We are big readers over here! As far as I'm concerned, you can never have too many books so they are all over our house! Every night we read two books to the boys - whatever two they want to pick out.
Well I'm always trying to think of fun new Christmas traditions to do with the kids and one of my friends does something I thought was really fun! She wraps all of their Christmas books that they've accumulated over the years and each night during the holiday season, they get to pick out one wrapped book to read - since it's wrapped in paper, they don't know which book they are getting, making it a fun Christmas surprise! Plus, they get to open a "present" every night and not read the same books over and over again (which mine tend to do!)
I thought this was a great idea for my boys! So I got all of their Christmas books out (which we store all together in the attic during the year) and wrapped them all in the same Christmas paper. Last night was the first night and I explained "this is going to be a fun new tradition! Mommy has wrapped all of your Christmas books up so you get a fun surprise each night when you open it to see which book you chose!" The oldest - who definitely is my most sensitive, perfectionist child starts whining "are you giving them away? But I want to read all of the books!" I tried to explain that we WILL read all of the books but this is just a fun way to do it!" He went to choose his first book and says "I chose the wrong one....I don't want this one" (I wish you could hear the whining in his voice) I say "That's what's fun about it! There is no wrong choice!!" He sulked but went on with his book selection. The second born could care less which book he gets! He just wants to open ALL of them on the first night!
Second night (tonight) and again the oldest is so nervous he is going to pick the wrong book!!! WHAT THE HECK! This was supposed to be fun!!!! Sure enough, he sees the book he's unwrapped and starts whining that he didn't want this book - So I told him to go pick out a regular book then since that is his "Christmas book" selection for the night - was that mean? Well he loses it! Temper tantrum that would blow any two year old AWAY and he's 5! Long story short - he couldn't even pull it together to read books - so I went into his room to talk to him and I apologized that wrapping the books wasn't fun for him. He says "it's always fun for little man because he always picks the right book but I always get the wrong book and that's not fun for me!" I couldn't believe it! I know everything in his little world has to be perfect - he's always indecisive when picking things out at the toy story, always worried if he'll choose the right thing and still will get home and regret the decision he'd made. I just couldn't believe that something so tiny that was supposed to be fun had caused all this drama!
So I told him tomorrow night if he has to unwrap every single book to find the right one then that's what we'll do!
Anyone have any other fun traditions they'd like to share?
