Our family of audiobook Junkies

Audiobooks have become a staple at our house. We eat, we sleep, we listen to books, we read, and then, well, everything else. They are some of my favorite treasures since they bring so much peace and  happiness to our family in the car, while we Lego, lounging in the backyard, snuggling under blankets, and just about everywhere we like to hang out all together.

Here are some of our favorites to try...

Short books

• Moongobble and Me Series by Bruce Colville (read by Full Cast Audio)
• Magic Treehouse Series by Mary Pope Osborne
• Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle series by Betty Macdonald
• A Long Walk To Water by Linda Sue Park (read by Full Cast Audio)

Story collections

• The Olivia Audio Collection by Ian Falconer (read by Dame Edna Everage)
• William Stein Stories (read by Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci)
• Enchanted Tales adapted by Mary Sheldon (read by Audrey Hepburn)
• Little Bear series by Else Holmelund Minarik (read by Sigourney Weaver)
• Han and the Dragon and other Tales from Japan written and performed by Elizabeth Falconer
• The Bippolo Seed and Other Lost Stories by Dr. Seuss (read by Neil Patrick Harris, Anjelica Huston, Jason Lee, Peter Dinklage, William H. Macy, Joan Cusack, Edward Herrmann)
• Frog and Toad Audio Collection written and read by Arnold Lobel
• Funny Business (A Guys Read Collection) written and read by Jon Scieszka, Mac Barnett, Kate DiCamillo and others

Audiobooks we have listened to MULTIPLE TIMES

• The Wild Robot and The Wild Robot Escapes by Peter Brown
• Harry Potter Series by J.K. Rowling
• Elementia Chronicles by Sean Fay Wolfe (read by Edward Killingback)
• Henry Huggins series by Beverly Cleary (read by Neil Patrick Harris)
• Romona series by Berly Clearly (read by Stockard Channing)
• George by Alex Gino (read by Jamie Clayton)
• Mr Popper's Penguins by Richard Atwater (read by Nick Sullivan)
• Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl (read by Douglas Hodge) 
• Land of Stories Series written and read by Chris Colfer
• Matilda by Roald Dahl (read by Kate Winslet)
• The Princess Academy by Shannon Hale
• Wishtree by Katherine Applegate (read by Nancy Linari) 
• Brixton Brothers Series, Book 1 by Mac Barnett (read by Arte Johnson)
• Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech (read by Mary Stuart Masterson)
• A Long Walk To Water by Linda Sue Park (read by David Baker and Cynthia Bishop)

Optional: box fort for easy listening

Walk Two Moons

Dear Rose,

I am really happy that we got to spend some time with together last week. It was quite a gift, getting to be with you on THAT WEEKEND. You know? When your life was turned inside out and your mother was recovering in the hospital from something I can hardly think about. I think that someday, you will look back on it as one of the strangest and most tumultuous weekends of your life. And I'll tell you what? You were STILL kind. And lovely. And brave. Even on THAT WEEKEND.

That says a lot about you. It really does. And I hope you are proud because what it tells me is that you are becoming an amazing person.

We went to Powells together and I picked out this book for you because it is one of my all-time favorites. It is about a mixed-race family (one American Indian parent, one white) and though it is written by a Brit, it captures some of the subtleties that bringing those cultures into our family has meant. And I love that aspect of it oh so very much.

It is also about a girl losing her mother. And with your mom just having had her head zipped open, the timing for giving it to you last weekend was, pretty much, HORRI-TERRIBLE (that means so horrible that it has to be combined with terrible).

So I held onto it this week. And read it again. And cried again. And fell in love with it all over again.

Now that your mom has passed through her zip-down and zip-back-up as ferociously as we all hoped she would, I am passing it to you.

I hope it adds another piece onto the lovely, brave, amazing person you are becoming.

Love,
Margaret

Reading's put a spell on you

Dear Lucy,

This year, you have quickly become a voracious reader. You favor fantasy series, especially ones that feature characters from fairytales or greek mythology. You have NO interest in books about typical kids; Ramona Quimby, Junie B, and the like do not capture your imagination or your interest for long.

But there is such a thing as being TOO EXCITED about a book you are reading. As in so excited that YOU CANNOT SLEEP! This has happened on and off with the Harry Potter books. You were falling asleep late, sneaking back up to read, and then waking back up at 2 pm ranting about the book and asking to listen to stories so you could get back to sleep.

