If You Can Read This, Thank a Teacher

Betty of Reflections With Coffee is hosting a mini-challenge as part of Cindy's (of Princess Bookie) Contest Craze. (Check them both out!)

Here's the challenge:

Do you remember who gave you your love of reading?  Your mini-challenge is to scribble a quick thank you note to that person. 

Maybe it is a parent who read to you at bedtime, or an elementary school teacher or even a college lit professor.  If the person is no longer here on earth or you don't have the address, scribble anyway.   Then post it on your blog (and leave the link here)  or  tell us in the comments a bit about the person, and how he/she influenced you. 

I tried writing a comment but because I have so many people, I couldn't manage to make a short one. So I decided to post instead.

Betty's card

Here's who have I have to thank for my love of reading:

My Parents - Before I could read, my parents would read to me (like most parents do). And then, once I could read, they would read to me if I wanted them to, or they would help me read to them. For most of my young life, if there was reading going on, it was generally them reading to me or me reading to them. So they introduced me to the wonderful world of reading. (Surprising, isn't it?...)

My Sister - My sister is only three years older than me, but she was a pretty big influence on me (still is). One thing she loved to do was read, so, because I wanted to be just like her, I started reading a lot too. She read to me sometimes, and at other times, she would help me read. Honestly? She was probably the biggest influence who wasn't one of the main ones teaching me to read. (She did help teach me though.)

My Teachers - Mrs. B* was my kindergarten teacher. I could read before kindergarten, but she helped me read more and gave me different books to read to help me, so she was a big boost to my love of reading.
I had Mrs. H* for first grade, and she was constantly giving me and two other kids books (like Henry and Mudge and Mr. Putter and Tabby and Amelia Bedelia), and she (as most first grade teachers do) encouraged me to read as much as I possibly could. She was such a huge influence on my life in a lot more than just loving and learning to read, but she passed away three years ago.
Mrs. F* was my second grade teacher (who actually still teaches the exact same class in the exact same classroom as she did when I was in second grade). She helped in lot of ways similar to Mrs. H, but it was at a higher reading level. She was/is an even bigger influence on my life, and she was a fantastic teacher. (I'm sure she still is.) I could go on and on about how much I love Mrs. F, but I won't take up more space about her. I think we all have a teacher like that.
I obviously have many more teachers who influenced my reading life, but those are the ones who shaped my love for reading the most.

My Librarians - I live in a small town with a very small library, but I was constantly going with my mom to the library. I couldn't tell you for sure (I don't totally remember), but I think that how sweet the librarians were** also helped me love reading. Not as much as everyone above did, but they are worth mentioning and worth thanking.

And there you have them. The people who helped me love to read. All of them are wonderful, and I have all of them to thank.

Now that I've shared mine, I want to see yours. Make your own post (whether you enter the challenge or not) and link me to it or just leave me a comment. Wherever it is, whoever it is, I want to read about why you love to read.







*I'm not putting their full names, just in case. 
**and still are - There were two of them at the time, and yes, one of them still works at my library. The other now works at the county level, so I still see her sometimes.