What we're reading ... and why

I happened to see an ad on the side of a city bus about 3 days ago for a new movie coming out for Christmas. The Tale of Desperaux. I went online to check it out and liked what I found enough to buy the book. I'm reading it to Sayer now. And I've requested the audio copy from the library. I think it'll take about a week to finish reading it to her, and then we can listen to it again on our drive back from Tucson. I also picked up an 'activity' book based on the story, with coloring pages, word seek pages, dot-to-dots, and crossword puzzles. If I find a picture book with the story in it I might pick that up for her, too, as she's reading *really* well on her own. I want her to be pretty familiar with the story before 12/25.

Because that's her birthday. And the theaters will be open. And she and Duncan have never *really* been to the theater for a movie before. We went once when Sayer was 2 3/4 and Duncan was 8 months ... And we saw March of the Penguins (followed by Wallace and Grommit Attack of the Were-Rabbit, but they were not paying attention by then), which is not something that's going to really hold their attention at that age.

So anyway, you see where this is going. We're going to read it together. Listen to it together. Do some activity pages based on the story. Maybe she'll read it to me ... And then on her birthday we'll get up, get her dressed in her favorite pink 'princess' dress, put a little 'birthday girl' crown on her, and take her to the movies.

After which I might ask her to discuss the differences between the movie and the book ... well, not immediately afterwards. First there's coming home for cake and gifts. :)

So that's what we're reading right now. We're also working on lots of random 'homework' worksheets because I'd like to finish the 3-ring-binder full of them by her birthday so I have a real 'start date' for graded work.