Books, Books, Everywhere! Part II: Discover the Bugs

Tomorrow is Wednesday and the carpet man cometh -- I am still clearing out the top floor in anticipation of the event. If you told me 20 years ago that I would be Christmas-Eve-excited about getting my carpets cleaned I would have laughed out loud!

The books downstairs are no longer in piles -- my 7 year old (God bless her) hunted through them last night and now they are spread out all over the dining room -- a virtual carpet of books. Scattered within the books, though, I notice the Bug magazines.

When my girls were babies, my mom bought them a subscription to Babybug, a fantastic publication that features short poems, songs and illustrations on tough card-stock paper --custom made for babies and toddlers.

As they moved out of the baby years, they began to receive Ladybug, the next step up in this series of magazines. Ladybug appeals to the slightly older child (and emergent reader), with whimsical illustrations, a continuing series in every issue, crafts and poems.

Now the girls read Spider, the Carus publishing magazine made for 6-9 year olds -- perfect for my kiddos.

Through the years in our house, these magazines have been collected and dragged everywhere from the doctor's office to the beach -- and have been invaluable on long road trips.

When the girls were too young to read the words, these magazines were a great excuse for me to sit down with them for some quiet time. Now they are more inclined to read them on their own, curled up on the sofa or before lights out at bedtime. The best thing about these magazines is that they will grow with your girls -- with first-rate titles all the way through the high school years.

I consider these publications top-knotch -- with consistently quality material -- kind of kiddie literary magazines. And these three titles are just the tip of the iceberg -- check out the Cricket website to preview issues of many others -- including Click and Ask. And don't let the price of a yearly subcription throw you off -- you'll find that any Cricket magazine is worth every penny.

Give these great magazines a try -- and enjoy reading them with your girls!

Books, Books, Everywhere! Part I: The Board Book Years

Today my living room looks like the children's section of the library has exploded inside of it.

We are having our upstairs carpets cleaned on Wednesday and are taking this opportunity to purge all Happy Meal toys, broken toys and toys that haven't been touched since Christmas 2002.

And we're weeding through books. Emptying out five bookcases, we see what a collection we've amassed over the years since our first daughter was born. So now all of these books are piled high downstairs while my husband moves the bookshelves out of the girls' rooms -- hopefully enabling the carpet guys to nail any lurking dust mites.

AND while hubby's doing the heavy lifting, I've got the task of deciding which books need to go bye-bye. This has proved harder than I thought.

It's an inherited problem -- I grew up in a house where, even during lean years -- there were always books. These books were proudly displayed in over-stuffed bookcases -- reading material that ranged from the Warren Commission Report on the assassination of JFK to my great-grandmother's time-worn cookbooks. As a result, I think it's in my blood to feel funny about actually getting rid of books.

But still -- there are quite a few that my girls no longer read -- and many which they were never crazy about to begin with. I start with those -- make a pile to donate -- and then I stumble on some baby board books.

I find Do You Know New?, by Jean Marzollo, a book that I read over and over again to both of my girls, even as infants. The cute rhyme scheme and the mirrored page at the end were irresistible to both of them.

I can still feel their wiggling little selves in my lap. I'd read: "Do you know blue?" Then I'd ask them the color of the sky and they'd point to the page with chubby toddler fingers and say "Boo!"

Another great book series that my girls enjoyed was the "My First" series by DK Publishing. These are a type of first dictionary -- introducing the concept that every object has a word to go along with it -- an early reading lesson. Plus the pictures are stimulating and colorful and my girls loved pointing to them as I'd call out the corresponding word.

And they liked to chew on them too. Answer me this -- how's a mom supposed to get rid of a book that has her baby's teeth marks etched in the corners? -- even if that baby is now 9 years old?

Nope, sorry, can't do it -- maybe next time we have the carpets cleaned. But not today.