Happy Halloween!

I'm really liking this recycled book craft. Happy Halloween!

Summer Reading Maker's Lab report

This summer we have been transforming the children’s study area at my library into a “Maker’s Lab” every Thursday afternoon. We have been working on craft projects appropriate for school-age children and tweens. Here's a sampling of a few of my favorites.

Everyone’s creativity was on display using rainbow scratchy paper.

Make-a-Minion craft, featuring the popular inventors from the movie Despicable Me.

One of my favorites was this lightning bug craft, that really glows-in-the-dark. 

I hosted a "Sidewalk Chalk Expo" Plenty of kids and parents showed up to take advantage of the shade during a hot sunny day. 

Just moments after our sidewalk masterpieces were complete, we felt the first raindrops… ah, so long, sidewalk chalk art! The art may not have lasted long, but the children made new friends and memories that will last a lifetime.

Recycled book crafts

I love altered book projects. There are so many that are pretty and inspiring. 

I'd love to do a craft project for teens at my library using some discarded/damaged books to make something like these, but I don't know if members of the public would have the heart for it. So many people hate to see a book "defaced" or feel guilty for reusing or recycling a book in any way.

Have you ever done a recycled book project? How did it go?

Amazing bookmark idea

Wow, so pretty! I'm kind of in love with these bookmarks made from paint chips. I wondered how they got the flower pattern on them, and after some googling around, I think they must have used a flower stamp. I love the grommet with ribbon... so classy. This would be a fun project to do at the library.

Zombie Felties review

Zombie Felties: How to Raise 16 Gruesome Felt Creatures from the Undead

by Nicola Tedman and Sarah Skeate

Andrews McMeel Publishing

2010

Just in time for Halloween, Tedman and Skeate bring us this collection of creative crafts. Never in the history of ever have zombies looked quite so gosh-darn cute! Page after page of this attractive volume feature full-color photographs of mini-zombie felt creations, including a zombie bride, zombie vampire duck, a zombie pirate and many more.

Readers will find the clearly-labeled instructions and a preface including hints and tips on basic stitches extremely helpful for getting started. Each project is rated by difficulty level: one skull for the easiest projects, and up to four skulls for challenging zombies. Japanese-inspired design with tiny bodies and wobbly oblong heads gives each feltie a very kawaii look despite the pink beads representing brains spilling out, or the red embroidery floss for oozing guts... leaving one unsure if you'd rather run screaming or snuggle these little guys.

Tiny, simple to make, and easy to completely hand-sew, making the zombie dolls from this book will be much easier if you are already a crafter with lots of scraps and notions to choose from. Still, I see no reason why an enterprising YA librarian couldn't acquire a few sheets of felt, some embroidery floss and an assortment of beads and turn the book into inspiration for a Halloween craft library program. Teens with a twisted sense of humor will love these undead felt dolls.


I borrowed this book from the library.

I'm happy to be hosting Nonfiction Monday today.  Leave a comment, and I'll add you to the Round-Up!  I'll be checking in and updating through-out the day.

Thanks again, to Anastasia Suen for organizing Nonfiction Monday.  Be sure and check out her line-up for the next few months... there may still be a few upcoming hosting spots available.  And don't forget to check out Nonfiction Monday next week, hosted at Picture Book of the Day.

Comments seem to have gone all kerfluey.  If you want to be included in the list, and haven't been able to leave a comment, drop me a line at madiganreads (at) gmail.com.

And here's the line-up!  (So far.)

• Jeff Barger is reviewing Country Road ABC by Arthur Geisert.
• Travis Jonker is reviewing The Secret Cave: Discovering Lascaux by Emily Arnold McCully.
• Anastasia Suen is reviewing John Greenwood's Journey to Bunker Hill by Marty Rhodes Figley.
• Angela Craft is reviewing The Good, The Bad and the Barbie by Tanya Lee Stone.
• Lit Lass is reviewing Straight Hair, Curly Hair by Augusta Goldin and Ed Emberly.
• Kim Hutmacher is reviewing A Day on the Mountain by Kevin Kurtz.
• Doret is reviewing FDR's Alphabet Soup by Tanya Bolden.
• Abby is reviewing DragonArt Evolution: How to Draw Everything Dragon by J. "NeonDragon" Peffer.
• And it looks like Charlotte has reviewed the exact same book!
• The Fourth Musketeer is reviewing Dave the Potter: Artist, Poet, Slave by Laban Carrick Hill and illustrated by Bryan Collier.
• Roberta is reviewing A Kid’s Guide to Latino History: More than 50 Activities by Valerie Petrillo.
• Alex is reviewing Sweethearts of Rhythm by Marilyn Nelson.
• Jennifer is reviewing Case Closed? Nine Mysteries Unlocked by Modern Science by Susan Hughes, illustrated by Michael Wandelmaier.
• Becky is reviewing They Called Themselves the KKK by Susan Bartoletti.
• Tammy Flanders is reviewing a whole collection of books that use woven materials in their illustrations.
• Shelf-Employed is reviewing All Aboard! Elijah McCoy’s Steam Engine by Monica Kulling, illustrated by Bill Slavin.
• Wendie Old points our attention to two wonderful non-fiction review blogs, Nonfiction Matters and I.N.K.: Interesting Nonfiction for Kids.
• Janet Squires is reviewing Paper Crafts for Halloween by Randel McGee.
• Last, but definitely not least, Shirley Duke is reviewing WILD Alphabet by Mike Haines and Julia Frolich.

