Valentine’s Activity

I come from a line of AVID readers! Actually, that’s quite an understatement. We all have wall to wall, floor to ceiling bookcases in our homes. In fact, I think we all dream of having vaulted ceilings with those bookcases with a rolling ladder to get to them all! We love books.

An important tradition that I do for Valentine’s is to have Valentine books out. I use these books to read from for our bedtime story, reading a different one each night. I love putting thoughts of Valentine’s Day into my kids heads, from morning until night. In our family books are often given for gifts. If you do this, make sure to sign who the book is to and from, and a short comment is nice as well. We love seeing our personal messages in our books. I love knowing that not only is “Love You Forever” a super sweet book (that I’ve read a million times and still cry every time) but that I received this from my Grandmother (another avid reader)! I did not go out and buy all of these books at once, they accumulate over the years. I try to buy a themed book for the kids for each holiday. These can cheaply be bought from book orders (look in the corner as there are usually $1 books there!), and after holiday clearance sales!

I found one of those school pocket things, from a garage sale. This is where my kids will find their Valentines books, on February 1st. I actually do this tradition every month. It used to be just for the holidays, but now I like to have a theme for those months without a holiday. For January, this was filled with books about Winter time. It is amazing how much the kids will automatically pick from these books to read. I have bookcases in every room of my house (literally). Yet, the books in this book display are the ones the kids will most read from (except my oldest who has her own, much harder, books to read! ;) It is also a good way of rotating books. It always feels like Christmas when I go through and pull out all of my books within one theme (in this case, my Valentine’s books). I find it makes the books more fun, each time we put new ones out this way.

I saw a lot of people are starting to have a Christmas book a day. I hope you can see why it is a great idea to do for Valentine’s Day, as well. My kids love picking which Valentine’s Book we will be reading for bedtime, though I’m sure you could wrap these up the same way many people did their Christmas books. For us, picking out which particular story for tonight, is half the fun for us. We rotate who’s turn it is to pick the story.

Rebecca

Katrina here:

I love this idea and have been doing the same for years. I started doing it as a way to prepare my autistic child for an upcoming event like Valentines Day, Easter, 4th of July, Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas. I used them like social stories. This way he knew what to expect when the time came. Not only is it a fantastic way to spend some quality time with your children but books like these can give your child a deeper understanding of what the event really means.

And YES I have always dreamed of a traditional library. I picture deep rich colors, dark woods, leather chairs and floor to ceiling bookshelves with rolling ladders. Oh and a fireplace because curling up with a good book infront of a fire just sounds like heaven. ;)