So we created a new rule, NO reading anything new after 7:30 pm. If you've read it before, great. But if you don't know how it ends, you can't read it before bed! This works well if we remember to enforce it.

We forgot last night. And lo and behold,  Harry Potter and The Prisoner of Azkaban had you coming downstairs an hour past bedtime saying, "But I can't believe Sirius Black is..." I missed the rest as your dad steered you back to bed.

You're too funny girl. So happy that you love books. But we will be remembering to enforce our rule tonight.

Love you,
Mama

Magic is happening

Henry with four books he can read by himself!

I remember bringing Lucy home from the hostpital and realizing that she didn't know anything. ANYTHING. She didn't know the word spoon. Or how to wave goodbye. Or which Star Wars movie is the absolute best one (Empire Strikes Back, of course). The universe had put me in charge of teaching her everything! It was a moment of complete terror. I called my mom in a panic and she calmly reassured me that it would all happen over time. Every day would teach her something new and before I knew it, she would know how to make friends, do algebraic equations, and make heart-shaped pancakes.

And slowly, time has proven her right. You have both learned to talk and walk and make friends and swim. And so many other things. But it still feels somewhat magical to me. Not like Harry Potter and pumpkin coach magical. But more like WiFi magical. I understand basics of the science behind the technology. But when I sit here typing and listening to music that is *magically* floating down to my ears from space, it feels like there is definitely some hocus pocus happening.

I felt the same thing when your brains somehow started processing letters into words. You are READING. I've read to you a lot. And we've looked at letters. But I don't feel like I taught you this. I feel like you were WIRED for it and somehow, at just the right moment, it came online all by itself.

It happened first with Lucy and now Henry has caught the bug. One day you are sounding out "fan." The next time I turn around you are reading full sentences and accepting the non-logic that through and threw sound the exact same but mean two totally different things. English. It is crazy!! Always seemed way too (not to, or two) complicated a thing for me to teach you. So it's a good thing that you are both absolutely, fantastically, magic.

Infultrated by robots

I started this game called "Robot" at the playground where I chase you while acting like a robot. It was intended to be convenient for me because, as a robot, I can chase slowly and the beeping noises keep you loving the game for a long time. The only downside is that its popularity has spread to everyone on the playground. Everyone. Thus, we play A LOT of Robot.

The Iron Giant, 1999

Then there is the ongoing discussion on the three universal laws for robots. Nothing like nerding out with a 4-year-old, going over these for the fifteenth time in one day.

WALL•E, 2008

Add to that MANY robot books we have checked out from the library. This one by David Lucas (OH MY GOSH, I LOVE HIM SO MUCH) is possibly my favorite:

Robot and the Bluebird by David Lucas

And pretty soon, a large part of my days are spent acting like, reading, or talking about ROBOTS.

You get even more of your fill watching robot movies.

Castle in the Sky, 1986

Despite the prolonged mania, I am still loving on the robots. We are one big robo-nerd family. Lucy even wants to be this one for Halloween!

Small Wonder, 1980's TV

Thanks for bringing some crazy, fun stuff into my life.

Love beep bo bo beep,
Your robot mama

Wishful thinking?

Or just plain delusional.

Insanity-avoidance read-a-thon

"Do you remember the books I read you, the words falling around us both like a blanket?"
~ Patricia Maclachlan in Your Moon, My Moon

Once again, a cosmic tide has shifted. All is atilt in the FiveCrows household.

We all have colds. Lucy, you are strangely moody and emotional at the drop of a hat. Henry, you are happy and full of contagious laughter one minute and then !DING! - suddenly a wild animal, who only says "I hate you" and "poop." the next.

You only hear half of what I say. Every transition is a struggle. Every task is a battle.

I manage not to yell for only so long, then lose it and have to run to the bathroom to hide until I can collect myself for another go.

Psst, the wild things are at our house.

I am tired of taking your toys. I am tired of locking you in your rooms. And I am REALLY tired of repeating everything 5 times before losing my cool only to see fear in your eyes when my voice volume goes up.

WHAT is going on?! Seriously. You guys rode the train to KUH-razy town. And I'm right there along with you (minus all the hair I've pulled out on the trip over).

GAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The best I can do is fall back on our almost-always-consistently-calm-happy-together activity: reading.

