Magic of Reading

    "Reading started with they were just little – Amy and Kristy, we would have reading time and it was a wonderful thing when we got to the point when I could start reading chapter books to the kids. 

     "I remember Amy and Kristy back in our other house and also in this house here, they would be getting ready for school in the morning and I would tell them, “As long as you are moving, I will read. But if you stop moving, I will stop reading.” And so in the morning as part of our morning routine I would go and wake them up and they would go to the bathroom and while they were getting their shoes and socks on, while they were brushing their hair, while they were making their beds, while they were packing lunches – all these things I would be reading to them. As long as they were moving and getting things done I would read to them.

        "Oh my goodness, we have read so many wonderful stories over the years. Just wonderful, wonderful books, it was somewhere in there that I was introduced to the Read Along Handbookby Jim Trelease and it has become my bible, in fact when someone is having a baby shower especially if it’s their first baby I will give them a couple of children’s books and also the Read Along Handbook by Jim Trelease because it is literally become my basis for finding really great books to read aloud to my children of all kinds of different levels – whether they are picture books or they are short story books or whether they are novels. We have enjoyed some wonderful stories over the years as we have read as a family together. 

     "In fact it was rather humorous – Kristy was in 5^thgrade, she had Mr. Gold – every book that he picked the class to read that year as a book, we had already read as a family. He figured that out – he’d say, “Okay have you read this one” “yeah I’ve read that one.” “Oh well. Okay, everybody now of what we’ve read, - we’re starting a new chapter now – I would like you to think about what might be happening in this chapter. I’ll take answers from everybody except for Kristy because she’s already read the book.  Kristy has an amazing memory too and she remembers all the details from books that we had read. I am happy that she is so well read and so well versed, but I felt kind of bad that there weren’t any new books there – that’s okay she enjoyed it because she was familiar with the books.  

     "One of our great family memories of childhood is reading the Harry Potterbooks together. I think Amy was about 9? 8 9 10 somewhere around in there when the first Harry Potterbook came out. I’d been hearing about it, that it was coming, that it had been in England, that it was just this amazing children’s book. We’d already read a bunch of books together so my kids were very good about sitting and listening. It was at this point Eric – If Amy was 9 Eric would have been four. 

     "I can’t remember exactly what age, but somewhere in there, is when we started reading the Harry Potterbooks. Oh they were magical and they were fun. It was a little challenging because the chapters are long, whereas other books had shorter chapters. Those Harry Potterbooks had longer chapters and that meant that they were listening for longer. We would always plan in the evening, we would start getting ready for bed at 8 o’clock, so hopefully they could be asleep by 9 or 9:30 but we would start with family scriptures, and had a prayer, and get them ready for bed and then climb into bed and then I would start reading. 

     "Or we would go out on the couches, because we had multiple people in different rooms.  Sometimes I would – we would all congregate in one bedroom, we’d all pile on the beds and read until it was time to go and then all went to their own beds. But we read – the Harry Potterbook would come out and then we would read it – sometimes we would re-read it. And each of them I also got as a book on tape and that began our love affair with books on tape. 

     "I had to laugh because we have quite the library of different books on tape that we’ve gotten over the years. I have a friend that was retiring as a Elementary school teacher and she gave me all the books on tape she had from her classroom because she knew we that we were very voracious readers. 

     "When we went to buy our new van, several years ago – I think it was 2010 – I was looking at it and one of the first thing I said, “What do you mean they don’t put tape players in vans any more?” They said no they don’t, they are putting CD players or they’re putting iPod or mp3 players connections in there but they are not putting tape decks in there. “What do you mean? I have to have to have a tape player I have books on tape!” 

       "I had to come to grips with the fact that they do not put them in anymore, they do have CD players so now whenever we go on a trip – we collect – we go to the library and get several books on CD’s so we can listen to them as we drive.  

     "I remember years and years ago, one of the first trips when I spent the whole time reading, the girls were in car seats.  I sat in the back – this was in our mercury sable – Ralph was driving – and we were driving all in one day. Normally before that we would drive part way at night. Ralph would get home from work and we would pile into the car and we would drive to Reno or Lovelock or maybe even Winnemucca, but we would drive partway spend the night, and then drive the rest of the way. It got to the point where we decided to do it all in one day. The one thing that helped was books on tape to keep the kids occupied. I remember sitting there in the back between the girls and reading books to them. A couple of years later I remember reading, “The Sign of The Beaver” as we were driving, I think we read the whole book that day or part of that one, I remember I read until my voice was hoarse, and it started to get dark and I couldn’t see anymore. “Mom, you have to keep reading!” I said, “ I can’t I don’t have a voice anymore and I can’t see the words anymore.”

     " We just loved to read and the thing I love too about the books on tape is that freed me up so I wouldn’t have to read the whole time. Fortunately I don’t get motion sickness from reading in the car so there’s no problems for me. We spent a lot of time – especially on those Harry Potterbooks – when we would listen to them for the first time with me reading them to everybody. Every couple years another one would come out, sometimes they were – a new Harry Potterbook would come out and we would be -- I remember there was (I think twice) during the summer and we were in Utah – I remember going with my sister-in-law Jan down to the bookstore to stand in line and get the new book. We started it the next day as we were driving up to Canada for a family reunion. 

We – Oh I remember we were staying with the Harris family one time when the book came out and so we went down to the bookstore at midnight to get the new book and we started reading it the next day.  Another one of our great memories – Harry Potterbook number six was coming out and this was 2005, the summer of 2005, we were in South Dakota. We had gone to do a Pioneer Trek at Martin’s Cove with my brother and his family and another niece. We had spent a couple of days there and we’d done this Pioneer Trek and we decided that since we were that far into Wyoming, lets just drive several hours further and lets go see that South West corner where they have Mt. Rushmore, they have just a lot of cool things. 

