The seven year old and I are still currently mid-The High Skies Adventures of Blue Jay the Pirate. The five year old and I are working on the 3rd Harry Potter, but I edit out a bit and keep it light, because it is too scary for him, but that doesn't stop him from wanting the street cred of knowing some spells and whatever.

Some other things we have read are:

Peanut by Linas Alsenas is an old favorite of my sons', and it regularly gets pulled down while we're at the library.

The Dark, by Lemony Snicket. Lemony Snicket is a HUGE favorite of my older son's, and so I was extra pleased to see this book on the shelves for my younger son. Neither of my kids have ever really been afraid of the dark, and I hate to introduce new fears if I can avoid it (I like sleeping. A lot.) but this book is lovely and funny and will not make the dark a horrifying thing in the minds of your child, unless your child is bent on making it that way no matter what a book says.

Together, the 5 and 7 year old have been reading Ten in a Bed by Allan Ahlberg. They love it and go suddenly silent and stop punching each other when I start reading it, so that's good. Sometimes I worry about how they get the non-"original" version of fairy tales or nursery rhymes before the old fashioned types (see: Super Why introducing a version of Humpty Dumpty where they can, like, identify some letters and stop Humpty Dumpty from breaking or whatever) and that frustrates me, but this non-original take on fairy tales is actually creative and fantastic and I am in favor of it.

With the Seven Year Old: The High Skies Adventures of Blue Jay the Pirate by Scott Nash

My seven year old and I are currently reading (and loving) The High Skies Adventures of Blue Jay the Pirate by Scott Nash. This book is gorgeous, right down to the tactile piece of the puzzle, and that is definitely what led to me pulling it down from the shelves and perhaps to my son choosing it to read first after I fanned out his bedtime story options on the coffee table.

We're a few chapters in, and so far, so good. I saw that it was rated as 9+, but he is following it easily and completely engaged.

He studies the pictures for ages.

My husband is currently reading him The Black Cauldron by Lloyd Alexander. (We sometimes end up having a book per parent if there is something one of us particularly wants to read with him, and my husband is reliving his childhood with this choice, I think, having just finished The Book of Three with him recently.) I hear lots of begging for storytime to go on longer when it is his turn, so it seems to be a hit.

Hi!

I have two boys, and those two boys (ages 5 and 7) have four ears through which I pump stories daily. If it sounds like I am exaggerating, I'm not: We live across the street from a library on purpose. The only time we are not in the middle of a book is the rare time when we've just finished one and haven't already started another.

Since I am a Library Person, I regularly get asked to recommend books for my friend's kids, and so I decided to start writing it all down: What we're reading, what I think, what they think, and what's next. So here goes.