Here comes Christmas! Trimming the tree and the gift of animals to our lives!

This year trimming the tree took on a new adventure for my husband and I. We have a great
big beautiful tree that we absolutely love.  When we plugged it in just days after Thanksgiving,
we found there were many lights that were not working. My husband knew we needed some new lights before we put it away so we ordered the lights on-line. So when we opened up the tree we were a bit taken aback at the number not lighted. However, being the person he is, he busily checked each light with his electrical circuit tester.  Boy, am I a blessed wife to have a husband who will do that instead of making me go buy a new LED tree!  Sorry, but I'm not ready to give up
my soft lighted tree for a brightly decorated tree yet.

The most recent book I read with animals in it is The Art of Racing in the Rain: A Novel by Garth Stein. This book is about a race car driver who has a dog that is his best friend and companion until he marries.  The dog narrates the story.  The dog lives through his masters many events and trials in life, including the joy of riding in a race car! You will laugh and cry with this book. 
Take time this season, read a good book then share your joy with others!

     

  Another thing we have learned
   is that our lovely kitty, loves the  
  tree.  She's not a climber, but
  a sleeper under her warm cozy
  hide-away!


Each year we exchange gifts at our staff Christmas party.  Everyone brings a dish to share, and we just enjoy each others company. This year, one of the gifts I received was a small rug!

Staff know how absolutely spoiled our cat is and how much joy we receive from her! In fact, after everyone left, she promptly came upstairs from her hiding and kneaded the rug, thus placing her own scent on it, claiming it as her own. She then rolled around on it too! I wish I'd had a camera!

Holidays can be a sad time for people. Including other people and even  and even our pets changes the atmosphere in our homes. Have you ever read the book Making Rounds with Oscar: The Extraordinary Gift of an Ordinary Cat by M.D. David Dosa? It is about a cat that is allowed to live in a senior care facility. The cat visits the patients. Nurses and patients begin to find that Oscar will take time to lay with the person just before they die. Of course the doctor did not believe it at first, then saw the truth of it with his won patients.  Needless to say, patients watched who the cat visited and became concerned. It is a truly touching book however. 

Many of you will have read Dewey the Library Cat: A True Story by Vicki Myron and Bret Witter. How about the The Horse Boy: A Father's Quest to Heal His Son by Isaacson, Rupert. This book is about a young boy with autism whose father took him to ride the small horses in Mongolia. The horses began helping the boy.  He came back to the busy life of the USA and found he needed to find a way to help his son continue relating to horses for the son's benefit. This reminds me of the video, Temple Grandin Starring Claire Danes, Julia Ormond, David Strathairn, et al. (produced by HBO Studio, 2010) who grew up 

learning to function in a normal world as an autistic child. She revolutionized animal husbandry of cattle

and many other areas. This movie helps educate us in the special gifting's autism can bring through our children.

Have your read the book The Art of Racing in the Rain: A Novel by Garth Stein? It is about dog who is picked out of a litter by a young professional race car drive before he is married. This wonderful mutt narrates the whole story.  He takes us through marriage, children, loss and much more. You will be taken with the insights. You will also laugh and cry through-out the book!

Enjoy reading this season, then share your joy with others!

Sharing the holidays together - simple ideas

Just prior to Thanksgiving (November 21, 2013) I wrote a Library Link that appeared in our local paper (The Colby Free Press).  I write a column each week, but this one I wanted to share with you because you may be a friend from out of the area.  The article was about helping others in our community have easy creative ways to share their memories and joys about the holidays.  Here is what I wrote and appeared on November 21, 2013:

This is our last Library Link until after Thanksgiving.  Thanksgiving and Christmas are always a holiday time for sharing.  We at the library have been helping others to create stories with their families or for others lately. This week we hosted Jo Ho the Storyteller. She enthralled the middle school students during the day, and then we had her tell stories to families in the evening.  Many of our attendees were student who dragged their parents to the evening program! Then on Tuesday we had a large number of librarians in from the area to take part in a workshop on storytelling and reading to children or others.  The creative juices just flowed.  On Wednesday, we decorated a table for the Diplomats Luncheon to help inspire ways to incorporate stories during the holidays. 

One such suggestion was to take time and place ribbons on your Christmas tree that had descriptions or questions that each person attending dinner or family time had to answer.  We also suggested placing ornaments in a basket and having others tell their memory from the ornament.

