Would you give your birthday presents up? Ryan Skarnulis did, and he is only 9 years old. Instead of the normal over-the-top birthday party, he wanted a charity party. He set out to collect 3,285 books to donate to Reach Out and Read. I know you are all wondering why 3,285 books. According to him, “When I turn 9, that’s how many days I have been living, so that’s what I wanted to do. One book per every day of my life”. Since he made this statement to a local paper here in Illinois, he has inspired the donation of over 6,000 books.
His birthday party yielded 1,200 books in 2 hours. Banks, churches, and schools held book drives and sent the books to Ryan. Strangers left books on his doorstep. People order books from online bookstores and sent them to their house.
To quote their site:
Reach Out and Read (ROR) is a national non-profit organization that promotes early literacy by giving new books to children and advice to parents about the importance of reading aloud in pediatric exam rooms across the nation.
This is a great cause, and I would love for this little boy to be able to collect even more books. You can donate either books or money to help. If you do donate to them, please let them know that Ryan Skarnulis and I sent you.