     "There is some caves, there is another big structure that they are building that they are carving, some Indian – I can’t remember what it is – they have just a lot of cool stuff – Custer’s State Park – just really cool stuff there in that Southwest corner and so we decided to go. But it was also right at the time that the Harry Potterbook was coming out. So we had gotten into – we were staying at a KOA campground with one of their camping cabins. We had gone to see Mt. Rushmore the day before and we were working over the Junior Ranger program. So we decided to go – but the next day I dropped Ralph and the two older girls off at Mt. Rushmore so they could finish their Junior Ranger program and the other two kids and I, Eric and Kylie and I drove into Rapid City to get the new Harry Potterbook. 

     "I had called all around the day before to see if there was anything available there in the Mt. Rushmore area, but there was nothing. We had to have the new book!  It was the newHarry Potterbook, we still had a ways to drive and we had been waiting anxiously for book number six to come out. So the two kids and I drove into Rapid City and we found a bookstore and we went in and got a book. It was 115° that day in Rapid City, fortunately it was a little cooler at Mt. Rushmore, but it was extremely hot conditions but we had good air-conditioning so that was fine. 

     "As we drove back, Eric grabbed the book and by the time we got back, he had read the first chapter or two. Amy and Kristy were just scandalized! “Mom how could you let him read that!” “It’s okay, it’s okay.” Later on that day, Amy was not feeling well, her stomach was upset, I think she was having some stomach flu problems she’d thrown up once. We just decided we were going to hang out there and so we all piled on the bed they had there in the camping cabin – there was two rooms – one room had a big queen sized mattress on it and that’s where Ralph and I slept, the back room had 4 bunk beds, two on either side, so it was the perfect size for us for staying and so we stayed there for several days while we were going to the various activities.  So we all piled on the bed and I started reading the Harry Potterbook. I can still picture how we were all piled on that bed together and we were just lying there and enjoying the Harry Potterbook. 

     "So I read and read that day. Well the next day we did a few things and Kristy wasn’t feeling well that day, so we did a lot more reading. Then we also went to see I think it was the Wind Cave. It was cold in the Wind Cave, so we went down.  Amy was feeling better, so Amy, Eric and Ralph went down into the cave a lot further and I wasn’t feeling so great, I was tired and Kristy wasn’t feeling great and Kylie was just four years old at the time so we just decided we were just kind of going to putter around up top so we did. 

     "Unbeknown to us, one of the reasons I was tired was I had breast cancer at this point – I wouldn’t be diagnosed until a month later – but I was tired. It was – my energy level was not what I was used to doing and my breast was sore – it took us awhile to get that diagnosed – but that was why I was tired at that time.  So we read a lot more and the next day it was time to head back over to Idaho to see my family in Southern Idaho, then to spend a day or two with them and then drive back to California.

     "So all the while back as we traveled through Wyoming – there is nothing in Wyoming. Every time we’d pass a prong horn, Ralph would say, “Antelope.” And it was like, “Ralph we’ve seen them all.” But there was just nothing and so I was reading and we were enjoying the story. 

     "So by the time it was late afternoon that we got back to Southern Idaho, we had maybe a chapter or two left in the book. And this was book number six – a person dies near the end of the story – anyways we’re building up to it and we come in to see my parents. My mom was laying on her bed, my mom had lots of serious back problems for years and so she spent lots of time lying on her bed – because that’s where she could get a little bit of relief from all the pain she was in – and she – I was in there visiting with her and the kids kept poking their heads around the corner, (in a whisper) “Mom let’s finish the book.” “Mom let’s finish it.” 

     "And my mom says, “What’s going on?” And I said, “Mom, I’m so sorry but if you’ll just give us like 45 minutes, let us finish the book. Then we’ll be able to concentrate on visiting with you.” My mom and dad were just chuckling at this point, “Sure!” And so we went and sat in the living room there in my parent’s house and my mom’s bedroom was just off of that room and the door was open so my mom could look out and see us. And she still talks to this day about how amazing and fun it was to watch us as we read the final chapter of Harry Potternumber six where Dumbledore dies. 

     "We were all crying Ralph - probably not Eric, well maybe a little bit - but Ralph wasn’t. But the rest of us crying. It was so sad! Dumbledore was like our friend, our favorite grandpa, our mentor, our professor! These books have been such an important memory, a thing that we shared and experienced. So it’s – my mom was just amazed, I said, “mom this is just how it is at our house. We read, we enjoy books together.”  

     "I remember when Kristy was in college this past year, she was taking – she had to do a project that was for talented and gifted education. She had to do a project and she sent me this text which I still have on my phone. It says, “Mom I want to somehow re-create the most memorable experience of my childhood and that’s reading the Harry Potter books together.”

        "That’s just something we’ve been about that’s just our family, that’s us, that’s a priority that I’ve had ever since I was 12 years old and I went to stay with the Cheney family and she was reading “The Secret Garden” to us. It is kind of fun that the fact  - so I stopped reading aloud to the older kids and I was starting to read to Kylie because we have that gap in there, that five year gap between the older kids being born and Kylie being born. So then I was able to read a lot of their favorite stories and they were able to read aloud to her. And she also has a voracious love of reading and in our house I have to say, “Would you put the book down and get something else done.” But that’s us, we like to read!