Since childhood, I’ve been lost in a world of books. My first true memory of falling in love with a book was when my mom read aloud Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. With each voice she used, I fell deep into the world of imagination, and I’ve never seemed to come up for air.

My reading journey has ebbed and flowed as my life has gone through different seasons, but I’ve always seemed to carry a book with me wherever I went. When I entered motherhood and gave my whole life over to my kids, I needed something that was just for me, and again found myself turning to the pages in a book.

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Maybe that’s where you find yourself too. You’ve always got a book by your side or you’re waiting for a quiet moment to get lost in another world where no one needs you. Just for a minute, no one needs you, and the world is quiet.

Here’s the thing though, I’m a mom who reads, and I also get to raise little readers—and that might just be my favorite part. Bringing them into the library each week only to have my daughter run wild like she owns the place fills my heart with joy. Watching my son cling to a book and point to the pictures in excitement brings me back to my days when things were a little bit simpler.

We’ve read hundreds of books together, getting lost in tiny new worlds of monsters and unicorns and llamas and blue trucks. We’ve spent hours together feeling the pages of books that are bumpy and soft and squeaky. And the greatest moments have been spent pouring over the greatest (true) story of all.

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One day I’ll sit them down, and we’ll read stories about the magical castle that I’ve been lost in since 2001, and then their own reading journeys will begin apart from me. For now, I can teach them how to get lost in a story and how to dream big and be creative. That everyone has a story to tell if you just listen. I’m a mom who reads, and I’m raising the next generation of readers.