Frog and Toad

Here's a felt board set I made a few years ago, and got the chance to use somewhat recently at a storytime. I love, love, love, the Frog and Toad books by Arnold Lobel.

These pieces are from "The Lost Button" featured in Frog and Toad Are Friends. I tried to keep the same color palette; green, brown, earthy. I think the raccoon was my favorite one to make, he turned out really well.



I made sure to match the buttons on Frog's completed jacket with the buttons that are mentioned earlier in the story.

Holiday Dove Craft

One of my colleagues created this wonderful dove pattern, cut out of a single paper plate. I hosted an after school craft program at our library last week, and here are the results.

Here's the sample that I made. It turned out so nice, I used it as a tree-topper.

And a close-up of the sample.

Here's one made by a seven year old. She decided to give her dove a pink scarf.

And this one, made by a three year old. I think it's cute!

Happy Holidays!

Spring Party!

One piece of advice that I’ve often heard given to new librarians is, “Never host an egg hunt in the library.”

As luck would have it, at my current branch, I inherited an annual Spring Party (including an egg hunt) from my predecessor.  Each year, she would invite families with small children to come into the branch where she’d hide plastic eggs ALL over the library.  The families and kids would ransack the place, overturning books everywhere to get to the eggs, but nevertheless, a good time was had by all.

Well.  I must say, I wasn’t enthused about handling the clean-up after an event like this, so I set my brain to work on how to incorporate a really fun party with a minimum of havoc.

In general, I tell some of my favorite Easter/Spring/St. Patrick’s Day stories at the event.  I do that for about 20 minutes. Then, storytime “ends” and I roll out some crafts.  We do that for about 20-30 minutes.  Finally, we do an “egg hunt” in the library.

My compromise was daringly inventive, if I do say so myself.  Using my background in theatre I came up with a few ideas to make our egg hunt more workable.  All egg hunts must take place within the confines of the community room.  Those participating must move as silently as a bunny, with an exaggerated slow tip-toe motion.  This was huge success.  The kids loved it.  The parents loved it.  The clerks at the library loved it.  Fantastic.  Friends, you haven’t lived until you’ve witnessed a group of madly, silently tiptoeing grade school children, eagerly scooping up armfuls of eggs.

This year I was able to book a very (very!) last minute performer, an Irish dancer, who came in, was low-key and charming, gave a few informative talks about Irish dance and a few demos.  She also brought a wonderful, sequined Irish dance dress, which of course, the kids totally loved.

In addition, I put up a huge display of St. Patrick’s Day/Irish themed books, Easter, Passover and Now Rouz books, which all checked out, I also (in a fit of desperation) included additional books on flowers, springtime and even potatoes.  They all checked out.  I think we can call this year's Spring party a total success!

Happy Spring!

Feltboard Fun

Most children's librarians have a few areas that they enjoy or specialize in more than others.  Some librarians are puppeteers, some are excellent at ferreting out free guest performers, some are handy with crafts.  Me, I'm a felt board kind of gal.

I'm a huge fan of Judy Sierra's wonderful book, The Flannel Board Storytelling Book.  The stories are easy and work well with young audiences.  The patterns are very, very easy to follow and turn out quite nicely.

Inspired by the cover, I decided to tackle The Enormous Turnip.  I'm rather pleased with it!  I did take a few liberties... I added the stripe to the turnip, as it just didn't look right to me without it.  I also added some spots on the dog, and stripes on the cat to make a proper orange tabby.  Gluing the pieces onto a black felt backing gives a nice almost stencil-like effect, I think.

But, oh, look at this!  Take away the turnip.  Add a nurse, and a piece of cheese, and now we have, The Farmer in the Dell!

I love that these little felt board characters can "star" in several different stories.  I'm thinking I may want to create a feltboard clock for the mouse, for Hickory Dickory Dock, and maybe one day I'll try to add a cow and other pieces for Hey Diddle, Diddle.