When the whining and tears and cries of "I'm bored" start, the cure is to start reading. The best place to get books is at our local library. We're pretty consistent about going but our order of operations while there has changed over the years. When it was just the oldest and me, we would go to story time, then we'd leisurely wander through the books, taking our time choosing the perfect books. Then we'd head over to the reading area and settle in to read through a few more books all before checking out. Oh and did I mention that we always walked to the library. We had time, it worked.
Then the twins came along. Story time was out because the babies were just too noisy. That's okay because we could still take our time choosing before moving on to a little bit of reading time before checkout. We also stopped walking there because a mile there and a mile back with a double stroller, a bag of books and a toddler that walked really, really slow was just too much.
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| (It looks like my boy is picking his nose, he's not. I hope.) |
These days after throwing the kids in the van, I lecture them the whole way there about not running/ yelling/ throwing books. Once there, we walk through the doors and the three oldest take off running in different directions. The oldest heads straight for the magazines, my boy goes for the drinking fountain and Pinky heads for the Princess books. The only reason the baby doesn't take off is because he's contained in the stroller. Story time is definitely out. We hurry and grab our books, the kids ask if they can sit and read, I say no, not today. I drag them disappointed and crying over to the checkout where they each insist on doing their own books. Thirty exhausting minutes later we drag ourselves home where I swear that I will never take them, ever again, until they're 25, at least.
I don't think it matters what you read to your kids as long as you read to them every day. It's also cool when they start getting old enough to read to each other. Those are the times when you're a bit more grateful for the library trips.
Read a good book today!
Kristen
That sounds exactly like the evolution of our library visits! I truly did laugh out loud. Shortly after Kathryn was born (#3), I thought we could still do story time because it was in an enclosed area so loud kids didn't matter. That went well, but trying to leave did not! I hadn't taken the stroller in that day - worst idea ever, so I had the baby in the carseat carrier on one arm and had to hoist the oldest kicking and screaming in the other arm. Halfway to the car I dropped the keys and we had to turn back for them. The oldest bolted back to the library door. At least my boy was good enough to follow along out the car. It was the worst trip ever. Now I take the oldest 2 on Saturdays while the younger two are napping and David stays home with them.
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