I've been doing a lot of blogging-related things from my phone (tweeting, blog-reading) since Juliet was born. Apparently my phone has realized that "I" and "Jessica @ Quirky Bookworm" are the same person. Which isn't creepy at all.
But, I've also been able to do quite a bit of reading while Juliet nurses. It's funny how different my kids are: when Eleanor was a baby I couldn't read at all. Every time she heard a page turn, she'd roll and try and grab the book, so I watched a lot of tv. But Juliet is all about screens. It's hard to get her to nurse around the tv, or even if there's music on she'll keep turning her head, looking for the source of the noise. So I either read, or do phone stuff with the ringer silenced.
I was feeling bad about Juliet's tendency to watch screens; and about how I always used to prop books in front of Eleanor, but rarely do that with Juliet. Poor second kid, the first one will turn out to be a big bookworm (who even occasionally NAPS in her bookshelf!), and the second one will watch TV all the time and have ADHD or something.
But then I started thinking that really, Juliet hears a lot more books than Eleanor ever did. When Eleanor was a baby I read her little board books with one or two words on each page. But Juliet will happily sit on my lap and pay careful attention while I read Eleanor long picture books, like The Sniffles for Bear
, or Bread and Jam for Frances
. She's been doing this since she was about two days old, so actually, I'm sure I've read her way more words than I read to Eleanor in the first six months of her life.
So I'm hoping that she'll get into chapter books earlier maybe. Eleanor still is pretty uninterested, I've tried Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle
and Winnie-the-Pooh
, and after three pages she wants to know where the pictures are. But since Juliet has an earlier tolerance for long picture books, I have hopes for reading Little House in the Big Woods
or Betsy-Tacy
aloud to both of them soon!
Do you read to YOUR babies?
This post contains some affiliate links, thanks for supporting QB. And, because I can't resist, a recent picture of Juliet, apropos of nothing.
