Library

Ben "works" for a fun afternoon activity EVERY day at school.  It helps keep him on task and motivated and keeps his teachers and therapists from motivating him with screen time, which was their first idea.  There's a whole other post behind all that that will likely never happen here, but needless to say, thinking of something EVERY day gets exhausting.  Ben often asks to go to the library but we actually hadn't tried it in at least a year.  He is blessed to have so many books at home that we might never read them all, and like many kids, enjoys a few favorites most.  He is also very blessed to have a large school library and librarian which many preschoolers don't experience.  He's been doing great in the library at school and apparently loves a certain Skyscraper book.

So, yesterday I threw out the idea that today Ben could earn a trip to the library followed by a trip across the street for ice cream.  Amy, Grace and Sara ended up joining us as they are on Spring break and we all delighted in the late afternoon journey......mostly.  Ben bopped around a bit and was much more absorbed in the playhouse than the books I thought he might enjoy.  He asked for some of his favorite books from home before noticing another little boy watching Dora or Diego (are they the same show?) on a computer nearby.  Sara had also settled into a game on an adjacent computer and then all books were lost on Ben.  He was happy to click and pound away at the blank screen, but this was not an okay library activity in my book.  Thank goodness Amy was there so I could get library cards and gather a few books I thought Ben might enjoy.

To be fair, we did arrive at Ben's toughest part of the day, and he waited very patiently all day for his friends to arrive.  It was after 5pm by the time we finished our ice cream and walked home so I fully own that side of things not going swimmingly.  

The great side of this story is that I did find a Skyscraper book that Ben carries all around the house so it's always nearby and he also LOVES The Big Blue Thing on the Hill almost as much as I do.  We will crack open the others in the coming weeks and I hope that with more regular and better-timed visits, the library might become as dear to Ben as it was to me as a kid.  There are 3 other libraries very close so I might scout the others to find one without shows and computer games in such close proximity to the kiddo books.