Another way to get the story juices flying and the dramatic individuals in your midst to share is to build a story.  Have someone start a story by telling two or three short sentences, then each person adds to the sentence till you reach the last person who of course gracefully ends it.

Jo Ho the story teller gave us an idea that she calls, “Built Up Story.” You think up a short story that you know. Tell it. Then the 2^nd person adds adjectives to the story for emphasis. The third person adds the sounds. The fourth person does the story in silly voices, and the fifth person tells it and adds actions.  I bet that by the end of this, your kids will be rolling on the floor with you laughing because not only were they silly but the adults were too.  You’ll also get to see once again where the brain trust is, the actors are, the shy but impressive thinkers are, and the gentle souls!

We are also encouraging others to think about giving of themselves.  What if you decided to give a gift of a story or tradition to your children or parents. Can you write something down to create a memory as a gift.  It does not take much.  Paper, pen or pencil, computer, you decide.  Can you draw with the story.  Does it have a great or proverbial ending. Like “always wear clean underwear,” or as Sandy & I always say, that was “an adventure.” For Sandy & I, “an adventure is discomfort recollected in tranquility.” And we have had lots of them! How about you. Do you have lessons, adventures, warm remembrances that you can share?

A family can also check out picture books of Thanksgiving, Christmas, or family themes that would be fun to read aloud. For the older kids, is there a chapter book during the Christmas holiday you read after dinner each night? Trade off who reads and enjoy the time.  Some of my most memorable times growing up was when I was read to or our family read a book together. I can still tell you many of the books I was read to as a child. I can tell you where I was, who did the reading, the smells, the day, temperatures, the food we ate, the event.  Your kids may never remember the copious TV programs you watch with them, but they will remember the times of reading.

If you are a digital person and love your tablet or computer and you think you can’t read (which I doubt), you can share others telling stories using the website Storyline supported by the Sage Foundation (http://www.storylineonline.net). This website has famous people sharing their voices while the story is shared on the computer/tablet screen

If you get tired of being indoors, the library with the cooperation of local downtown businesses has put up what we call the StoryWalk®.  The goal of StoryWalk® is to help build children’s interest in reading while encouraging healthy outdoor activity for both adults and children. The walk begins at the Sunflower Bank where flyer's will be available with a map and additional information.  You are also asked to sign the “trail” book if you participate. Following the map, you will find the direction you need to take to read the book, If You Give a Moose a Muffin by Laura Numeroff, as you stroll.  If you cover the route 3 times, you will log in nearly ½ mile.  You can return to the bank and write any comments you may have about the project in the “trail” book at the conclusion of your walk.  We have great cooking, crafts and other activities that you can do with your children once you have taken the walk. Simply go to our website, colbylibrary.com and click on the picture book cover of “If You Give A Moose a Muffin.” This will then take you to the link with all the activities (http://www.colbylibrary.com/storywalk.html). 

Our fall hours remain: Monday-Thursday 9:00 am. - 8:00 pm; Friday 9:00 – 5:00 pm.; Saturday 10:00 – 4:00 pm; Sunday 1:00 – 4:00 pm. Come get information on your new eBook and digital audio-book service. See you at your library! 

Today my post is entitled "Remembering Debbie" - Assistant Director at the Pioneer Memorial Library - Colby, KS

We at the library and the community were gifted with a member of our library staff
that left a great legacy of love, joy and service.  I created this Prezi to honor her at a Booked For Lunch function in October, after she passed away from brain cancer September 2013. It contains just a few recent photo's of her time as she worked along so many and contributed so much. Her family does have copies of it for their memory too, so please do not send a copy to them. 

Debbie would want us all to contribute to our community in ways that bring others joy and help.

Honoring Debbie October 2013:

http://prezi.com/dpmc3ie_x5h5/copy-of-rembering-debbie-tittel/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

If you take and open the site, then open to full screen (lower right) then go to the little arrow on lower right, click on it. Select 10 seconds and it will scroll through.

Hope you enjoy.

Melany

Fall season Begins - enjoy the fall colors!

My favorite time of the year is fall.  I love the deep and rich tones that the many colors create  on our landscape.  Leaves turning yellow, burn orange, and such.








Wheat turning golden,

                                Milo in the fields red, gold and white.

Sunflowers with their bright faces turned up just before they droop under the weight of their seeds.

Enjoy the landscape and colors because soon they will turn white with snow. 

