Read Aloud Challenge: Bringing Books to Life

Footprints in the Butter

I have a confession to make....we haven't read anything out loud this week. Nothing. Zip. Zilch. Nada.

::sigh::

However, what we have managed to do is bring a couple of our most recent read louds "to life" so to speak.

As most folks may know, The Hobbit was released to DVD this week. We happen to have DirectTV and we also happen to have been snowbound on Tuesday when the DVD came out. So we called it a family night and ordered the movie to watch without ever having to brave the new 12 inches of new snow that fell. (Where is spring!?!?!)

However, in the spirit of keeping it real, I will confess something else. I had a major mom failure as well. My middle son is very sensitive to what he can watch and I need to be mindful of that. We were having a family movie night and I just figured I would tell them to close their eyes during the scary bits. I forgot how scary Orcs can be and in particular the white Orc in this film. Which leads me to also say, I really wish Peter Jackson had stuck closer to the original story line, but I digress.

I had one very scared little boy going to bed (he's almost 12 so don't tell him I said he was little). I apologized to him and we prayed. We even left a light one. Mommy guilt began to really wrack me so I prayed even more once I went to bed. And thankfully he slept through the night.

The next morning the first thing I did was ask him how he slept and he said "great!" with a big smile. I again apologized and told him he has my permission to tell me "Mom, I don't want to watch this" if ever we put on something else on the scary side.

Learning lessons for both of us.

And today we headed to the local Opera House to see a rendition of Shakespeare's A Midsummer's Night Eve and it was excellent! I had read a children's version of the play to my boys earlier in the month in preparation for today's performance. I think it helped them keep the story straight as the actor's did talk in Shakespearean English, but added a few "hip" elements as well.

I knew my 16-year-old was hooked when it began with a "Stomp-like" drumming performance as well as a "fight" scene. While the play was designed for older students, I did bring all my boys and even the nine-year-old was able to follow along to some extent and even enjoy it. I haven't laughed that hard in a long time.

I think one of my favorite parts though was when two of the actors kissed and it was dead quiet in the theater and you heard a boy in the back go, "Ewwww!" Priceless.

So while we haven't read anything, we have enjoyed a few "books to life" moments. We are also listening to a wonderful Lamplighter story, The Robber's Cave. We are doing three field trips this week, thus the lack of reading time, so we'll have lots of time in the vehicle to listen to stories.