Where there are books...

What a powerful thought.

I was thinking yesterday about our library addiction. It's pretty epic.

From the time I was a little girl, the library has been the most magical place in the world to me. It had the ability to make the world feel safe and connected while making it feel massive and untouchable in the same moments. I was drawn to variety most of all. I do not waste my life by sticking to one author, one topic, one type of book. Life is far too short to consider limitation on books.

A woman I know was asking me about what my children's lists for school work looks like... but I had to start with the most fundamental belief, down to my core, about my children's education - Everything comes second to reading in our home. First and foremost - the only skill we teach from birth is reading. Until my children can full independently read, nothing else is in focus.

Reading is the gateway to all their desires. It can bring them everything from God's word when they are weary to a full guide on a far away land they want to backpack through after graduation. Reading is the core of our life. I have seen my children consume books with a desire to conquer multiplication and devour books in a whole adventure series because they can not consider not knowing what happens next. Literacy skills are the foundation to everything we do in this home.

Who has time to read in a go-go-go world like ours? In my opinion, you don't have time, you make time. When we consider what is good, better, and best for our family - books is always the best choice for us. Of course I have reluctant readers, I have non-readers, I have cant-be-bothered-to-eat-today-this-book-is-too-good readers and I have one tiny tear-the-pages-if-mom-isn't-watching readers in this house.... All of them valuable readers.

This is our book box for going to the library - 

It's a toolbox. It used to have a tray in it and a lid with metal clasps to close it.... But I needed heavy artillery to hit the library and this fit the bill perfectly (though, between you and me, I'm considering buying a bigger one because I fear I have out grown this one). Over and over again through the years, this box has been lugged in and out of library after library. Sometimes I get wonderful comments from people, sometimes I get comments from moms that call me insane for allowing that many "liabilities" in my home at once. Nay sayers or not, there is nothing to stop me from a home filled with books!

In our home you'll find books in every room. They are on the couch from a kid who forgot to put them back but were quickly discovered by another kiddo who thought I should read them all to her. They are in bedrooms and though banned from the bathroom, on occasion, they are found there too.

They are found in pathways to sleeping children as if they set their shoes and their books down before falling into bed at night. It's an adorable, funny fact that I find this trail to their beds almost every morning. 

And in conclusion to our lifelong love affair - this quote is apt to what I hope for my children. I want them to read so much that questions they didn't even know arise in their bones and move them forward with passion. I wish that every book they encounter can spark a fire that blazes brighter than they could have imagined and invokes a drive to read more, do more, be more.

Modeling this love affair with books is perhaps what I'll be remembered for in our home. Books, my loves, is the gateway to everything.