Sorry, its been a while! We've been trying to figure out what we're going to be doing in the new year. Everything is up in the air still, since we don't know what's going on health wise and since we are going to be going to the new library this spring at some point (date not yet determined).

One of the things that we are excited about is "Stories on Demand".  We will be doing 15 minute live storytimes with just you and your kids. We'll have times that certain staff are available and then you just fill out the form and let us know when you'd like to do it.

Also, in light of the fact that we are moving to a new building, we will be creating "make and take" craft kits that you can pick up during the week beginning in January (with the possibility of a "New Years Eve" one the last few weeks of December as well).  This will help us dwindle down all our craft supplies so that we don't have to move quite so much to the new building. It'll be you're way of helping us move!

So here are just a few things we'll be doing, but we have a bit of fun planned for you, so keep an eye out for everything.

On a side note, I have a new friend! Sparky the Caticorn. They're a friend of Spark the Unicorn, yet they can fit in my pocket! With that in mind, Sparky will travel around the library (and throughout the universe) with me via their Instagram page.

So today Miss Valerie asked me to create one of our book bundles with my favorite books ... apparently I'm hungry! HAH! All the books I picked had to do with food!

Dinosaur Kisses - He eats all the animals he tries to kiss.
Very Hungry Caterpillar - He eats everything.
Strega Nona - Big Anthony makes use of Strega Nona's pasta pot and makes some for everyone in the town, but then it backfires!
Red Hen - Anyone going to help the Red Hen make cake? Don't think so!
Edwina the Dinosaur Who Didn't Know she was extinct - Thank goodness she didn't know, she makes the best cookies!
Bear Wants More - He is hungry for berries, but there's never enough.
Drat That Fat Cat - He's so hungry he eats something that goes a little haywire in his belly.
There was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly - I love this specific one because the illustrations are so awesome and there are cut outs in the illustrations so you can visibly watch her belly get bigger.
Kitten's First Moon - He wants that Moon that looks like a bowl of milk and darn it, he's going to get it!

Let me know if you get hungry after reading these books too! They're DELICIOUS!

One way that you can keep the conversation going is to ask them to tell you a story about what is going on in the picture. Want to keep it going even further? Write down that story in nice big easy to read letters. It lets them see that 1. what they are saying is important enough to write down and 2. What they are saying can become "pictures" on paper.
Why not try and see?
Have a great safe day everyone. Try and enjoy the snow!

So I'm trying to learn lots of new things while this thing is happening. And I thought I would share some of my new tidbits. One of the things that I learned is about the importance of play with your little ones. One way of doing that is through songs and "fingerplays" such as "Five little Piggies". Therefor, I will be sharing yet MORE video fun with different fingerplays.
This is what happens when you can't sleep. You go a little crazy. :)

My daughter LOVES rubber duckies. She was furious with me when I got rid of a bunch of them because I was trying to clean the house and everything I thought we didn't need. Apparently we needed those little guys.
Do you have a favorite rubber ducky? Is it something special or is it very traditional? If you are like Ernie and Big Bird from Sesame Street, you like the traditional style rubber ducky. Ernie loved his so much that he created a song for his! "Rubber Ducky you're the one, you make bath-time twice as fun."

Want to read some rubber duck books to your rubber duck or listen to some music during bathtime? Check these out!

Another few exciting things going on this week are:
Minecraft - tonight from 6-7pm
Science Club - Thursday from 6-7pm

And it's nice that a day was made especially for me to act foolishly. At storytime today Ms. Valerie and I were only allowing ourselves to be silly ... which is why we made it silly storytime!
We read "This is a Taco!" in which the author thinks they're going to tell everyone a general book about squirrels, but the squirrel wants to tell everyone how much he loves tacos. Who can blame him though? Everyday should be Taco Tuesday.
Jan Thomas is just a plain silly goose. In "Is Everyone Ready for Fun?" the cows want to have fun on chicken's sofa but chicken just wants to be left alone. No jumping, No dancing and NO WIGGLING!
In their book "Rhyming Dust Bunnies" the little dust bunnies like to rhyme (except for the blue one, who likes CAT!) but the big mean grey dust bunny has other ideas. 

Like silly books? So do we, and we have plenty of them. Come on in and check them out. Know any good jokes? We love those too. Please come in and send them our way! Need ideas? Our joke books are in the non-fiction under 818. Come check them out!

It occurred to me at some point that blogging regularly at the beginning of the week over blogging regularly at the end of the week makes way more sense. If I was going to tell you everything that was going on this week, it would make more sense to tell you before it happened rather than after it happened.
That's okay though. Only took me a year to think about that. :)

So like now I can tell you that this week's storytime theme is YETIS!
We had our Toddler Time (2-3 years) today at 10am, but we still have Tuesday at 10am for Preschoolers and Thursday at 10am for everyone. Join us! Its a blast and this week you can find out "Are We There Yeti?" 
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And today we are going to have Minecraft at 6pm. We are still having a blast with Minecraft, so I say come join us!

I just found out about this website that we have access to!

DaybyDayNY is a website for young children and their families. It is part of the New York State Library early literacy initiative Ready to Read at New York Libraries.
 
Libraries are essential to Family Literacy. In New York State, libraries bridge the gap for those who may not have access to resources for a variety of reasons. Libraries educate the whole family by providing computer and internet access, materials such as books and music, access to health information, and interaction with staff that are skilled in programming to engage young children to learn.

The New York State Library hopes that families across New York State will use this interactive calendar to develop a love for books and learning that will last a lifetime. The calendar uses multimedia to enhance books, songs, and family health and bring these components to life.  If families can only spend a few minutes together, this calendar will give them something they can use to make sure that this is quality time as well as educational time.