Image from BarelyFitz's Flickr Creative Commons

So, it was Father’s Day last Sunday. Per usual, I’m approximately 4 days behind the rest of the world’s calendar. That’s not to say I didn’t give my dad a hug on Sunday (we had him over for a cookout), but I didn’t exactly get his gift to him that day. I delivered it last night.

What do you give a dad who has everything? Who is retired and financially comfortable enough that he has the time and money to get and do whatever he’d like, when he’d like it*? Well, I’ve been giving him booklists. A few years ago, desperate for a gift, I gave him a bookmark with a list of books that sounded “like him.” He carried it around for a year and when he’d come in to volunteer at my school library (yes, he’s that great of a dad), he’d often have one of the books on the list under his arm. He wondered out loud to me once how I had compiled a list of so many great books that tickled his interest.

Ha! Finding books for readers is kinda what I do for a living, Dad. Probably my favorite part.

So, this year, it was time for a new list. And here it is: The Super-Long Father’s Day List of Books. It IS long, in no particular order, a strange mix of nonfiction, mystery, and science fiction/fantasy, and it includes some series halfway through because that’s where my dad is in them. I don’t know why I’m posting it here, except it’s books and it’s a list and I’m a librarian, so pass it on I must in the hopes that someone else somewhere might find their “just right” book.

Enjoy! (And please, I’m always looking for suggestions for next year’s list. Send them my way!)

* Not that he necessarily does. He’s pretty frugal, my dad. Which only makes gift-giving harder because if you give something too extravagant, it might be construed as, well…extravagant.

* I’ve already waxed on about my dad and reading here.

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Yes, it's me. All Knuffle Bunnied up.

So, summer vacation is finally here for me! I finished inventorying (is that a word?) all 20,000+ items in my library yesterday. Luckily, I had lots of excellent help!

Summer is writing season for me. It’s also reading season. And this summer I’ve thrown down the gauntlet with my fourth and fifth graders. We’re in a race to see who can read the most pages by the first day of school, September 1. Any student who can beat my total wins UNLIMITED BOOK CHECKOUT for the entire school year. Yes, the right to check out as many books as they want. For the entire school year. I’m keeping track of my reading on a blog. They can check it for my totals or for reading suggestions.

You would not believe how excited they are about this. I’ve run into kids at baseball games and the playground and the grocery store. I’ve overheard parents talking about it at swimming lessons. My challenge is posted on refrigerators all over our neighborhood. The kids are gunning for me–and I love it! Because, of course, though I talk tough, I hope I’ll get beat. (And I know I will. I have some HUGE readers on board.) After all, as I tell my students, the very best way to be ready for 1st grade, 2nd grade, 3rd grade, etc., is to read, read, read over break!

Follow along on our reading blog here: http://mrswreads.blogspot.com/.

So, what are YOU reading this summer?

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1. The Super-Long Father’s Day List of Books
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I first came to reading at midnight—with a newspaper and a bowl of cherries.

I was very young, still wearing diapers at night, when I first became a reader. No, I wasn’t a child prodigy. I am simply the oldest child in my family, so when I was little, my dad was still in medical school. He’d come home at night, way late, exhausted from his rounds at the hospital. And every night, my mom would have dinner—and me—waiting for him.

My dad would eat, then he’d retreat to the scratchy olive green plaid couch in the living room. And I’d scramble up next to him. We’d wedge a bowl of cherries between us, and then, with a waft of ink and a slight breeze on my face, my dad would flick open the newspaper. That simple twitch of his wrist would seal us off from the rest of the world, in a place where just the two of us existed, snuggling and snacking on those red-black cherries.

I don’t remember my dad reading to me as he looked at the paper. Most likely he didn’t. After all, it’s hard to read aloud when you’re spitting out cherry pits. All I remember is knowing that if I kept quiet enough and kept looking like I was reading, too, I’d get to stay up later. And snuggle longer. And eat more cherries. Already, I knew that reading was something so significant, so special and so…juicy, it broke all the normal rules.

Eventually, our late nights had an affect on me. Besides needing a good, long nap each day at most other people’s dinner time, I knew something else about reading and me. I had sat there long enough, watching my dad and staring at the black and white columns of the newspaper, that I felt like I was reading, too—just as much as my dad was.

And that’s how, years before I actually learned to read a word, I became a reader. Because knowing you are a reader counts much more in a person’s “reading story” than word decoding skills, comprehension scores, or lexile levels. I knew that reading was important. And I knew that reading was something I did. And with that, my little preschooler brain was primed for future reading adventures.

My reading story. A bowl of fruit, current events, and my reader dad—way, way past any kid’s normal bedtime.

What’s yours?

(cherries picture thanks to IH on Flickr Creative Commons)

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