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Monday, September 3, 2018

Grandma and Grandpa's Library


This post is sponsored by Precious Moments.  All opinions are my own.

We will have to get a crib and a highchair and a few other things for our home because when our grandchildren come to visit it won't be for a few hours, it will be for a few days.   Besides for the necessities, we want our grandchildren to have fond memories of the fun things that were in  Grandma's and Grandpa's house just for them.   Our kids have those memories of my parent's snowbird home in Florida.

My mom was an amazingly crafty person and displayed her beautiful creations on the low shelves in her dining room.   She put them there for her grand kids to enjoy and she loved when they would ask questions about them.

My older son, Joe, loved the umbrellas she made out of lotto tickets and cigarette packages.  He remembers how he was so impressed with how no two umbrellas were alike.  He has fun memories of  spending hours trying to figure out how the many different patterns were made.


My dad built a small table for the kids in their screen room.  Under the table was a box of toys.  Lisa would be so excited to get to the crayons she knew would be in the cigar box in that toy chest.   After quick hugs for Grandma and Grandpa, this was the first place she would head when we arrived at their home.

We all loved playing cards with Grandma and Grandpa every night after dinner.  They also had other games around their house.  Mike knew where to find all of grandma's hand held games and it never took him long to make his way to the cabinet in the living room.  His favorite was Yahtzee and Grandma knew that.  Most of the time, the game would be out and waiting for him before we arrived.

We're hoping our grandchildren will remember all the fun they had when they visited us in our snowbird home.  One memory we want them to have is one of Grandma and Grandpa's library.  We hope they will remember that some of their favorite books were on those shelves.  We hope they remember listening as we read to them just like we read to our own children.  I can still remember how Lisa would need to turn the book upside down every time we got to the page where Grover from Sesame Street was standing on his head.

Our first grandchild is only 4 months old but we read to him, already, when we are in NY visiting.  Baby Boy hasn't visited us yet but will be in a couple of months.   Most of the books we have in our little library are older and have been waiting quite a while to be read.   We hope to add a few new books before he makes his first visit.

Our collection includes a couple of stories that were told to me when I was a child.  My mom was Japanese so I grew up hearing all the Japanese fairy tales and loved all of them.  I bought my favorites when I spotted them in the stores on our trips to Japan.  I can't wait to sit with Baby Boy and read the story of Momotaro the Peach Boy to him.


We had a very large collection of books for our kids.  We weren't going to have the room in our smaller home to keep all of these books so we could only pick a handful to bring along with us.  We hope that our grandchildren will enjoy these books as much as their parent did.


Before I retired three years ago, I was a TA for twenty years in a wonderful nursery school.  My favorite activity to do with our 4 year olds was to read to them.  I don't know who enjoyed story time more, me or the preschoolers.  Sometimes, while I was reading, I pictured myself reading the same books to my grand kids.  One of my favorite books to read, and one of the favorites of our students was Magpie Magic.  I heard shouts of "Again!  Again!" every time I read it.  This book has no words so the story is up to the interpretation of the reader.  I wasn't able to offer the opportunity for one of the kids to "read" this book to the class but I imagined asking my grandchild to read it to me.


A new book, that we just added to our library, is one I am so looking forward to reading to our grandchildren.  Precious Moments Little Book of Bible Stories has some of my favorite bible stories in it.  The nativity story and David and Goliath is what I was sure would be included and they were.  I was hoping to see the "miracle of the five loaves and two fish" as I flipped through the book and it was!  It's a little boy that helps to save the day by offering his lunch to feed thousands of people.  What child wouldn't be impressed with that!


The stories are short and sweet with colorful illustrations.   It's also a chunky book so no worries for grandma or grandchild.   Chunky books are great for standing up to being handled by even the youngest child.  I have easily wiped off plenty of sticky fingerprints from these types of books.   It will look brand new for a very long time.  This book would make a great Grandparent's Day (September 9) gift for any grandparent to start or to add to their library.


We are having so much fun finding and buying the perfect books to add to our library.  At the rate we are going, our small snowbird home will be needing an addition very soon!

Do you have favorites that you and your children/grandchildren enjoy reading together?  We would love to hear about them!

16 comments:

  1. Arent grandbabies the greatest? We are traveling with hubby's job and living most of the time in our 5th wheel camper. I too have a small area with books for the kiddos. There is just nothing like having them sit in your lap and reading to them. I really need to check out that "Magpie Magic" book. Sounds like that would be very interesting. #BloggingGrandmothersLinkParty shared x4

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    1. Yes! I beginning to know the joys of being a grandparent. And if you can find Magpie Magic you really will love that you have it in your library. PS. It sounds like so much fun traveling from job to job with your hubby!

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  2. A love of reading is possibly the most important thing to develop with preschoolers #DreamTeam

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  3. You are awesome! I am doing something similar with books and toys for when my grandchildren come to visit. Making special memories is so important. Thanks for sharing!

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    1. Thank you so much for stopping by! I would love to read about the special place you made for your grand kids one day!

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  4. So exciting, and reading to those kiddos is so much fun. Thanks for sharing on To Grandma's House We Go!

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    1. I love reading to children. Their reactions and smiles are priceless!

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  5. Cathy,

    One of my all time favorite books growing up was "The Little House". I also enjoyed "Snow", The Berenstain Bears "The Bears Vacation", "Are You My Mother?" and "Put Me in the Zoo". I read all these to my daughter and she loved most of them. For some reason she didn't care for "The Little House" but I read it for me then.


    Maureen

    P.S. Using my daughter facebook account.

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    1. I will look for some of the books you mentioned. Thank you for your list. Put Me In The Zoo was one of my favorites to read to our pre-schoolers!

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  6. Story time is great isn't it. We love reading too, especially in the lead up to bedtime. There's nothing better than have a big library of books to hand. Thanks for sharing with the #dreamteam linky.

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    1. I can't wait until my grandson is old enough to really enjoy being read to.

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  7. I have always loved to read, and I love the idea of instilling the love of reading in my future grandchildren. I sure hope I get some soon! Your library is awesome! Thank you for sharing at Celebrate it!

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    1. Thank you for hosting a great party! Hope you will be blessed with grandchildren soon!

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  8. These books look wonderful, anything we can do to encourage healthy reading is well worth the effort.
    Kathleen
    Blogger's Pit Stop

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    1. Yes. We hope our grandchildren will love to read on their own one day!

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