In Texas, it's an era of uncertainty: new TEKS, changes to STAAR, school finance. What's a teacher to do? How can teachers avoid reinventing the reading curriculum every time a change rolls around? Reflecting on the foundations of reading instruction--time, choice, relevance, talk, and rituals and routines--offers a way to answer these challenging questions. This article connects each of these touchstones to theory and research as well as discusses brief strategies that support each principle. The article also offers teacher commentary on each principle. Finally, the authors argue that the heart of reading instruction doesn't change: it is readers falling in love with books.