With this   comes the opportunity of fall schedules, Booked for Lunch speakers at the library and other events.  Reading or listening to a good book by the fire or in the warmth of your home! Take time enrich your life not only with color but wonderful soul filling stories and inspiration! See my Shelfari shelf for good books to read. 

Sometimes life sends you a curve ball!

I don't know about you,  but sometimes life throws you a curve ball! Just received one at the end of June when a work associate became sick.  By the first week in July she was diagnosed with brain cancer! Wow-- does that make a mind spin. It just so shows me to count each day, because tomorrow may not be yours.

This created opportunities for growth and challenge for each of us in the library.  I certainly felt the difference in air velocity, and the low and high pressures that changed the direction of the ball. My days became longer
but knowing that you were making a difference in circumstances made it also rewarding.

In the midst of changes and planning I had to take time to finish book club books. Inevitably, they had someone experiencing cancer or death. Books can be therapeutic and at this time that is what I found. Friends and loved ones were also there and they were definitely therapeutic for me as well.

With this time frame in mind --- don't forget to smell the roses, watch the sunset, and sleep in once in a while, tell others you love them, and give them a hug too.

I read an article from our local paper, "Colby Free Press." It was entitle, "Sunny yellow invaders have insid track." The original piece came from Daris Howard  (http://www.ldsmag.com/article/1/12862 ). The paper tells us that Howard is an "award-winning, syndicated columnist, playwright, and author. . ." As I read the first few lines it caught my attention because my husband has been working on planting new grass in areas of our lawn that need help. We have fertilized, killed potential grubs and weeds! Like this great article we have a neighbor who has weeds and they blow directly into our lawn. After I read the article myself I immediatly shared it with my husband. We both smiled and just knew this article put's things into perspective.

The story puts weeds in perspectives. Howard was complaining that Dandelions kept appearing on his lawn. He sprayed and sprayed. Then one day he went out and saw his 4 year old daughter summarily blowing and twirling around with the beautiful wispy round globes of seedlings. She was joyfully spreading the wispy globes all over their lawn. Howard wisely got a hold of his emotions and went to talk to his daughter. He asked her what she was doing. She said she was giving him beautiful flowers for the lawn. She said she wanted him to have Daddy Lions since God made them, but they keep turning brown so she has to go and find more. Howard said he decided that they add so much to their lawn. Please read the article. it is heartwarming and better than my discription.

Like all things, our values change when we are brought to see things from another person's or child's perspective!!

National Library Week and many other activities

National Library Week is one of my favorite times of the year! At our library we have lunch each day with a featured speaker. We had 3 authors scheduled and two special speakers. One of the things that has happened the last three years is a snow storm right in the middle of National Library Week.

Thursday morning we had blowing snow and our author could not get to us from their location 2 hours away. When snow blows across our highways sometimes you can not see where the side of the road begins.

Since I did not want our author getting herself killed, I advised her to stay home. Hence, I began working to put together a program about new and interesting books that we were adding or had added recently.

It was a fun morning. Really, the whole program went well and I enjoyed sharing with everyone in the audience. We had about 45 people in attendance. I am especially delighted when patrons share their best reads, which did happen. 

Here is a copy of our discussion: It is entitled, "NLW -April 18, 2013, Melany Wilks, Library Director speaks impromptu on titles.   http://youtu.be/kj68RAJqEPo.

The rest of them will be placed on our PML website in a few days located at http://www.colbylibrary.com.

The Digital Explorer vs. the Slow or Non-Initiator!

I am working in a really great community. Like many libraries, we have people of all ages who are adapting to and loving the new Tablet and ebook environment. They come into our library asking questions and getting help.

While one can say that there are generations that are adapting more easily, there are still a large number in what I would call the unexpected category marching full force into the new digital technology. 

In my work, I also run into all ages that are not interested in this technology craze. However, many are looking to help their loved ones and friends become part of the 21st Century way of life.

Some are blessed by the help from others, and then their are others that really would rather be left alone.  View these short clips and enjoy!


"So dad, how do you like the iPad we got you?" : http://www.wimp.com/dadipad/

 "Paper is not Dead.": http://vimeo.com/61275290 

I have laughed and guffawed at these, but there is truth in their humor. So if you are one of the uninitiated and don't want help, this will make your point. If you are one who is struggling to become proficient with technology, this will encourage you that you are not alone. If you have tried to help others and have been rebuffed, this will soothe your brow!

Happy viewing!!