<img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-3410" style="margin: 8px;" title="Love You Forever book" src="http://writingtosanity.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/200px-LoveYouForever.png" alt="Love You Forever book" width="200" height="200" />

My parents loved to read books to me and my siblings while we were growing up.  Some of my favorites were (pretty much every single book from) the Dr. Seuss book list and part of the Golden Books classics -- <strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;">The Pokey Little Puppy</span></strong>, <strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;">Scuffy The Tugboat</span></strong>, <strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;">The Little Red Caboose</span></strong>, <strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;">Tootle</span></strong> --  now my children and others in their generation have been introduced to these books, thanks to parents who want their kids to experience the same delight they felt as a child.
<blockquote><em>As the story begins, a son has just been born. The story then continues through the life of the boy until he is a grown man. The mother continues to rock her son to sleep singing "I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always, as long as I'm living my baby you'll be." Later, the role is reversed and he holds his elderly mother and says "I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always, as long as I'm living my Mommy you'll be." At the end of the story, the mother passes away and her son is the father of a little girl, rocking her to sleep; singing the same song that his mother used to sing to him.</em> --<a title="Love You Forever book" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_You_Forever" target="_blank">Wikipedia</a></blockquote>
Sweet, don't you think?  A family friend gave me <strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0920668372/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=writingtosanity-20&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;camp=217145&amp;creative=399369&amp;creativeASIN=0920668372" target="_blank">Love You Forever</a></span></strong> after my first child, Ethan, was born in 2001.  Besides our beloved Dr. Seuss and Golden Books collections, this was a book we read over and over; it took up permanent residence in the diaper bag until my second child, Mary, was out of diapers and has since been the first book I bought for friends that had newborn boys.  Our copy of <strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;">Love You Forever</span></strong> now waits patiently for my children's children.

<a title="Audio file of Love You Forever" href="http://c1550162.cdn.cloudfiles.rackspacecloud.com/126460538117na_love.mp3" target="_blank">Listen to an audio clip of Love You Forever by Robert Munsch</a> so that you might understand why it's so special to me and my children.
<h2 style="text-align: center;">What was your favorite book as a child?  What is your child's favorite book?</h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">[box type="note" style="rounded" icon="none"]I am participating in the August 2011 <a title="NaBloPoMo challenge" href="http://nablopomo.blogher.com/" target="_blank">NaBloPoMo</a> challenge.  Books included in this post can be purchased from any major bookseller.  <em>This post has affiliate links.</em>[/box] <em></em></p>