perhaps the worse version of lion hunt ever.  And my 3 year old Lil Guy LOVED it.  I endured reading it for every bedtime, naptime, storytime, reading time for about a week before I hid it at the bottom f the book pile.  Lil Guy found it.  I tried hiding it, leaving it in the car, and trying to say I forgot the words to that particular book, but it was still a favorite.  Finally I packed it in the bag to go to grandma’s house.  Guess what we discovered?  Grandma and Grandpa are even better at reading the lion hunt book than I am.  The book stayed at grandma’s house.  Thank goodness.  This was a win win situation for all involved.

I think book authors and bloggers are the best kind of celebrities.  Let’s start from the beginning here.  I got started in blogging after I wrote an email to an author about an experience with my students and her book.  After getting a very unexpected personal email in reply I was inspired to jump into the world of book blogging.  Since then I’ve had other totally awesome author encounters and connected with book bloggers who are equally awesome.  I brag about the experiences to my friends and family.  I honestly feel a rush of excitement when I get a tweet, comment, or message from an author or blogger.  What I like most about authors and bloggers is how down to earth they can be.  I’ve laughed with authors about my reviews, connected with fellow bloggers, and learned to not take myself too seriously.  So, if you happen to be a fellow blogger, reading advocate, or author just know … you are like a rock star to me!  

So, that's it for my confessional this morning.  I enjoyed getting personal and thank you to Maria from Once Upon a Story for hosting this challenge.

For more information or if YOU are 
interested in joining Bloggiesta, Check out: 

Suey at It’s All About Books  or Danielle from There’s a Book.