What to Read??

I just purchased a bunch of books at Barnes and Noble. I got an African inspired coloring book, an Amharic phrasebook and the book "I'm Chocolate, Your Vanilla." Wow--I have lots of reading to do.

I really enjoy reading. I read for fun and every 6 weeks my group of friends/neighbors gets together for book club. Admittedly, I don't always read the book for book club. I usually try but if I can't get in to it I move on to something more enjoyable. Other times I am to busy with other stuff to sit and read.

So at this moment I am reading our next book club book, "Nineteen Minutes" by Jodi Piccoult. So far it is really good and I think I will enjoy it. I have until June so hopefully I can finish it.

I also started to read the first few pages of "I'm Chocolate, Your Vanilla". I have heard and read many wonderful things about this book. It is a book for parents and educators of biracial and black children. It is written by a black women psychologist and deals with how as parents we can develop a strong, independent and proud child regardless of the color of their skin. It is a parent's guide to how to reduce the impact of racism on our child's development. Do I want to believe that our child won't face racism? Sure I do but the reality is at some point while growing up they will encounter someone with an ignorant question. It may be an innocent kindergartner who doesn't think I am my child's mom since we don't look a like or it may be a not so innocent adult with questions about why we chose Ethiopia instead of Eastern Europe or China.

We want our children to be proud of their African heritage and will encourage continuous learning about African culture and more specifically Ethiopia. We know that it is our responsibility to make sure we raise our children to be well educated, independent and secure. We know we may get strange looks or random questions but we feel that by reading this book and being aware ahead of time we can appropriately answer questions and teach our child how to as well. I digress...

Anyway, I also started looking at the phrasebook. Wow--I have never been that great at languages. I can read basic french and understand the same basic french that I can read but now I am looking at a language that uses a whole different alphabet. It will be challenging but I want to learn some basic phrases for when we travel and we want to share the language with our child as well. It will be difficult to say the least but it helps pass the time during the months of waiting.

So my brain is full of info right now but they say knowledge is power right? I don't know if I like power but knowledge is always useful. I will let you all know what I learn and maybe share some Amharic words and phrases.