Book Sale

This morning Jocelyn and I took a field trip to a children's book sale. Its the first book sale that either one of us have ever been too, and boy am I glad we showed up early.

If asked earlier, I wouldn't have ever guessed there would have been so many people interested in getting books at a discount.

          I was shocked.
          In a good way.

The going price was 5 books for $1.
Sure the heck can't beat that!!

I didn't get to turn our book sale/field trip into exactly what I wanted since it was a bit chaotic and there were so many people there, but it was an outing and a different experience nevertheless.

My mission?

1. Find some new 'Jocelyn Appropriate' books (which includes simple pictures so she can see them. Dang CVI can make a lot of books appear 'too busy' and then she can't see them),
2. Engage in a different activity outside of the home and
3. HAVE FUN!

I found several books about dinosaurs. Jocie doesn't have ANY books about dinosaurs and these happen to fit perfectly into our preschool theme that's coming up in the next two weeks.

 

It doesn't look like it here, but I found a huge over-sized book about a little girl in a wheelchair that I thought might resonate with Jocelyn. If not now, maybe one day? The book talks about the things she can't do because she's in a wheelchair, what she excels at in her life in different ways, her feelings regarding everything and so on.

 

One of the coolest books I found was a hamburger shaped one. Its a 3-D pop-up book about nutrition and even has detachable pictures to go with it. The detachable pictures are a bit too small for Jocie to actually see {again, because of the dang CVI}, but I will totally scan them, make them bigger, laminate, add some velcro and play a matching game with them. Can you see the teacher inside of me emerging?? I do! :)

 

Look at this thing -- cool book right?

 

 

I also came across these books but decided "Toilet Training the Retarded" simply wasn't an area of interest.

 

I snapped a picture of these books because I was shocked, totally and utterly SHOCKED, that a book like that would be at a children's books sell. I have to admit, I was pretty appalled that books like this haven't been pulled and used as fire-starters. I'm not one for everyone being all politically correct all the time {seriously, all that 'correctness' can REALLY get on my nerves}, but once you have someone refer to your very own child as "retarded" ... you think twice when you see and hear that word. I'll never forget the first time a woman came up to me and said "What a beautiful daughter you have" only to then follow that with "I use to work with little retarded children like her."

 

          There simply are no words for that.

 

I realize that the word "retarded" was once acceptable. My friend reminded me today that terms are ever changing and so are their acceptance, but when that word is used now, its most certainly is used in the most derogatory of ways. I'm sure that those like the lady mentioned above, who have felt the need to inquire about my daughter, were simply looking at her in the wheelchair, her lack of visual contact, being nonverbal, the differences in her motor mannerisms; and then of course ASSUMED this about her.

 

It only takes hearing this word once for someone's whole opinion to change. I have people very close to me that continue to use the word "retarded" ... family members in fact ... and they don't use the word to necessarily describe someone, but they don't realize how them using it, makes you SEE that word in your head ... how it makes you FEEL.

Sometimes, it simply comes down to what a person has experienced, that shapes their perception on a subject matter.

 

And let me be clear, I don't care if someone is "retarded" or not, it doesn't defined their character, their heart, their soul ...

          ... What matters is that we ALL live up to our potential ... engage in our individual God-given talents/gifts as He's intended.
     I truly believe that!

 

But I digress. All this nonsense is a totally different subject matter.

 

~**~ Back to the good stuff ~**~

 

Can you believe all these books???!!! Books about counting, farm animals, colors, shapes ... you name it and we about got it! :)

 

All-in-all, we got 25 books for a whopping $5!!! Total steal!

It really was a good morning, got to see some familiar smiling faces and do something different.

 

Success! :)