At our house, we have two voracious readers under the age of 18 and three more who will sit for hours to be read to. As they've gotten older, it's been much more challenging to keep them in books than it has been to keep them in shoes.
Why is it so hard to find wholesome and worthy reading material for children these days? Well, I guess they are out there and easy to come by if you are independently wealthy.
So, what's a mommy to do? One of my major projects has been to beef up my children's library, especially the chapter books beyond easy readers. Here are a couple of things I've done so far...
Do you know about paperback swap? The gist of the system is this. You post 10 books that you no longer want. Anyone who has credit can request them. You send them, paying for shipping (around $2.25 per book using the U.S.P.O. Media Mail rate). When they receive their books, you get credit. The beauty of the whole thing is that you can do the same, request books and someone else pays the shipping for them. It's huge, thousands of books to choose from. Give away your old paperbacks, get a treasure trove of new and exciting books to read.
Are you hooked in to freecycle? I've gotten some books that way too. Just find the Freecycle group in your area via the Freecycle website and join the group. You'll get posts with things people are getting rid of. You just contact them and go and pick the item(s) up for free. The best part about it is that you can also post all of your junk and people come right to your door to pick it up. It's great.
And, of course, for a mommy like me, there are always thrift stores to search and yard sales to scour for those little gems. I've gotten more great books for my children that way than any other.
Books that I am currently collecting for my children: Childhood of Famous Americans, American Adventure, Boxcar Children, Elsie Dinsmore, Anne of Green Gables and other Anne books and Christian Heroes Now and Then.
What about you? Got any good tips that I need to know about?
1 comment:
I like the American Girl books, and my boys all like CS Lewis.
I'm glad you started a blog!
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