Archie Andrews…and another Wimpy Kid

I loved to read as a child.  I read Nancy Drew, I read Trixie Beldon.  I read Judy Blume books.  I read pretty much every book in the Fairmount Public Library and the Jamaica Elementary Library.  But I had a special love for Archie Comic books.  My mom bought one for me at pretty much every grocery store we went to.  I can remember getting one at the Catlin Grocery store on a regular basis.  I somehow kept  a decent number of the books that I had bought for me as a child.  My dad gave me a tote a few years ago that I was astonished to find contained many of my Trixie Beldon’s, Nancy Drews, and my beloved Archie comics!  I know there were many more, but even a few dozen of these well worn, well loved books were a treasure!  I put them on the bookshelf that contained my other books about a year or so ago.  I believe that this is how my daughter discovered them. 

One of my daughters loves to draw, pain, create works of art.  This is about the only time she is sitting still!  Otherwise, she is moving around, playing, wiggling…and doesn’t care for reading one bit!  If I read to her, I swear she isn’t paying any attention, but her listening skills are surprisingly good, and she  has a good comprehension. She just dislikes, hates the reading herself!  This was a blow for me, because this child is very much like me.  I will protect her identity..lets just call her “Baby B.” 

Now, the other child.  From now on referred to as ‘Baby A” for no particular reason of course, is nothing like me (at least in looks and mannerisms.)   Baby A has soo many of her dad’s looks and interests that it is a huge surprise that she would be a comic book reader.  No offense intended, but her dad’s idea of a good read was an internet article on the latest Fighting Illini recruit!

But somehow, she likes to read..and I love it!  Of course, I can’t talk her into Trixie, or Nancy..or the really GREAT books, but she is totally addicted to Archie Comics.  Even I type, she is 2 feet from me, reading one of these books that is dated from the 1980’s!  These books are all over my house and in the car.  In fact, her sister has been known to hide them so that she will play with her in the car.  This child misses lots of family car conversation because she is soo engrossed in her reading, and often wants to read them aloud to me. 

Yesterday, we headed to Bismarck Grade school  book fair so that the girls could pick out books that their Nana (the librarian) could choose for them for Christmas.  We do this every year. Baby A chose “The Diary of the Wimpy Kid.”  Now, the book fair had 4 of these books, so she  bought the first one (her own money) and gave the names of the other 3 to Nana, who wrote them down.  Now, this child finished that book (all 217 pages of it) by this morning!  Last night, she was laughing out loud, and reading me sections of the book.  You have no idea how much joy I get from watching my children enjoy anything..but a book…I just LOVE it!  Of course, now we have to wait until Christmas to get the next few books…..