Books, Books, Books

Our bedtime routine has always included a story time. Up until a few months ago, we use to let the boys pick a book and then they would 'read' in their crib while we stood in front of the cribs and read. This was our approach because they boys would fight over the book or pull the pages. Ok, I admit, this was just an easier approach. Around February, we started sitting on the floor in the boys' room to read before bed. The boys were much better and we were able to get through the stories without too much fighting.

The boys would pick the book they wanted to read and bring it to the reader. They quickly found their 'favorite' books. There is a Blue's Clues book, a Thomas the Train book and a few Scooby Doo books that are in FREQUENT rotation. Even the boys were starting to memorize the words to these books, which made them even more fun (for the boys) to read.

Mommy started to get bored with our library of books. So, we decided to head off to Barnes and Nobles to pick out a few new books. The local store does a story time at 11:30am on Saturday morning so we took advantage of this activity to hit the store. The boys were more entertained by this reader than during our previously story time attempt at the library. However, the excitement of the train table and other stuff in the store would pull them away.

Here is Andrew listening to the story... Wesley also stopped by to check out the story...

The boys spent a lot of time playing in the interactive area where there was a Thomas the Train table set up and other books/toys for the kids to play with. They were allowed to play with this stuff, right??? (Note Wes standing on a book....)

Wes helped me pick out some books for the boys. There were two books for each of them or six for the group. Great, this should help keep Mommy entertained during story time! Wes picked out one Thomas the "Train book." He would not willingly put the "Train book" down long enough for the cashier to check us out. I had to pry it out of his hot little hand but gave it right back. I asked if he wanted to put it in the bag with the other books and he said, "no no." In addition to the "Train Book," there was the Angry Bunny book, Yo Gabba Gabba book, Wonder Pets book, another Thomas book and an Elmo book that plays the "Take me out to the ballgame" music.

When we got home, the boys were eager to read their new books...

Wes is showing off the "Angry Bunny" book. This book talks about the emotion of Anger and let's just say Mommy picked this one to help the boys understand that it is ok to get angry but it is not ok to hurt anyone because you are angry. Yep, the testosterone runs high here at times!

Wes and Jared sharing a few moments while checking out the books...

Jared interested in the ceiling fan that Andrew is turning on and off and on and off and ... well, you get the picture...

We had a wonderful morning out as a family and we have some new books to add to our library to show for it. As we headed into nap time, Mommy was excited to enjoy some of our new reads. While the boys would ask for the new books to be read, they also quickly returned to the 'old faithfuls!' Sigh...

I should also mention the Elmo baseball book that plays "Take me out to the ball game" is a fun book to read. It's a fun book to read and fun song to hear until it has been played about 100 times. Then, it gets a little annoying especially because I feel compelled to sing the song every time the song is played. How can you stop? It's a great song!! Well, as we approached the 200th time of playing the song (estimates related to number of times played), it became fun again when the boys start saying... 1, 2, 3 ... BALL GAME!!! Love hearing that from them.

All in all, another great morning with the fam!

Take care,