One of the many things that was important to us as we were making our homeschool curriculum decisions was that whatever we chose would be full of good books. Jimmy and I both love to read (the fact that he can't usually stay awake for much longer than a few pages at a time does not diminish his love of good books), and we wanted our kids to love to read as well. We think one of the ways to ensure that is to saturate them with good books right from the very beginning.

Imagine my delight when I found one of my very favorite childhood books on our reading list for this school year. It was hard to see it on the shelf and have to pass by it whenever I was looking for a new book to read aloud to the kids, but I was determined to wait until it came up on the schedule and fit into the time period that we were studying. And this week it finally came. It had been so long since I'd read it, but I was already tearing up in the first chapter remembering how it was all going to go! Fortunately, the kids are used to me becoming emotionally involved in our stories, so their usual laughter and eye rolling (and offers to read for me) were no surprise. We flew through it pretty quickly and I think they enjoyed it almost as much as I did (evidenced by the fact that they were willing to sit and listen to more while being able to see the neighborhood kids playing in the back yard). Good books make school time cozy and fun.

Good books joy...