Parenting Toddlers

When I was pregnant with Peanut, someone gave us Sweet Dreams, Mimi, which is a Baby Einstein book. Naturally, I want my kids to be genuises, but I thought, “There’s no way she’s going to like this. It has too much text. It’s too long to hold her attention.” I tried it, and she loved it. She always has. It’s not super long on text, but for young toddlers, sometimes short is sweet. But she liked the pictures, the words. Something about how it’s written is great, and very engaging for toddlers. Here’s a little sample:

Each night after kisses, Mimi asks for sweet dreams…
And Mama whispers
Softly colored pictures
To fill Mimi’s head
As she slips into bed
Between sheets cool and smooth

The whole book is very melodic, lyrical. I was wrong when I thought that that wouldn’t appeal to Peanut. Espeically at bedtime; it’s very soothing. It’s full of language…do you know what I mean? This book is just full of quality writing. The way it flows, the way it describes. It’s great.

I was thinking about how important it is to read to toddlers. When Peanut was younger, I read to her all the time. I read to her in the womb, I read to her when she was a day old. Now, to be honest, I’ve kind of slacked off. With the baby, I’m sometimes too tired to read to her at night. That’s such a lame excuse, because obviously I could read to both of them. But if he’s crying, I just want to get her to bed so I can handle him. It’s terrible. Espeically since Peanut has been waking up in the middle of the night, asking me to read to her. She’s done this four or five times in the past month, maybe. Three or so in the morning, she’ll get up and ask me to read her a book. That makes me feel terrible. So today, I made a deal with Peanut. If I promised to read to her every night before bed (even one short book - whatever we can do), would she stay in bed? She said yes, and I think it’ll work. I can’t believe that I’ve neglected something so important. I was a teacher, for God’s sake. I know how important reading is. We all love to read in our house, and I want to make sure that Peanut continues to love to read as she grows. That’s my job. I should fire myself! Anyway, that made me think of good old Mimi. I think we’ll be digging it out of the bookshelf, along with some others.

I know that if you are taking the time to read a parenting blog, chances are very good that you do everything you can to ensure your child is healthy, happy, and intellectually stimulated. So I thought I’d help out a bit.

Leave a comment or drop me an email telling me what your toddler’s favorite book (or books) is. It’d also be great if you could give a brief description and tell me when you typically read to your toddler. I’ll randomly select one person and send him or her an Amazon gift card for $10. You can buy a few toddler books on Amazon for $10 - which is a great thing about little kid books. It’d be a good Christmas present for your kids or another toddler in your life. So get me your emails or comments by Saturday, December 13 I’ll only need your email address to send you the gift card. It’s easy, it’s free. And Amazon is awesome.