I have always been an avid reader, but as a mom, sometimes we forget to include self care time in our daily schedules. By the time I get my daughter to bed and do all the work I need to get done, I am ready to crash. This was leaving very little time for my nightly reading. I recently wrote about ways for moms to find some extra reading time in the day, and today I wanted to share one of my main secrets. Read on to find out how one free app tripled my list of books read for the month!

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Learning to Love E-books

In the beginning, my sister and I were against e-readers. It’s the end of books! We love our paperbacks! Too many screens! Now admittedly, I still love having a good paperback in my hands a lot of the time. And I encourage my daughter to do more reading off screens than on them. However, I have grown to love e-books in addition to my normal reading.

A few years ago, my parents bought me a Kindle for Christmas. I used a gift card to buy a few e-books, but I struggled to spend too much on them. I’m that person that still has CDs because I don’t trust all of my music being stored on the computer. I know it sounds crazy, but I like having the physical product in my hand! So I had a hard time spending the same amount of money on an e-book that I would spend on a hard copy.

Where I Find E-books

But then my sister introduced me to a wide open world of reading possibilities. If you didn’t already know, your library may offer e-books as part of your library membership! Since we live in New York State, we are also able to access the New York Public Library. In addition to all of these options, she also introduced me to BookBub, a site that shares daily e-book deals based on your preferences. All of these options lead me to have a library full of e-books just waiting for me to read them.

Add some of these books on happiness to your reading list!

The App That Changed My Reading

For the longest time, I was only reading my library of e-books on my Kindle. But then I found the Free Kindle Reading App. This app is available on iOS, Android, Mac and PC, allowing you to access your library of books and magazines wherever you go! Stuck waiting for a train? Sitting in the pick up lane at school waiting for your kids to get in the car? Open the book you were reading on your Kindle last night right on your phone. It will even find the page you left off! Were you a few pages short of finishing your book when your e-reader battery died? (This has happened to me on more than one occasion). Install the Kindle App on another device and finish that story!

Using the Kindle app on multiple devices has allowed me to fit more reading time into my day, without infringing on time with my daughter or other parts of my life. Instead, it allows me to fill the wasted moments with more enjoyable and useful means. In June, I finished 7 books. This past month, I have finished 21 books! That is 3 times the books!

Related Post: Find more ways to fit reading into your day!

The Kindle Reading App also has a bunch of awesome features. The Collections option allows you to sort your many e-books into different groups. I have mine sorted by fiction and nonfiction, as well as read and unread. The Newsstand section also keeps all of your magazine subscriptions updated when a new issue is released.

When you open a book, the app provides you with information about the book, the author, and any other books in the series, as well as the average reading time. As you read, the app will calculate your reading speed and update the estimated time remaining in the chapter or the book. These numbers are super helpful to me when I am up later than I should be, deciding whether or not I can read another chapter.

The app also allows you to change the font, spacing, and background color of the book to make it easier for you to read. You can easily highlight sections of the book, make notes for yourself, and even look up words in the dictionary or Wikipedia. All of these bonus features make it even easier to read in the app.

Have you used the Amazon Kindle App? Check it out here!

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