2014 Reading Challenge

I love to read!  Reading's my favorite!  And when I'm reading a book, I take that book EVERYWHERE!  To the bathroom, in the car, to bed, to the kitchen, everywhere!  I have loved reading my whole life.  I read the entire Babysitter's Club series in the 3rd grade.  All through middle school and high school, I would get absorbed in a book and forget to do my homework!  I was at the bookstore at midnight for the release of every Harry Potter and Twilight book.  I read all 3 Hunger Games books in 4 days.  I love reading!!

My sweet daughter doesn't seem to share the same love for reading as I do.  She will enjoy a book when she reads it, but can always find something she would rather be doing.  She read the first Harry Potter book and liked it, but hasn't touched the rest.  She did find a great series called "Confectionately Yours" about a girl her age who loves to bake cupcakes, just like Caroline!  There are four books and she has read the first 3.

And she also just finished The Hunger Games and started Catching Fire a few days ago.  She seems to really enjoy those books, but I had to bribe her to get her to read them.  Apparently, Caroline is the only 12 year-old in the entire world who hasn't watched The Hunger Games and Catching Fire.  I honestly wasn't sure she would like it, so I hadn't let her watch them yet.  So I made a deal with her that if she read the books, she could watch the movies!  Well, that definitely made her want to do it!  So she has read the first one and seen the first movie!  I'm hoping she finishes the second one before the movie is out of theatres!  I wanna go see it!! 

I have been trying to find ways to encourage her to read more.  Her main complaint is that she isn't a fast reader.  I keep telling her that she has to practice at it to get better!  But, she's a tween, and definitely smarter than me!  But I think I may have found something!  Today we spent a lot of time on a great website: goodreads.com.  It's sort of a social media site for book lovers!  You can connect with your facebook friends to see what they are reading, read book reviews, rate and review books, and get recommendations!  When I was doing some exploring on the site, I saw that they have a book challenge!  You can enter in the number of books you will read in 2014 and it will keep track for you!  Such fun and I love a good challenge!  I also signed Caroline up with her own account on there!  She committed to read 12 books, 1 a month, and if she completes the challenge, I'm gonna get her a little treat!

Another thing that is helping her enjoy reading more is reading on the IPad!  I personally love to read from a traditional, actual book.  I love holding books and I love the way books smell.  (Ok, I guess my "weird" is starting to show.  I'll just tuck that back in!)  But Caroline seems to really love reading on the IPad!  She loves the little digital bookmark and she always highlights the last word she reads so she knows exactly where to start!  Whatever works!

I encourage you to go take the 2014 Reading Challenge.  It's easy to sign up and in 5 minutes your "want to read" list will be a mile long!

I'm currently reading the Divergent series, what about you??

Gonna curl up and finish this book!

Nicole