We have read a good 2 hours today. Bed time is coming, which will be another 30 minutes or so.

My voice is almost gone and my throat is sore (a little worse now since I choked up while reading this, so lovely).

On the bright side, we definitely have a great start on our summer desperation reading program. At this rate, we should have the grand prize by next week. Oh goodie - we'll look so great in our matching t-shirts when we check in to the psych ward together!

Oh come on guys, get your shit act together! Or you mom is totally going to lose hers.

xo,
Mama

ps - Here is a video of Henry (almost 1) saying "Trucks" while looking at a book. We only realized that you were talking after we watched the video. This is, perhaps, your second word. "Danks" for thanks was the first of your words that we understood.  Daddy is reading to Lucy in the background.

pps - My new dream is to have that quote painted on a wall or shelving near all of our books. Ah - I just love it!

Wait and see

We have hundreds of children's books in this house. Many of them, we have read hundreds of times.

Some of them I love to read, some of them I grit my teeth and just get through (Disney drivel), and a few have gotten "lost" so I don't have to read them anymore (ahem - Alice in Wonderland).

But this one in particular (a gift from my sister Millie), touches me every time. I do not think I've read it a single time without tears.

It is a simple story about a bunny who dreams to someday become one of the 5 chosen Easter bunnies.

One day a little country girl bunny with a brown skin and a little cotton-ball of a tail said, "Some day I shall grow up to be an Easter Bunny."

Then all of the big white bunnies who lived in fine houses, and the Jack Rabbits with long legs who can run so fast, laughed at the little Cottontail and told her to go back to the country and eat a carrot. But she said, "Wait and see!"

As she goes on to have 21 baby bunnies, she devotes herself to motherhood and loses her dream of becoming an Easter bunny. But when her babies grow to become little girl and boy bunnies, she IS chosen and then she proves herself the swiftest and bravest of them all.

This children's tale turns out to be a beautiful story of modern feminism and motherhood. So wonderfully sweet, and quite amazing in that it was written in 1939. It is an empowering story for all us working mamas for sure.

I hope you will remember this book; and when someone tells you that you can't achieve your dream because you are a girl, or a boy, or are too old, or too young, or have children, or don't have children, or look different than the last achiever looked, that you will believe in yourself and tell them..."Wait and see!" 

Little Fur Child

The Little Fur Child has become one of our favorite books. So much so that I could probably recite it backwards. Today, you put on this jacket and called it your "Fur Child Coat." Aww. Melt.

Lucy sings

Some of our favorite books are song books like this one. I've read/sang them over and over to you hundreds of times. All the way from the The Itsy Bitsy Spider on down to John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt, I'm pretty sure we've covered at least all of the basics.

Today, when I was on the phone, you were looking at this song book yourself and sang most of the words to each of the songs. (!) You would never do this for me (I ask you to sing with me all the time and you say "I want Mama to do it") so I just pretended to be on the phone after my call finished so I could listen in.

Amazing! It has been sinking in this whole time. And there is more - I've caught you singing other songs too.

This book (along with your special love for all things princess) has taught you a whole suite of songs. There are about 20 in there and you know most of the words to these too.

Of course, you know all the Wizard of Oz songs now. I have really learned to love these songs. The tongue-twister words (We hear he is a wiz of a wiz, if ever a wiz there was) are fun to sing and the melodies are great.

And there are even more including Christmas songs you pull out of nowhere and even a few primary songs.

It is just amazing to me that all of this is now wired into you and already starting to build in Henry's brain. You may not have memories of these early years but you will probably remember these tunes all of your life.

Crafty Mama

I am loving this book and want to make almost everything in it.
I've only found time for one project so far - a blanket/sleep sack for you to use at school. It's fleece so no sewing required and it was super easy.

Her blog has fun ideas too. Maybe we can find time for these exciting Octo-dogs.

Reading: Nurture Shock

I am in the middle Nurture Shock, by Po Bronson & Ashley Merryman. The book explores the latest findings in child development and its findings challenge a lot of commonly held premises behind education programs and parenting styles.

I am fascinated and want everyone to read it so we can discuss.

The chapter on siblings was a little alarming. Apparently you are going to fight with your new brother at least 10 minutes out of every hour - mostly over toys. That sounds like a lot of fighting over junk. Do you think that will replace the current whining or be added to it? It hurts my ears just thinking about it.