Children, Librarianship, Library events

Happy Cookies

Two days ago we got invited to a party with the Stanley Cup at the Garden (the photo of Jim and me with the Cup is here), which was very, very cool.  While we were sitting at a table at the party, I noticed that the kids in attendance were totally jazzed about the special Bruins cookies that party guests could pick up after getting their photo taken.  “Hmmmm,” I thought to myself, “I know Jim and Bill and Judy and I aren’t going to eat our Bruins cookies…what if I brought them to the library and raffled them off to the library kids who come every day after school?  Hmmmmm…”  Especially perfect for a library, since the Bruins were the official sponsors of the Massachusetts summer reading program for the last three summers.

So I carefully carried home three of the cookies, making sure not to crack them or melt the frosting, and first thing yesterday morning I put them on display at the children’s desk with raffle tickets and a bucket (and the photo of me and Jim with the Cup), asking that only kids enter and that each kid only enter once.

And, boy, was that raffle a hit.  I had planned to draw the three winning names at 4:00 this afternoon, but one of my favorite fifth graders came up to me at 3:30 and said, “Abby.  When are you drawing the names for the cookies.”  Not a question, mind you, but a statement.  I told  her I was planning on 4:00, and she looked me in the eye and didn’t say anything.  “Are you leaving before 4?” I asked.  Yes was the answer, so I told her that I would just ask the other kids in the room if they had entered the raffle – to give everyone a fair shot – and that I would then draw the names.

A few minutes of happy chaos ensued, as the dozen or so afterschool kids swarmed the desk so that they could each fill out a raffle ticket.  I had thought that maybe I would duck into my office to quietly pull the winning names, but as I looked around it was obvious that was NOT an option: the crowd wanted to witness the drawing to be sure it was fair.  So I took a deep breath and pulled the name…of a child who wasn’t in attendance.  Time to move fast – the crowd looked ready to turn on me.  I drew the second name – of a fifth grade boy who clearly is a huge Bruins fan.  He chose his cookie (the Stanley Cup cookie) with triumph, and I drew the last name.  This time a sweet third grader won, and grinned from ear to ear as he chose his cookie (the Bruins banner).

Luckily, the non-winners were mostly older kids and all excellent sports, bearing their cookie loss with aplomb.  And joy, too, because it was such a fun spontaneous moment that none of us had expected on a rainy afternoon.  The fifth grade winner let his friends look at his cookie before leaving happily, and the third grader spent a good half hour looking at books on the shelves while holding tightly on to his cookie.

And then an hour or so later, the little girl whose name I drew first came in, and I asked her if she had gotten my phone message.  No, she said, looking puzzled, so I held up her cookie and told her that she had won.  She was so happy that she couldn’t speak – she went over to her mom with the cookie, all smiles and shining eyes.  The family stayed looking at books for a while, and the little girl held her cookie the whole time, cracking it a bit in the plastic bag while she thought out loud about how she would eat it: a little bit each night, with some ice cream.  Kind of reminded me of Frances holding the Chompo bar on her way home from the store…

All in all, it was much, much more fun than if we grownups had eaten the cookies Tuesday night! 

Children's literature, Librarianship, Young adult literature

E-book webinar

Today several of us on the library staff were able to attend parts of the Library Journal/School Library Journal webinar on e-books and libraries.  There were a lot of good statistics about current e-book usage in libraries, and lots of good ideas and lots of questions.  But not many answers.

Many of the questions were questions that I’ve been thinking of myself:  with the rise of e-books, what happens to people who can’t afford e-readers?  What about the different formats of e-readers that don’t talk to each other?  How can libraries incorporate e-books into their budgets and their collections?  How is the advent of e-books going to affect the structure and existence of libraries?  What about the long waiting lists for popular e-books at libraries, when the e-book medium is perceived by the public as being an instant one – instant gratification?  How can libraries explain the need to wait on a list for a certain e-book title, even though that is the way it works for a popular, recently published print version of a book?  And, more specifically for library staff, how to decide which titles to spend limited available funds on?  And which e-book formats are worth investing in?

I had two favorite parts of this e-book summit: several speakers mentioned that libraries will need to change their focus from being solely book-based, and these speakers mentioned that libraries can pump up their programming (storytimes, book groups, etc.) in order to retain a wholly relevant place in the community.  As a programming-ambitious children’s librarian, that’s a lot of what I do.

And the other favorite part for me of the webinar was M.T. Anderson’s closing address.  It was very similar to the closing address that I heard him present at the children’s literature summer institute at Simmons this summer, but I was glad to hear it again.  Anderson is an intelligent, wise speaker, and his talk on e-books is dense and packed with information and meaty thoughts to digest; a second hearing only helped my understanding.  I won’t attempt to summarize his nearly one hour talk in a few sentences here, but I will say that I left both hearings of Anderson’s address feeling hopeful about the future for books and libraries and authors and literature.  Change is nothing new, and change could bring great things to our culture.  It could also bring unpleasantness, but despite Anderson’s balanced presentation (both hopeful and pessimistic), I came away feeling good about my career and my passion for books.  A good way to end an enlightening day.

Jewelry Making

What to do about Etsy…

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As of October 5th, I only have five remaining items listed in my jewelry store on Etsy.  I still have a sizable stock of bracelets to sell, tucked away in a ziploc bag in a drawer, but I’m not thrilled by the results I’ve had selling via Etsy and thus not sure I want to bother re-listing my inventory.  Twenty cents to list each item, with each listing lasting for four months before expiring, then a cut of each sale to Etsy, another cut of each sale to Paypal, and the impossible game of trying to charge an accurate amount for shipping costs – I’ve lost more money than I’ve made through my few Etsy sales.  Not to mention that my meager jewelry offerings are lost in the whirl of goods that are listed each day on Etsy.

