Weekly Wrap-up 14

books books and more books

While 2025 has not been my favorite year ever, the one thing I have really gotten right this year was the sheer amount of reading aloud we’ve done as a family. We have read SO MANY BOOKS. All together. Multiple times a day. Against all odds (toddlers). And that is what I want to write to you today about - our favorite read alouds of 2025.

To start off, I would definitely say we are more of a bookish type of family. I have organized our homeschool to really revolve around literature. We visit our public library twice a week on average and we always have holds going off to be picked up. Our kids don’t have iPads or phones, but they do have Yotos and access to my Audible account. I make reading out loud every day a real priority, even though it’s really hard with a toddler. Our day flow usually goes something like individual math - morning time (read aloud, poetry, world news, geography, history, memory work, picture books) - individual language arts time (phonics, math, dictation). Then, we usually follow that up with “morning time part 2” when the toddler takes a nap. At that time, we gather as quickly as we can to the couch (usually with tea and snacks) and that’s when I get some real reading out loud done.

I asked my kids last week what their top read alouds from this past year have been and here’s what they said -

Number 1: A Place to Hang the Moon

We JUST finished this last week and it was really such a favorite. It’s a middle grade novel about the WW2 blitz and the children evacuating from London to the country side. We all just loved it!

Number 2: The Vanderbeekers (any and all of them!)

We started off last December reading the first one and we are about to start book six soon. My kids absolutely love reading about all of the adventures the Vanderbeeker children have in New York City. They beg me to get the next one as soon as we have finished the current. They are all SO good. Let me tell you though, I tried to read the first book out loud to them about four years ago and no one was into it. It was just too over their heads at the time. I put the book away and brought it out last winter - this time everyone adored it! Just goes to show that if a book doesn’t really work right now for your kids that doesn’t mean it won’t ever work. Sometimes you need to put something away and bring it back out during a different season.

Number 3: The Bark of the Bog Owl

Wow, my adventure loving boys really loved this series! We read the first two books in the series last year and they were big hits. Outside of our normal genre (historical fiction) but all my kids were really into these. My oldest son is very “into” survivalist stuff right now and this fit the bill for him. Highly recommend for the 7-12 boy crowd

Number 4: A Tree for Peter

If you’ve never read this short Christmas novel out loud, please go get it right now for next month. It is really, really good. It’s a bit of an older book but still very appealing. I can’t make it all the way to the end without crying myself. Also, it is short and you can probably read it out loud in a week or two.

Now, some audiobooks that were much loved last year! ALL of the Harry Potter books on audio were definitely the most listened to and loved by all my kids. They are definitely in their Harry era and loving it. So am I! I read the first two books over the summer and fell in love with the sweetness of them. At their core, they are deeply Christian novels about the battle of good and evil. After I read them, I followed them up by taking an online class on them from The Literary Life. I learned soooooooo much and took tons of notes. I figured if my kids were going to love these books, I better get schooled on them myself. Highly recommend. Other audiobooks that were particularly beloved were the Mouse and the Motorcycle series, Adventures with Waffles and Little House on the Prairie (Farmer Boy esp!).

My history loving eleven year old would tell you his *favorite* books are the Nathan Hale graphic novels. He has asked for a boxed set for Christmas because he has only checked them out from the library over and over and over again. These are great for the 10 and up crowd.

I think that about wraps up. Really, reading out loud has saved our homeschool (and life!) ten times over. There’s been seasons when I haven’t been able to do it as much for one reason or another, but then when I am able to again it’s like we are all humming comfortably. Right now, we are reading Snow Treasure (still on our WW2 kick!) and also Lost on a Mountain in Maine. If there’s one thing I want my kids to remember about their childhood and their homeschool, it’s that their mom read out loud to them all the time. It really is the most important thing to me. When we start our days slow together on the couch with a book, it just goes so much smoother.