Looking for books for Ben

I'm on the look out for book series that inspire Ben to read. He's at a difficult stage, while he can read almost anything I put in front of him, but he doesn't enjoy much of it. I want him to be a passionate reader like I am, so I am looking for series that he won't want to put down.

So far the series that have done that for him are:

Enid Blyton's, The Magic Faraway Tree and The Wishing Chair.
J.C. Greenburg's, Andrew Lost series.
Ron Roy's A-Z Mysteries.

Now I am looking for more series for him. One of the librarian's recommended, The Animormophs. Since the series was unknown to me, I borrowed one from the library and read it. Decided that this is not a series that I am going to give my 7 year olds to read. Books that refer to a girl as a "skank" are not what I want Ben reading.

Currently I have the following books sitting in my pile to review for Ben. (Notice that I don't have a list for Shira? That's because she has a list of books on her to read list that I already know. She's finds far more to keep her enthralled than Ben does. Right now she's reading Lemony Snickett).

Kate McMullan's Dragon Slayers' Academy.
Enid Blyton's Adventure Series.
Louis Sachar's Wayside School series
Louis Slobodkin's Spaceship under the apple tree series.
Eleanor Cameron's Mushroom Planet series.
Ruthven Todd's Space Cat series.
Ellen Macgregor's Miss Pickerell books
The Danny Dunn series by Jay Williams and Raymond Abrashkin.

Ben appears to really enjoy Sci-fi, so that's why this list is heavily loaded with that genre. If you have any series that enthralled your children, please let me know.

Little House in the Big Woods

We're currently reading "Little House in the Big Woods" by Laura Ingalls Wilder as a family read aloud.

I have to chuckle, because I'll bet that in most families, the concept of a family read aloud is mom and/or dad doing the reading out loud. Not so in our family. Ben and Shira think it is most unfair if their parents get to do all the reading, so in our family we each take turns in reading two pages at a time. I'd prefer it if Marc and I did all the reading, but I can't complain as it's great to have the children willingly practice their out loud reading.

Mommy brag moment alert! The chicks actually read out loud rather well. It's a pleasure to listen to them reading as they read with fluency and lots of expression.

We had some funny moments while we were reading and I was reminded of Tina's post on her children knowing from whence their food comes . The book talks about how the Ingalls family prepared for winter and goes into a fair bit of detail about the butchering of a pig. You should have seen Shira's face when she discovered that bacon was pig meat. I have no idea what she thought bacon was as she has never eaten it but for some reason, the thought of it coming from a pig, horrified her.

Ben and Shira can be excused for not knowing anything about pig butchering though as they are thoroughly urban, kosher vegetarians. I'm thinking though, that even though we don't eat animal flesh, that perhaps we need to ask Tina if we can visit when they next butcher an animal. I think it will do the children a world of good to understand the process that gets the meat from animal to table.

Update: Even though the kids had been tucked into bed, we could hear noise from Ben's bedroom, so we knew he was building something. He's just come in to show us the smoke house he built, complete with pieces of meat hanging inside it. You've got to love Legos and Tinkertoys. (sorry, no pic, I was too lazy to get up and find my camera)>