Ginny and I have been sharing books for a while now. We choose a book from our pile that I will read aloud when we both feel like it.

Since January, we've read a lovely book of poetry (which our friends Janice and John sent to us), "Island of the Blue Dolphins" (which I'd read to the kids when they were younger, but wanted to read again since it's basically about a young woman who survives despite endless challenges), and "The Twenty-One Balloons" (which I'm pretty sure that 4th grade teacher Kristi Titus --who had all 4 of my kids--read aloud to her classes every year. )

Now we are reading "Remarkably Bright Creatures" (forgive me, but I don't recall who sent this one to us). A nurse (at Children's National Hospital) noticed recently that we're reading this book, which involves an octopus as a central character. She told us that she read that in her book club. We had a fun conversation about it and how in her book club, they like to pair books and movies and then discuss both. Some of you may be thinking "Wow. This club has missed something crucial! The pairing is supposed to be a wine!" But, G &  I loved this idea. We watched the documentary "My Octopus Teacher" and read more of our book so we might be able to have the next conversation with nurse Ally.

Ally was not our nurse during our most recent visit to CNMC (Saturday night through this evening when we returned for Ginny's fever, pain, low hemoglobin & low platelets), but she stopped by the room to talk about "our book club" which was SUPER sweet!

I even started wondering the whereabouts of my copy of the other octopus book I read. It's a children's book that always made us laugh. Who out there is familiar with "Cowboy and Octopus" ? If I have time, I'll see if I still have it somewhere.