Perhaps one of my favorite ways to unwind, to detach myself from the chaos of the world, is to escape on an adventure into a new one. I have always been a lover of books. Ever since I first learned how to read I was hooked. I even remember my very first book report that I made (If You Give A Mouse a Cookie) and have purchased the complete set for my own children. I was a regular customer of the school library and one of the very first things I did after getting a drivers license was getting a library card at the nearest public library.

But that only lasted until I got my first job, at which point I traded in public libraries for used bookstores and have been growing my personal collection over the years. I’ll admit, after getting married and having children, the amount of time I spent reading had dwindled. It seemed as if I never had the time to do it. But now the girls are older and I have grown as well and with that personal growth came the realization that with the time I spent getting lost in the black hole known as social media reels, I could instead take that time and put it back into a hobby I had let fall to the wayside. That’s exactly what I’ve done. I’ve rekindled that love to adventure into a good book. I’m finding myself trade in my phone for my book more and more and that’s honestly how I’d prefer it. Although I’ll admit that now, when I do end up going on social media, I find myself inundated with bookstagrammers posts and have a wish-list that is forever growing longer.

Strangely enough though, what I have found to love the most is that I can now enjoy reading with my husband. We may not read all of the same books, after all we definitely have different interests but we do have some overlapping categories. When I was younger, having a husband who enjoyed reading was not something I really thought about. Sure I loved to read but I didn’t mind if he did not, honestly I hadn’t even considered the alternative. But now we have been reading the Wheel of Time series together (you’ve likely seen them featured in pictures on other posts) and to be honest it feels great to have something we can do together and enjoy. If I think about it, I probably have to give him the credit for getting me back into reading in the first place.

What a blessing it is to love books.

Elizabeth von Arnim