Me, My Son, and Charlotte's Web

A and I just finished reading Charlotte's Web a few minutes ago. We've been reading it for about 10 days, cover to cover, fitting in a few chapters each time we could steal a few minutes alone together. We snuggled up in the chair or my bed and entered the amazing world of Zuckerman's barn cellar.

For A, this was his first chapter book. For me, it was the fulfillment of my lifelong dream of reading classic literature to my children. My favorite childhood memories, without doubt, are of reading books like these with my own mother while my baby brother napped. We even read from the same worn copy I had as a little girl, saved all these years with this very day in mind.

I teared up a few times, and though I edited out words like "murder" and phrases like "he's going to kill you with his ax" I could tell the story got him thinking at times. When Charlotte stayed behind at the fairgrounds, having just created her egg sac and knowing it was time to die, A did not like to see Wilbur and Templeton going off without her. "She'll be all alone" he protested. "She might be lost."

When we read the last words together, A looked at me with a huge satisfied grin and gave me a little snuggle. It was naptime, and we laid next to eat other until he fell asleep, something I haven't taken the time to do in a very long while. He wiggled his nose against my nose, brushed his hand against my cheek, and stared into my eyes until his closed and he slept. He is three years and three months and sixteen days old.

Towards the end of the book Charlotte places five hundred and fourteen eggs into her egg sac. When Wilbur asks what it is, she says of her children, "This is my magnum opus, my great work, the finest thing I have ever made."

Looking at my Growing Up A and Little B, I know exactly how she felt.