Bedtime Stories

Leslie Posted this blog and I couldn't help but copy and save it for my own enjoyment...besides it does talk about my kids too.
From Leslie's Blog:
Every time I hear a parent say how much they love to read to their child I’d feel a bit guilty…

To me, sitting down and reading was almost PAINFUL…down right torture. FOR ME.

And, then, Tanner grew up. Imagine that.

At the ripe old age of two he will now sit and allow me to read to him.

How this all came to pass – the story goes something like this:

A few weeks ago Melanie took a random last minute jaunt to Utah. I was able to watch the kids from the whee hours of the morning until the evening…Wee hours as in I had to set my alarm clock. I’ve also recently realized I’m NOT a morning person. period.

After spending a majority of the day at our home I loaded up the kids and headed to her house.

HUGE mistake. Both girls were instantly in tears when both Mom and Dad were not home yet. We drove around Sumner for a good hour, and finally the hunger screams of four children sent me through McDonalds drive thru….isn’t this wonderful to read Melanie….yes, I starved all of our children. :/ After full bellies I thought the girls would be happy to head to their home. The short drive from McDonalds to their home I prepped them “Mom is still in Utah and Dad is still at Work.” I may or may not have repeated it a 100 times.

Tears still came fast. They love their parents. I wonder if my children love me as much as those girls LOVE their Mommy and Daddy.

Even though bedtime was more than two hours away McKenna begged (she actually brought me EVERYTHING) to be put in her jammies. Tyler followed right along….and with hours before they’d acutally shut their eyes we all headed upstairs to their bedroom.

(HIND SIGHT, McKenna is so smart. She knows what comforts her. And, as an adult I will admit that getting into my jammies and into my bed still is comforting to me.)

She hopped into bed and asked that I lay next to her…and so I did for an hour.

Thankfully, the other three kids all played good together.

McKenna and I read story after story. And, I realized I WAS MISSING OUT. I determined then that I’d at least read to Lil Girl who has an attention span longer than a two year old.

Then, I came home and realized we didn’t have any books besides board books…I value books and am in near tears when my helion child rips THOSE books…imagine how I’d be with REAL paper pages…so over the last few weeks I’ve been purchasing REAL books. – don’t start with going to the library…I’m not faithful to them and end up purchasing the book with late date payments….more than once!

This past week after jammies are put on and before prayers we all hope onto Lil Girls big girl bed. I sit in the middle with my back to the wall. Lil Girl snuggles in, always to my right – I didn’t realize it was her “spot” until tonight when world war 3 broke out because I attempted to put Tanner over there. Tanner sits on my “wap” (lap). Victor at the foot of the bed. (He usually grabs the book after we’re done and flips through the pictures )

We’ve been reading every night. And, LIGHTBULB I’m reading to my children. Thye’re sitting. I’m enjoying it. No more guilty feelings! Thank you, Tanner….in this ONE aspect I’m thankful you’re growing up!

Since it’s a bit expensive to buy book after book I broke down and purchased Disney’s Bedtime Stories from Wal-Mart. It has over 200 pages of stories about different movies…the stories are short chunks but long enough that last night and tonight I’ve only read half the story. Each story must be 10-15 pages of reading, but too much for the kids timespan and so we’re going to slowly read through this book…unlike how I normally read a book, this time we’re going enjoy each night of it!