"I READING, Mommy!"

Drew introduced Rachel (and, by extension, me) to "Go Dog Go," which was a favorite of his as a kid. I thought it was the stupidest book imaginable. As I explained at a baby shower, to much laughter, "there's no real narrative arc."

Turns out that's not exactly true. The book starts with simple words and phrases such as, "Dog." "Big dog." "Little dog. Big dogs and little dogs.." and ends up with a huge group of dogs on top of a tree at a dog party. It sounds completely ridiculous even as I write this, but trust me, it makes sense. The book has really grown on me and I'm glad Drew insisted on including it in Rachel's library.

I read it to her last night and she insisted on taking it to bed with her (this is becoming a regular occurrence). Today in the car on the way to school, she took it with her, opened it up on her lap and started READING! Well, probably not exactly, but she would turn to pages in the book and say almost exactly what was going on. "A dog on top of a house. Two dogs in the water." "Two dogs go in" (really, it was only one dog). "Dogs making music" (her interpretation of a picture of dogs in a boat, with one playing the guitar.

"I reading, Mommy!" she said delightedly. I was so impressed, I couldn't really say anything.