Ida B and Willard Library

Last week I took the kids to Willard Library.

I've taken them before, but it has been years. We discovered clues for a letterbox hidden there and after we found it, we visited the children's room.

I spent so much time in that children's room whilst I was growing up.
Every week our class would walk there, spend time with Miss Margret and Miss Anita, and check out books. So to take my children there last week and find Miss Anita sitting behind the desk was pretty cool! The kids scattered, checking out all the nooks and crannies of this amazing place and I was able to catch up with an old mentor.

She invited my oldest and me to join a mother/daughter book club that was beginning soon. The first book they were planning to read was

Ida B...and Her Plans to Maximize Fun, Avoid Disaster, and (Possibly) Save the World by Katherine Hannigan.

I thought it sounded like fun and dd is always up for a read aloud, so we signed up. The club meeting was in just a few days, so we began reading right away.

I have this to say-

finally a relatively new book, (copyright 2004)

for young girls, that is imaginative, fun, and allows the main character to be herself. Ida B is a nature girl. She talks with the trees, lays in the brook and reads to her pets. She embraces life and appreciates the everyday things that surround all of us.

There are some valleys that Ida B has to climb up out of, the book faces some tough realities. She isn't a perfect person, she has lessons to learn. The focus on this book is Ida B, her feelings and emotions and behavior.

But a lesson I took from this book is to give my children some room. Even during tough times, when they might act out & become brats. Times when I'm more likely to jump down their throats than listen or let them breathe.

I often want to tell them how they should feel instead of listening to what they are feeling. Moms, read this one with your daughters.

The book club meeting was last night, and it went pretty well. Miss Anita wasn't there, but there were three sets of moms and daughters and another wonderful children's librarian. We were the only homeschoolers, and as Ida B is homeschooled for several years, the spotlight was on us during some of the discussion time. Ida B experiences one really bad teacher and one really good teacher. So instead of delving into my beliefs about schooling or my dd's feelings about attending a public school over homeschooling, we tried to direct the conversation back to the book.

That needed to be done several times as all the ladies (young and older) in the group tended to want to talk about themselves and their experiences!

I think that over time the group will gel more and focus more on the book. We look forward to next month when we'll be reading,

Miracle on 49th Street by Mike Lupica.