Spring has sprung!!!

It is officially Spring!!! For our sixth week of Story Hour we made our very own pots out of plastic cups that we decorated and planted beans and peas. We also read a few gardening stories which taught us about growing and eating healthy veggies. We read "Up, Down, and All-Around", "Oliver's Garden", and "The Gulps".
I'm so excited because this year we are attempting to make a library garden and grow our own vegetables right here. On April 25th, we hope to have United Way's Youth Day of Caring break the ground for our small garden patch. We would like to try and grow tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, broccoli, chard, and onions. We are also going to try to grow sunflowers, peas, and squash down along the bottom side of the building. Once the weather is warm enough, I would like to have a planting day and invite the children from Story Hour to come and help me plant some of the seeds we have started this spring.

If there is anyone who would like to help with our garden, please let me know! Or if you have any plants, tools, topsoil, etc. that you would like to donate. We will not be using any pesticides or herbicides--everything will be as sustainable as possible. This would be a great opportunity for someone who is not able to have their own garden but would like to. I can't wait!

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss Week!

I'm a little behind on my blaug-o-rama, so I'll have to play catch-up. For our fifth week of story hour, we celebrated Dr. Seuss's birthday. In honor of the late children's author, we read the story of "The Sneetches" (some with stars, some without stars on thars) and another short story called "What Was I Scared Of?"
If you've never read either of these stories, I highly recommend them. "The Sneetches" teaches a great lesson about acceptance and "What Was I Scared Of?" tells a story about fearing the unknown...(see comment). Plus, they're both just plain silly. Any story that features a character known as "the pale green pants with nobody inside 'em" has to be great.
We celebrated with a balloon hunt and then made our very own creative balloon creatures. Dr. Seuss, you were one crazy dude. Thank you!

Finger...puddin'?

Cello!
Juniata County Library, what have you been up to? I couldn't have a worse case of spring fever. Please be warm soon, pllleaaassee!!
Last week was our finger-painting week and I decided to take a swing at homemade finger-paints...which turned out to be kind of interesting. Interesting in that they looked and felt like strange bright-colored pudding. I imagined the children diving in and smearing the paint on everyone and everything, but I was surprised at how cautious some of the kids were. Some children went to town, while others preferred to touch the paint only with a paintbrush. Either way, we created some masterpieces. The story we read was called "The Pencil" which was about a penicl that creates a whole world that comes to life only to realize that the world it created has it's own problems that need to be fixed. Soooo true. Better watch out for the eraser! Later gators.