July 2006

Summer Reading continues through July 24.

Feathers & Fur July 3
PetToons July 10
with Dan Collins
Wet, Wild, & Weird July 17
Mark Wood’s Fun Show July 24
Storytime weekly themes are similar.
Feathers and Fur July 6
Wet Pets July 13
Wild & Weird July 20

Mark Wood’s Fun Show will be the closing program and EVERYONE is invited. This family entertainment features comedy and magic. There will be a balloon animal for each youngster. Come and share some old fashioned fun. Program time is 11:00 on Monday, July 24. We’re hoping for a nice day and an outside performance.

Teens will have their night on July 19, 6:30 - 8:00. There will be food (of course) and games. Featured guests will be a Canine Companion with Gary Buechel and a Psychiatric Service dog with Scott Leonard from Annie’s Outreach. Thirty-two teens have signed up and received a wristband and a tattoo. There’s still time to participate in weekly prize drawings by signing up and reading. Books, magazines, and graphic novels all count.

Summer Reading program attendance has been close to fifty and over 100 students have signed up. There won’t be a tally until the end but the forecasts are good. Just check stickers on the prize ribbons lining the front windows Storytime has averaged slightly over twenty. SACC has also visited the library on several occasions. It’s a busy time.

Special thanks this month should go to staff, especially children’s librarian, Vicky and Susan who have spent much time preparing for programs and building a dog house for the children’s area. The hamster tunnel is on loan from Seamus and Miles. Megan and Katie, and Kayla and Nicole are volunteering with the summer reading program - counting stickers, passing out prizes, and helping with crafts and activities. The Bell family has loaned their Beta fighting fish as the “Library Pet”. Christine did The Pet Shop window art. Stephanie Reed helped set up the boxes for our annual worm race. Many parents served as worm race monitors. Gary Buechel and his Canine Companion dog visited the opening program. June Carter from the Humane Society brought two enticing residents. Then there was the snake…

Adults have turned in almost 100 reviews qualifying them for prizes. In the meantime those rankings and comments provide suggestions for other patrons - and for additional library purchases.

Prizes in the weekly bonus drawing include two Clippers tickets, a $25 coupon for Cameron Mitchell restaurants, and several tickets for the CAPA classic movie series. It’s winner’s choice. No reading is required but you do have to be an adult and be interested in the prizes. Our first winner selected tickets to The Butterfly House. We appreciate being able to offer these tickets.

Staff Picks :

Kristin Hannah’s Magic Hour is Barbara's choice. The Olympic National Forest is vast acres of impenetrable darkness and great beauty. From the heart of this old forest a 6 year old girl appears, speechless and alone, with no clue to her identity.

Karen has two picks. Still Life with Chickens by Catherine Goldhammer is the tale of a mother and daughter who start a new life by moving to a small house by the sea and raising chickens. Sex with the Queen by Eleanor Herman (who also wrote Sex with Kings) recounts 900 years of vile kings, virile lovers, and passionate politics.

Vicky's “Creature Feature” reading has focused on mermaids and she has five young adult and two adult titles to recommend. Dive in! The Fish in Room 11 by Heather Dyer, Aquamarine by Alice Hoffman, Teenage Mermaid by Ellen Schreiber, Tale of Emily Windsnap by Liz Kessler and Mermaid Summer by Mollie Hunter. (YA)
Alice at Heart and Diary of a Radical Mermaid by Deborah Smith (adult).

Cheaper by the Dozen 2 was rated as a really funny, family movie by our page Megan.

Apropos of the summer reading theme, Liz strongly recommends two classics, Farley Mowat’s Never Cry Wolf (both book and video) and the Yorkshire veterinarian, James Herriott’s books.

The Humane Society will benefit from the library’s collection box. Their wish list includes clear packing tape, bleach and paper towels, 55 gallon trash bags, laundry detergent, dog leashes and collars, dog and cat toys, AA batteries, gently used towels and blankets, and #10 envelopes. Everyone is encouraged to visit at 4920 State Route 37 East. Foster homes for kittens and permanent homes for animals in their care are also needed. It may be more difficult to say “no” after visiting.

The east side lawn project is basically complete and the newly seeded grass is beginning to sprout. The best news is that we’ve not had any water coming under those basement doors so far. The new doors should arrive for installation sometime this month. Bids for work on the west side, however, were much higher than estimated and both work and estimate need to be revised and the project rebid. Michael Foor did a great job of making that west side landscaping look more presentable for its extended life.

Book sales have been booming thanks to a huge donation, which included several boxes of children’s books. Many books were added to the library collection. More are available for sale.

The Garden Craft program was attended by a small but enthusiastic group of varying ages. For those who missed the program but are interested in the projects, Creative Concrete Ornaments for the Garden has some excellent ideas and plans.

The auditors are here. The library is a public institution and is audited by the state every other year. Two auditors from the state will spend a couple of weeks going through the library’s books to be sure everything is done legally. They’ll need their earplugs on Monday mornings.

Books, books and more books. We added quite a few from that large donation. We ordered thirty new large print books. We received a call from a Mom’s Club who collected thousands (literally) of books for Literacy Coalition and is looking for good uses for those books. Liz is in the office cataloging - hiding, and not eager to order new DVDs. Not for a couple of days at least.

Check the July calendar for special events: the Ottawa-Bota Wheat Harvest Festival near Radnor, The Music Man at the Marion Palace, Kids’ College at Marion OSU, Summer Camp at Stratford Ecological Center - and more.