My Evolution as a Bookworm

There is an event in my life as a mother that happens on occasion.  It is known as "Organizing the Kids' Bookshelf."  I don't know why I do it.  It's actually not that bad.  The real problem is that there isn't enough room on their bookshelf for their books.  Right now, it looks like this.

They have many more books contained in baskets around their room, and even more in their beds.

At six and nine years-old, they are at that funny stage where one is still into the picture books, and the other is delving into chapter books.  They are also still attached to their favorite books we read when they were babies -- which I think they get from me.  Which brings me to the topic of this post...

I happen to have a lot of vivid memories of my childhood -- as early as when I was 2-3 years old, living in the small Navy town of Oak Harbor on Whidbey Island in Washington.  As I sort through my memories, many of them are related to books.

And as I sorted through my children's books, I found MY favorite books among them.  Yes, I am so fond of my books that I still have them.  These books have been in my possession since the early 1970s.

My favorites as a pre-schooler were these:

I especially LOVED The Ear Book, and wanted my dad to make popcorn just because of it.

We moved to San Diego just before I started Kindergarten, and my favorites then became these:

I loved it when my dad read How Fletcher was Hatched and Miss Suzy and especially Eighteen Cousins (because I was the youngest of 34 grandchildren on my mom's side and 26 grandchildren on my dad's side -- but that's a different post altogether).  The Pied Piper was completely intriguing to me -- albeit a little creepy.  And I lived vicariously through Splish Splash because my mother NEVER let me do that.

When I got old enough to read more complicated stuff on my own, one of my favorites was this birthday present, given to me when I turned 7:

 My love for reading the dictionary started when I was about 7 years-old.  My husband and co-workers still find me engrossed in reading the dictionary or an atlas or random articles on Wikipedia.  Yes, I openly admit that I am a book nerd. 

I recently read a post on a blog by Mr. Schu that made me think.  I always encourage my students and own children to read.  We talk about the kinds of books they enjoy, and I make recommendations based on that.  I have never really reflected on the books I enjoyed reading in elementary school.   I had a mix of popular favorites and some relatively obscure titles:

• picture books about this horse named Blaze -- I grew up in a horse town outside of San Diego, horse trails around our homes and school
• anything by Judy Blume -- especially Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing (the first book to make me cry, believe it or not) Superfudge, Blubber, and Starring Sally J. Freeman as Herself.  I credit Judy Blume as being the one to fuel my love for reading.
• anything by Madeleine L'Engle -- A Wrinkle in Time, A Wind in the Door, and A Swiftly Tilting Planet
• Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Patterson
• Mandy by Julie Edwards (aka Julie Andrews -- the Julie Andrews)
• A Little Princess and The Secret Garden by Francis Hodgson Burnett
• Beat the Turtle Drum by Constance Greene
• The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis
• From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler
• The Story of Helen Keller  (this is probably how I got in to deaf education)
• Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH
• A Cricket in Times Square
• Charlotte's Web
• Anne of Green Gables
• The Witch of Blackbird Pond
• The White Mountains (Tripods series) -- THIS was intense, I think this was probably the first book that hurtled me into the YA genre.  Anyone else remember this series?

And there were these, which were not necessarily my favorites, just noteworthy enough because of all the books I read, I remembered these for some reason:

• Champions Don't Cry
• My Robot Buddy by Alfred Slote
• The Lancelot Closes at Five (knock-off on From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler)
• The Little House series (I tried to like these...but found them very boring.  I blame the TV series)

I could probably add more titles to both lists if I thought long enough, but these were the ones that came to mind when I thought of it.

Hmmm...learning a lot about myself as a reader.  The things I enjoy reading today as an adult are not that far off from the things I enjoyed reading as a child.  I'm still a bookworm, or booknerd, or whatever you want to call it.

What were some of your childhood favorites?  Feel free to chime in!