I forgot to tell you, that a few weeks ago I finally finished National Velvet - it was fabulous! I really loved it, once I just pushed myself to read it.

You might not remember, but, I had talked about how it was difficult to read, because there was so much I didn’t understand.

The story is based in England, and so, therefore, there were English expressions that I didn’t understand.

It was also written in the 1930’s, so there were expressions of that time that I didn’t understand.

And there was a lot of horse and horse equipment talk, that I, either am not versed on enough yet (I’m getting there) or it was ‘horse talk’ that was English or English and 1930’s - you know what I mean?

And I am very ‘type A’ when reading - I have to read every single word in the book - from the very front cover to the very back cover. I’ve often been stalled out from reading a book, because I am ’stuck’ in a very boring foreword chock-full of words or ideas that I don’t understand. I was just talking about this with my son recently. He said, “Mom - why don’t you just start reading the book?”

And I explained to him my biblio-perfectionist need to read those boring forewords and introductions, etc.

He thought it was very silly.

Well, on the same token, I really need to ’see’ every sentence that I read. And when I cannot do that, I get stuck. It is very hard for me to forge on ahead not really knowing what hill or valley or horse body part or whatever the author has just told me about.

However, I realized that if I didn’t get over that with this book, I was never going to finish it. And I was determined to read the whole thing, as Shawn brought it home for me from his classroom and that was just way too sweet!

So I pushed myself to not hang on and attempt to understand every single word, and just read on through - and it turned out that I really loved the book!

It was made into a movie with, I think Mickey Rooney and Katherine Hepburn…ok, I could totally have those wrong - but, anyway, I really want to see it!

And the theme is so classic, about the ‘average Jane’ persevering and accomplishing something really grand! Fabulous!

Here is the book:

GO READ A BOOK! 

That’s right!

…sent me a holiday card!

And I love it! Well, any bookworm would - it is so cute!

You can check it out here:

Season’s Readings!

Awesome! I wish I could’ve pasted it here, it is so cute!

Oh well - ya’ll just go look! Ok? And make sure you have your speakers turned on!

And then…

GO READ A BOOK!

I have spoken here before about Squidoo

A wonderfully fun and inspiring and educational in many ways place on the web full of user-generated pages called ‘lenses’.

Veering a bit off course…here are my Christmas lenses - they do still need a little work:

Kids Love Christmas

and

Kids Love Christmas Crafts

Anyway, back to my topic at hand, I’ve stumbled across a really fun lens that I wanted to tell you about.

Take this sentence, from one of the modules:

“It wasn’t until later in life that I fell in love with the tantalizing texture of language and the sounds words make when jumbled around like jelly beans in all sorts of crazy colorful patterns.”

Now what true bookworm wouldn’t just love a sentence like that, I tell you!

His lens is all about rhyming - and having fun doing it!

Here is a lovely introductory sentence he’s written about his lens:

“Rhyme is a gift of youthfulness, a gift of joy, even a gift of passion… so Step into the Land of Rhyme Time and let your Imagination run Wild!”

And the really cool thing is that he is donating all of the proceeds from this lens to Room to Read!

“Room to Read partners with local communities throughout the developing world to establish schools, libraries, and other educational infrastructure.” …Now that’s cool!

So go on - step on in! Go there now! You’ll be glad you did!

Rhyme Time on Squidoo

And then, of course, don’t forget to…

GO READ A BOOK!

What?! I didn’t get a perfect score??? They didn’t even tell me what I missed…Oh, sure - Mrs. Lisa “Mama Bookworm” herself - missed one?!

I bet they’re just making it up! I was gonna do this quiz, and then come on here and brag to ya’ll - see, why I’m such a good reading influence on your children? But noooooo….

(Yes, I know - you’re not supposed to start a sentence with ‘but’, either. Ugh.)