I’ve been reading more and LOVING it! I’ve had a love/hate relationship with books for a long time now because I’ve always wanted to be more of a bookworm, but I’m such a visual learner that it’s hard for me to get into something I’m just reading about. On top of that, my attention span seems to have only gotten shorter, I’m running around the house most of the day chasing my toddler, and many other smaller reasons I could list that add up to “I don’t have time to read”.

Caleb made an excellent point to me about two and half weeks ago while I was busy baking one morning. He was out of the house and I was explaining to him what the sound was he heard on my end of the phone call. I told him I had Zeke watching a program on the TV so I could focus on the baking. That’s when he told me, “I feel like he’s been watching a lot of TV lately.”

I was SO frustrated and felt defensive in that moment. I was upset because of how busy the morning had been, feeling out of control of so much, and I just needed a break. Caleb and I later talked more about what he said and decided we needed a more concrete approach to limiting screen time and our reasons.

We’ve agreed since before we had kids that we didn’t want our future kids to become addicted to TV, we wanted so much to limit it and teach our kids to be creative and think of other ways to entertain themselves, also knowing that boredom can be a good thing. I also had to pause and realize what things our boy’s focus naturally gravitated towards and use that to our advantage more. Fortunately, he loves books and I don’t know where he got that!

Caleb and I’ve decided on a limit for now with screen time and while we know it’s likely to change over the next several years, but it’s been working well for our family over these last couple weeks. Since implementing our decided limits, both Zeke and I’ve been reading so much more. Our limits have been good for me too because it’s forced me to rewire my brain about what I choose for entertainment. I hadn’t truly realized the time I was wasting on social media before this and now it’s become clear just how much time I actually have in a day.

I thought I’d also share what’s helped me in addition to a family screen time limit to get my eyes away from the TV and into books more because I know I’m not the only one who’s struggled with wanting to read more, but can come up with a million excuses not to:

This is not an exhaustive list, but instead the main things that have helped me. I’ve also included some of the books I’m currently reading, recently finished, and one of my son’s favorite books (a side bonus to encouraging reading is simply how adorable it is to see a toddler come to you asking you to read the huge book in his hands!).

I’m so thankful now to Caleb for sharing the thought with me weeks ago, and also to my parents for seeing them reading as I was growing up and them having me and my sister do summer reading programs through the library every year. All these wonderful memories come flooding back as I’m flipping pages and picking out new books, or sitting with our son in my lap. Reading truly is a treasure-trove.