Yippee! Today is Family Literacy Day. What does that mean? Simply, it is a day to celebrate reading together. Today families are encouraged to read together, play together, and plan to continue to learn as a family all year long. (Although I think it should be every day.)

I spend my life telling anyone who will listen that families need to have more fun together. One of my family’s favorite activities for spending QUALITY time together is reading with the kids before bed. It’s my favorite time of the day – snuggling with the kids on the bed and reading a story that makes us smile or giggle. It’s a great way to unwind and put a positive end on a stressful or bad day. We all go to bed calm and happy. Even though my kids are 11 and 8 now, surely old enough to read themselves, we still read chapter books together every night before bedtime.

You can read about all of the wonderful benefits of reading to your kids to make them smarter in this great post by Heather Feldstein, a fellow blogaholic, but I say read with your kids because it’s FUN.

I love what Heather wrote in her PTPA blog post today:

Our job is to enhance our children’s reading readiness and eventually their reading skills, by providing them with a “literacy-rich environment” and by making reading a nurturing and positive experience.

My husband and I both love to read and we’re thrilled that we have created that same passion in our kids. (My son read the last Diary of a Wimpy Kid in 2 hours!)

It’s never too early to start reading with your kids so to get started tonight, here is my family’s Top 10 Toddler Bedtime Stories. There are so many great toddler books out there but these were the books we read so many times, we had them memorized.

1. Pajama Time -Sandra Boynton
2. Sometimes I Like to Curl Up in a Ball - Vicki Churchill, Charles Fuge
3. When Mama Comes Home Tonight - Eileen Spinelli
4. Bear on a Bike – Stella Blackstone
5. Mama, Do You Love Me? – Barbara Joosse
6. Fox in Socks - Dr. Seuss
7. Kiss Goodnight, Sam – Amy Hest and Anita Jeram
8. Goodnight Moon - Margaret Wise Brown
9. Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See? – Eric Carle
10. I Know a Rhino - Charles Fuge

What are your favorite toddler books?