Though I had dreams of making my fortune through my Etsy store, my realistic goal was to sell enough jewelry to support my expensive new hobby.  I’d still like to achieve that, since jewelry making is a blast and an excellent, creative change of pace for me from my job and our home improvement projects, but I don’t think it’s really going to happen.  Silver, my favorite medium, gets pricier every day, and copper wire just doesn’t cut it…blech.  So I’m trying hard to think of a way to sell enough jewelry to support my habit, especially since the more jewelry I make, the better I’ll get at making it.  Perhaps I’ll establish my own website, which seems like an enormous amount of work, or perhaps I’ll highlight new jewelry pieces here on this blog, or perhaps I’ll work at creating enough stock to rent a booth next year at the farmer’s market down the street from our house.  Meanwhile, though, I think I need to investigate whether I can take a business loss on my taxes for this year…ah, the price of creativity and a broad, interesting inner life.

Cats Dogs Plants Animals

Cats

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There’s no better feeling than to shuffle out of bed in the morning into the kitchen, only to be greeted by feline adoration.  Ophy looks anxiously through the French door, pawing impatiently at the door as I walk towards and through it, then wraps herself around my ankles while purring like crazy.  Pippa stands on top of the cat perch, chirping her morning greeting to me while leaning out as far as she can, bobbing up and down to get a head rub.  Then a big >thunk< as Pippa hits the floor and runs towards me so that I can give equal attention to both madly purring cats.

Like I said, a pretty great way to start each day.

Children's literature, Spare time - Culture, Young adult literature

T.A. Barron

Just got home from a lovely author visit at Willow Books in Acton – we went to see T.A. Barron, who just happens to have lived for the first ten years of his life in the town in which I work.  A year and a half ago he graciously came to our library for an evening event, and it was such a fabulous evening, with many people coming to hear him speak who had grown up with him or known his parents.  Truly the most unique and special event we’ve had at the library, in my opinion.  And it was so nice to see him this evening: he’s an incredibly intelligent, well-spoken, kind, and gracious man, and it’s so neat to watch him interact with his younger fans.  He remembers their names, he references letters that they have written to him, and he encourages them in their love of reading and their dreams of becoming writers.  In this age of technology it’s heartening to witness old-fashioned human connection, especially with books, real books, as the backdrop.

Children, Storytime, Teaching

Wednesday was another day

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So Monday’s storytime was a bit rough…but then I did the exact same storytime lesson plan on Wednesday, with a group of similar composition (i.e., ages and number of children), and it went very well.  Though the two stories I read were long, this group was able to stay attentive; though there are a fair number of newbies in the group, the group dynamic was focused for most of the twenty minutes.  This was good, since it reassured me that I’m not crazy and this lesson plan on hats can be used successfully with this group, but it also made me think that I should have changed tactics a bit more midway through the Monday storytime.  If I had stopped and deliberately encouraged everyone to stick it out, rather than keep rolling as if there weren’t a problem, if I had addressed the unraveling of the group directly, then perhaps the entire storytime could have been resurrected.  I did think about doing this, but I didn’t want any one parent to feel self-conscious or singled out, so I decided to just keep on going.

What is the best solution?  Stop and talk about the meltdown when it’s happening, or keep going and give the parents and caregivers time and freedom to address inattention without feeling singled out?  The “keep going” option has always, always worked for me before…but perhaps there are just times when it’s not the way to go.

Children's literature, Young adult literature

It must be fall

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I’ve been reading lots of book reviews the last two weeks – trying to catch up on my book ordering after a busy summer – and from those reviews it’s clear that it’s the fall season, and a good fall season at that.  I have found dozens of books that sound absolutely terrific, and I’m more excited about this order than I have been about an order in a very long time.  There are many additions to popular series (even a new adjunct entry to my favorite series, Ranger’s Apprentice), as well as new books by masters like Jerry Pinkney, and also books by some new authors that sound fabulous.  Some authors, like Gabrielle Zevin, are branching out into new genres (I just brought home her book All These Things I’ve Done – can’t wait to read it) and other authors and illustrators, like Maurice Sendak, sound like they’ve produced their best work in years.

Keep your eyes out for this batch of books to be on the library’s shelves in a couple of weeks – allowing time for me to finish my order, the books to be shipped, and the books to be processed.  And then it will be happy reading to all, and to all a good read.  (Or something like that…)

Storytime

A bad day for storytime

We had a less than stellar storytime today.  The two’s and three’s were not in synch with each other or their parents or me this morning, and my well-planned and usually popular storytime on Hats went over like a sinking lead balloon, going down, down, down.  By the halfway point of the storytime, half of the kids and their caretakers had left the room, leaving the other half rather confused and distracted and definitely not attentive.  I soldiered on, determined to finish the storytime – which I did – even if it wasn’t going to be my best ever.  It’s a challenge to work with this age group, since they can be very attentive and devoted, but they are also so easily distracted and taken off course.  One too many distractions, and it’s all over, storytime lady!  But it’s still my very favorite age group, and even in the midst of chaos on days like today, it’s a lot of fun.  And by next Monday I’ll have come up with a succinct peptalk for the adults in the room to encourage them to try to stick it out for the whole twenty minutes of storytime; perhaps if we can all make it through one entire storytime together, we’ll be able to grow as a group and have an easier time the week after that.  At least, that’s the plan…

Reflections on children, literature, libraries, and life…and cats.