BookwormBabies

ByKanikaG

Copyright2014byKanikaG

Website:

www.kanikag.com

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Bookworm Babies

Over the last year Tania had grown very fond ofreading. Knowing her fondness for animals Mamagot her a hardbound copy of the Aesop's fableswith fantastic illustrations. This book reallycaptured Tania's imagination.

Initially Mama would read it to her. Tania lovedthe stories since they usually featured variousanimal characters. Her favourite story was the"Thirsty Crow", also known as "The Crow and thePitcher". The crow in this story was so smartand resourceful. Tania really admired it. Intime she learnt to read by herself.

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Tania was also very fond of Noddy books and thebedtime stories by Enid Blyton.

One Sunday morning Mama took Tania to achildren's library. It had 2 large rooms, onefor little children and the other for youngadults. Mama took Tania to the room with booksfor little children. The walls were lined withshelves filled with colourful children's books.

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There were some comfortable little stools andmats to sit on. Tania loved the place as soon asshe saw it. She browsed the shelves, selected 3or 4 books and made herself comfortable on amat. Soon she was engrossed in reading. Mamarealised Tania was not going to need her, so shewent to the next room and picked out a book toread.

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When Mama came back a couple of hours laterTania had her nose buried in a short story book.She was surrounded by 6 more books, 3 of whichshe had already finished. One was a book ofrhymes, another was a short book about animalsand the third was a short story from the Noddyseries. Mama waited till Tania finished thestory that she was reading and then told herthey had to go home, since it was almost lunchtime.

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Tania was very reluctant to leave the library.On the way home she asked "Mama can we come backto the library tomorrow?"

Mama said "Baby you have school tomorrowmorning."

"Okay, then in the afternoon after school?"

Mama said, "Tania, this library is quite faraway from home and because of traffic it takes along time to get here. I am glad you had such agood time and I can bring you here once a monthbut not more often than that. Unfortunately,there is no children's library near where welive ."

Tania looked disappointed. Mama said "Tania I

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always buy you the books you want. Why are youso sad?"

Tania replied "This place is so lovely. As soonas I entered I felt like reading and reading andnever leaving. There are so many books to choosefrom. It is nice to just browse the books andthen decide which to read, and it is so cosy."

That evening during dinner Tania said "Mama, Ihave an idea. What do you think about mestarting a reading club?"

"A reading club? Where would you do that? Howwould it work?"

"Here in the society club house. I'll make aflyer and post it on the notice board to spreadthe word. Every one will have to bring somebooks. That way each of us will get to choose

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from a large collection of books. We can do thisevery Saturday and Sunday afternoon for a coupleof hours."

"That sounds like a great idea Tania. Why don'tyou talk to Tanisha and see if you can get it towork."

The next day Tania discussed the idea withTanisha. Tanisha loved reading, so she thoughtit was an awesome idea. They were trying tothink of a catchy name for the club when Taniaremembered the bookworm costume Tanisha wore toKarishma's costume party. They played aroundwith the idea and came up with the name"Bookworm Babies". Tania got her art suppliesout and they made the flyer together.

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Mama talked to the society chairman and gotpermission to post the flyers on thenoticeboards. Throughout the week Tania gotcalls from mothers and kids living in thesociety.

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Mama found an old book case that Tania coulduse. She also gave her a rug and a stool.Tanisha's mother also contributed a bookcase.There was a storage closet in the clubhousewhere they stored the book cases, stools, chairsand rugs, so they could easily take them outwhen the reading club was in session.

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Saturday finally arrived. Tania was excited. Shehelped Mama make cookies for the inauguralmeeting of the Bookworm Babies. Mama packed somelemonade with the cookies. Mama knew readingwould be even more fun if there was something tomunch and sip.

At about half past one Tania skipped off to theclubhouse with a back pack full of books. Mamahad already dropped of the lemonade and cookies.Tanisha arrived soon carrying books and a stackof plastic cups for the lemonade.

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The watchman helped them get the bookcases outof storage and they arranged the 25 odd booksthey had between them on the shelves.

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Soon Karishma, Sonali, Nikhil and Rajiv arrived.They now had about 70 odd books. It was a goodthing there was a second book case. Nikhil'smother had sent a rug with him and Rajiv'smother had sent a chair. Karishma and Sonali hadhelped the boys bring them in. The clubhousealso had a few plastic chairs.

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The kids all picked out some books and madethemselves comfortable on one or the other ofthe available seats. There was still room toseat a couple more people. They also helpedthemselves to some lemonade and cookies. Theyreally enjoyed themselves reading, munching andsipping.

Nikhil was reading a book that Tania brought inand they stopped for a while to talk about howfunny something in the Noddy story was.

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Vivek joined them at 3:00. He was on his wayback from piano classes. He had brought someAsterix comics with him. Tanisha pounced onthem. She loved reading those and he had somethat she had not read before.

The 7 of them had a delightful afternoon with somany books to choose from. They were lookingforward to the next session.

Tania got back home and told Mama all about thewonderful time she had. She said, "Mama, it wasjust like the Secret Seven in the Enid Blytonstories, except that we read about mysteriesinstead of solving them." Mama smiled. She feltproud that Tania was reading enough to makereferences to fictional characters inconversation.

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The square rug image was posted by Olga Kuba at:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/olgakuba/12176578005/

The round rug image was posted by Mr Thinktank at:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/tahini/4048051299/

The cookies with sprinkles image was posted by Pink SherbetPhotography at

https://www.flickr.com/photos/pinksherbet/4824572819/

The lemonade image was posted by Shardayyy at

https://www.flickr.com/photos/shardayyy/5429999286/

The plastic cups image was posted by Daniel Oines at

https://www.flickr.com/photos/dno1967b/6880994686/

All the above images are under the following license:https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

The pictures of the library are of Mcubed library and obtainedfrom

http://mcubedlibrary.com/workshopgallery.php

with their permission. Thankyou Mcubed.

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