Our love of audiobooks and a new partnership with Audible

We’ve always loved audiobooks. Even before embarking on this adventure we were regular listeners. And not just on road trips. Whether shuttling kids to school, running errands or making a day trip to the beach, there was always a book on in our car. In fact, the second the kids stepped into the van they would ask to put it on, even when the journey was far too short to warrant it.

When we visited the Roald Dahl museum in Great Missenden last year, we left the gift shop with an armful of books and about six CDs. The CDs ran on a loop for about a year, with a couple of other titles occasionally allowed into the mix. We knew we’d have to bring these books along on our travels and would, though we all LOVE Roald Dahl, want to find other titles to explore too. Of course traveling with lots of CDs isn’t so practical so Michael started looking for digital solutions last summer. He discovered Audible, put the app on his phone and downloaded a few books. He connected his phone to our car stereo and we’ve not stopped listening since.

Alongside traditional reading, Audible has been a big part of our year. We have been entertained by audiobooks as we traversed the coasts and deserts of California, explored the pampas of Uruguay and circumnavigated the rainy, forests of the South Island of New Zealand. Really, if we stepped foot in a vehicle this year without a book at the ready, there was much discontent. We have also used audiobooks to augment our homeschooling—listening to the Adventures of Captain Cook, for example, while visiting some of the places the famed English explorer visited.

A couple of months ago Michael joked that we were becoming the ‘poster’ family for audiobooks. I had mentioned our fondness for them in blog posts, on Instagram and in interviews. We enjoyed them nearly every day and couldn’t imagine this year without them. “We should really be working with Audible,” Michael said. So he reached out, hoping we might get a few free credits in exchange for reviewing children’s titles we loved. The folks at Audible liked the idea too so we’ve teamed up.

Over the next couple months we’re going to be sharing our favourite audiobook titles here and on Audible‘s website. We’ll talk about how we use audiobooks to augment our homeschooling and we’ll share art projects the kids have done related to their listens. Our goal is to get other families listening. In a world with probably too much visual entertainment on offer, we think the aural entertainment of audiobooks offers a more peaceful and imaginative alternative. It also gets kids excited about literature, which has turned our kids into more eager readers.

We’ll be donating $1,000 from this partnership to the Rainbow Centre, Sri Lanka and Audible has generously agreed to match our donation. Together we hope to help the Rainbow Centre continue their amazing work providing education and welfare to some of Sri Lanka’s poorest kids.

We’re really pleased to be working with a brand that offers a product that is entertaining, educational and encourages kids to enjoy and explore literature. Audible is offering readers of this blog a free trial. You can find it here. We hope you like it as much as we do.

The images above were taken by our friend Amelia Fullarton when we were in Byron Bay in April. 

This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of Audible. The opinions and text are entirely my own.