golden 15

For Shelby's Golden Birthday (the year your birth date is the age you are turning) we were determined to make it memorable.

We are big fans of not buying our kids much outside of their needs, in part because we want them to truly treasure receiving gifts and in part because we would quickly be overrun with stuff. (Ten people, remember?)

So for her Golden Birthday, we decided to buy Shelby either a Nook or a Kindle. Both Scott and I were terribly excited to see her reaction as she opened her gift: a paper with nooks and kindles plus covers all over it with directions that she was to choose which eReader she wanted and we would buy it. We could just imagine the gleam of excitement in her eyes at the thought of carrying her library of books around in one hand.

She ripped open the envelope as Scott & I exchanged excited glances. And here it was -- The Reaction.

Underwhelming.

"Oh, this is great. Thanks!" Little enthusiasm. Little excitement. Little anything.

Huh.

Scott and I chatted after the cake, trying to make sense out of Shelby's response. She had been drooling over eReaders for months, had lovingly cradled Aunt Laura's iPad, and had mentioned daily how nice it would be to have a Nook, but that a Kindle might be a smarter buy. We were (not surprisingly) utterly puzzled.

 A few days later, we went to Shelby to ask her about it. We explained our surprise and subsequent confusion. After a loooooooooot of assuring her our feelings wouldn't be hurt, we weren't upset, and that we just wanted her to be excited about her gift, Shelby confessed.

"I like to hold books. I like the feel of a book in my hand. I like the sounds of the page turning. I like being able to write in it, to dog ear it, to drag it around. I just really, really like books and the words inside."

Her gift quickly changed into a hefty gift card to Barnes & Noble. Shelby chose to wait until after Easter to use it as the Easter Bunny has always left books for Easter. (No candy, no baskets, no stuffed animals. Just towers of books. And I cannot even begin to express how much I adore the excitement which builds in the week before Easter over the books which are on their way. Le-Sigh. My reader's heart is just so content at those times.)

This morning we spent over two hours at the bookstore. Shelby and Scott had done the Rutherford version of window shopping (insert here: strolling around the bookstore and finding books that peak your interest to go on the when-there-is-enough-funds-I'll-be-back-to-pick-up-this-bad-boy list) a few weeks ago, so Shelby already had a good idea of what she wanted. And then, she just kept browsing, and making towers on the table nearby.

I made a tally, subtracted the Educator's Discount we receive for homeschooling, and let her know she still had about $29 to spend. I wish I had a picture of her eyes lighting up as she looked at all the books she had chosen before dashing back to grab four books she had fingered lovingly.

It took all 9 of us working as a team to get Shelby's books plus two more Ranger's Apprentice books (for Dawson; he came downstairs this morning excited about the amazing cliffhanger the second book ended with but quite distraught knowing that we did not yet possess book 3) plus a new Berenstain Bears book (for the twins -- it was 50% off!), a Fancy Nancy book (for Abigail, also 50% off), a Tangled Painting book along with a Disney Fairies book (Isabelle heard we were going to the bookstore and grabbed some of her spending money) and a Wee Sing America (which was finally in stock) up to the front of the store.

Of course, our Make Way for Ducklings-style trek to the checkout was commented on by several people, a few other children thought we were having a book parade & tried to join us, and the lady who rang us out groaned a little as we began forming towers on her counter. Our work at the bookstore done, we drove home with a van full of jabbering about who was reading which book first & would someone please read this to me & I can't wait to go back and get that one book I saw. It was simply fabulous.

Shelby says this was truly the best gift ever. And really, that was the goal all along.