I’ve been waiting for this for a long time. And in retrospect, I’m not sure why I thought that it would happen any sooner than it did.

Caroline, who is now the very definition of a voracious reader, did not start reading fluently until the end of first grade. All this year, Katherine has been making slow and steady progress but not really reading ‘for fun.’ I would show her book after book, hoping to catch her interest on a rainy weekend afternoon. And nothing really took.

Until this weekend. We went to the book store to buy a baby gift and I let Katherine make a few choices for herself. She chose a couple of short chapter books and finally found the ticket. She found a book with big type, a few simple pictures, lots of white space on the page and an easy to follow plot.

For those of you who are curious, the actual book was The Critter Club but I’ve realized that the title doesn’t really matter.

For some children and perhaps many, I believe the key is a chapter book with a fun plot, big type and some pictures. Children who grow up in houses of readers know that readers read thick books. Not early readers or Bob books. Those types of books are for school, not home.

It wasn’t until Katherine found just the right thick book that I found her standing in the living room looking like this..