Misadventures of the Monster Librarian

Today marks my 10 month anniversary of when I started here at Sticks Library! I can't believe how fast the time has flown by and how much fun I've had since I started, and so many fun things ahead of us!  Thought I would share some more Summer Reading fun (since I was so remiss about doing it during SR!) A big push in libraries and schools in the past couple of years has been projects which fall under the category of S.T.E.M. (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math)--as we all know the U.S. is so painfully behind the rest of the 1st world in these subjects--so Prairie Dawn and I scheduled S.T.E.M. projects for K-12th graders one day every week during our 6 weeks of summer reading. I say we, but all I did was put it on the calendar and Prairie Dawn did an awesome job of finding interesting projects for the both groups, which we split up into K-6th, and 7th-12th grades. Simple fun on our Make & Take Monday: water bottle bubble makers Not a S.T.E.M. project, ...

I recently lead a Kids Cooking program for 24 Kindergarten-2nd graders. I say 24 kids, but what wound up happening was a lot of the grown-ups stayed too so we had 37 people at my program--which was great...but chaotic! It was a little stressful, but a lot of fun. I had a couple parents tell me they had as much fun as their kids. I got many thank yous at the end, and even one hug. All in all, it was a success. The kids made bugs out of healthy snacks, borrowing and slightly modifying ideas from Disney's Family Fun website . (I put my slightly modified recipes below!) After we were all finished making our bug snacks I read two stories: The Wolf's Chicken Stew , Keiko Kasza and Whopper Cake , Karma Wilson--the kids LOVED the stories (and made me laugh when some of them thought Whopper Cake was about a cake made out of Burger King Whoppers. :) PEANUT BUTTER FLY: Ingredients: Peanut butter Apple Carrot Instructions: Simply make a nut-butter sandwich using apple sl...

It is hard to think of what I want to say after posting nothing of my own substance as of late. With the holidays over and programs at the Library back in full swing, I feel like my week spent out East in Massachusetts--at the Farm I used to work out--was eons ago. Best friend K and I were set to leave for our roadtrip the Sunday after Christmas...which we did. However, we decided to leave at 1:30 a.m. instead of 5am, to be adventurers, in "true roadtrip fashion," and really because we had gone out with our friends that night and neither one of us were the least bit tired...So it began. A journey. A roadtrip. A homecoming (for me). When my Dad died just over a year ago, we spent the next 6 months cleaning out our family home that we had lived in for over 20 years. My Mom moved out. The house was sold. And in all that I really lost a sense of "home," in that Hallmark Card sense of the word; the "home" where family gathers for holidays, dinners, etc....

So, the chitlins in my Cooking/Folktales class learned a little about Russia this week, and began the steps for Russian apples this week. Talking to the kids about Russia was so interesting, as the former U.S.S.R. fell when I was the same age as some of the kids sitting in front of me. It's interesting what you remember about history--living it as it happens really changes the way you think about a huge world event. I love that each time we have one of these classes I learn so much about the country to be covered, since I do research to see what I can teach the kids. Like, did you know that Russia was taken from the Mongols in the 12th Century and was called "Muscovy?" Interesting, right!?! I also learned this week that I love Russian folktales. If you are interested read, Onions and Garlic, Baba Yaga, or The Fool and the Fish. Anyway, this week it was cool to note that the kids were doing the measurements a lot faster; even the younger kids now seem to be understanding h...

Met for the second time with my little cooking friends last night. We met to learn about Australia and make Australian Anzac (Australian & New Zealand Army Corps) Cookies. Anzac Day in Australia sounds sneakily like Memorial Day in the U.S., anyway, that is neither here nor there. A smaller group last night, maybe due in part to a last minute date change of the event. We had about 9 kids last time and only 4 last night; 2 boys (the Einstein Bros ), 2 girls. As always I began the class by having the kids show me where Australia is on a huge map. Then I asked the kids to throw out anything they knew about Australia, which led us to comments about animals like kangaroos and koalas and a riveting discussion on marsupials. (Luckily I had done some research on these pre-class as I had a sneaky feeling they would come up). I passed around pics of said animals and also of Aboriginals and other things Australian. I also told the kids a little bit about digeridoos while we listened to some ...