Integrating Behavior: Library Visits

We took on the library summer reading challenge. We went to the library, signed a star, received our sheet to color each day we read 10 minutes. She really wanted that rubber ducky. Diva E and I read each night before bed, that is a given. She loves to read.

But then I started thinking. Since that day we signed up for the challenge, I had never returned with my child to the library. Besides being 8 and 9 months pregnant this summer, what was keeping me from going?

When my bonus kids were younger, during the summer I did a great job at taking them to the library every morning for an hour. It was a free activity and it kept the amount of "checked out" books at bay at the house. (Because honestly, it is no fun to receive a late fee on a book your child has misplaced.)

As they grew older and my child entered the world, I slowed down on the visits. I am not proud of that and while I look at the amount of activities there were at the library this summer, I feel bad that I missed out on tons of FREE entertainment for my toddler.

So, I did something drastic to ensure that trips to the library would occur at least monthly. I canceled a few of my magazines that I know the library receives each month. A few things will come of this:
1. I won't feel so overwhelmed at being "behind" reading my magazines. Each month one comes and I haven't read one since April. Some magazines are just easier to read in a sitting while your child watches Doc McStuffins. Others......
2. I am saving money.
3. Less clutter. What do you do with all those magazines?
4. I am modeling reading at the library for my child.

Diva E met the challenge and I made a conscious effort to get her to the library to get her rubber ducky and free book.

 I gave myself a challenge. I will get my child to the library at least once a month. But how will I do that?  So when my favorite magazine that I have had since the beginning came in the mail with the renewal stamp. I sent it back with a "cancel please" a first I felt like I had betrayed my dear friend, Oprah, but I know each month, I will see her at the library. And since she is so into the promotion of reading, she can understand my motivation to do this. So after doing inventory of the magazines that I subscribe to and checked to see if they were at the library.

So my house has said good bye to:
Ebony
Parents
Oprah
and Good Housekeeping.

I will have to keep Essence until the library has those. But I feel a ton lighter knowing all of those subscriptions are not collecting dust as I put them to the side, planning to read them.

And..... I have inherited People and a few gossip magazines that I always read in the check out line at the grocery store. (I purposely pick the long line just to read them).

What will you do to get you and your child to the library once a month?

Integrating Food: National Watermelon Day

August 3rd- every year we celebrate a big fruit. One of summers favorite treat and so popular. I know we have seen it at almost every BBQ we have been to this summer.

Here are some books to read.

This one is great for counting. A little description:

Max and Josephine are planting a garden,
from small blueberries to big watermelons
and everything in between.
Can you help them count the seedlings from one to ten?
And when they are ready to harvest,
can you help Max and Josephine count the crops by tens…
all the way up to one hundred?

For Watermelon Day

Description: There's a watermelon growing in the corner of the patch where the fence posts meet, and Jesse is waiting for it. Waiting for it to fill up with the cool summer rain and the hot summer sun. Waiting until at last it is ripe and ready for eating. Waiting until it is ready for her family's annual Watermelon day.

And finally, my favorite: Just then we heard a fella yellin??
He was sellin? watermelon! . . .
We chomped and slurped
And gulped and burped,
Then Peter spit a seed at Sue. . . .
Four friends turn a boring summer day into a rollicking, watermelon-seed?spitting adventure that takes them all the way into the town square, where everyone can?t help joining in on the fun. But when the mayor arrives, will she put a stop to it all? Energetic, begging-to-be-read-aloud text and boisterous, hilarious illustrations combine to form a picture book that celebrates simple, good-natured mischief.

Of course, if you are as creative as my friend is, you could even cut out a watermelon in the shape of things like a pig, a baby in a carriage or other creative things. All you have to do is "Google" it! Have a Happy Watermelon Day!!