Ladybug Picture Book Award Reading Marathon

On Thursday, November 17th a group of teachers and staff of Freedom Elementary School and I read 10 picture books nominated for the Ladybug Picture Book Award to children in grades K-3. Whew, it takes a long time to read ten books! Fortunately, we had an attentive audience. After the children heard all the stories, they each voted for their favorite. Click here to see the entire list of nominees.

And the winner was... Too Many Toys by David Shannon! About a little boy named Spencer who has so many toys his mother is on his case to give some away. He finally agrees to part with some and ends up discovering the best toy of all. 11 out of 30 children voted for this book.

Runners up were Bats at the Beach by Brian Lies (4 votes) and a three-way tie for 3rd place (3 votes each): Bedtime at the Swamp by Kristyn Crow and illustrated by Macky Panintuan , Little Blue Truck by Alice Schertle and illustrated by Jill McElmurry and Waking Beauty by Leah Wilcox and illustrated by Lydia Monks.

Here are some photos from the morning's reading marathon. Click on photo to see larger version:

Radar

Meet the Rhymer's new kitten Radar, who visited the library this week to the delight of all who chanced to meet him. Here he is with two of his biggest admirers, Margaret and Hannah. Don't worry, Louie is still the library cat!

Raffle Prizes for 6th grade and younger

If you have more raffle tickets than you can spend at the library store, or if you aren't going to be able to shop when the store is open on Wednesday August 19th from 4:00 - 5:30, you can try to win one of the following prizes. Come by the library, email the library at freedomlibrary@roadrunner.com or call the library at 539-5176 to tell us how you want to use your raffle tickets. You can put them all toward one prize or divide them between prizes. Don't forget to give us your name and phone number.

Here are the prizes:

1. One 18 hole Mini Golf game & 1 GoKart ride at White Lake Speedway (2 winners)

2. Mini Golf 2010 Season Pass at White Lake Speedway

3. 1 Gb Sansa Clip MP3 Player








4. Sony Boombox with CD player, cassette & radio

5. Light box made by Herb Burroughs

6. Cool Bike

7. $10 Walmart Gift Card


8. Candy! (two winners)









9. Huge Pink Horse

Teen Tie Dye

Many thanks to Sarah Groleau who ran this tie dye workshop with the teens this summer. Some came back the next week to show their finished tie dyed clothes.

My how you've grown!

Here are Hannah and Maggie with one of the ducklings that was perched on Bill's shoulder not long ago. I don't think the duck would fit on his shoulder anymore!

Duck Duck Goose

The Rhymers have acquired some new babies - 4 chicks and 2 ducklings. And they've been visiting the library the last two days. Here are the ducks with Bill Stoops.

Twister!

School let out early today so Hillary & Brianna came to the library. Not much to do, so we got out the Twister and each girl won once.

Oh-so-helpful Kitty

I finally had to kick Louie out because he was getting in the middle of everyone's work... Here he is "helping" a patron with her computer tasks.

Irene's newest grandchild

7 month old Mariana and her grandmother, library volunteer Irene Hopper, came to visit this week. What a sweet baby. We fell in love!

Her name was Lola

The Stewarts have a new Havanese puppy named Lola. Pictured here, Elizabeth Rhymer, Judy Johnson, Howsie Stewart and sweet little Lola.

Check Out Louie (April Fool!)

Louie pics

Louie has had a good winter working here at the library. Here he is soaking up some sun and enjoying a nap with Joel.

Hard work!

A Visit from the 2nd Graders

How nice to have some down time to spend with some good books.

A special new friend

Bill and Sally Stoops have a new addition in their house -- a chocolate lab puppy named Millie. Millie came for a visit this week and was a big hit. Here Sierra is meeting her for the first time.

Fun at Storytime

We had a big group of storytime kids this week, including some visitors (Spencer & Jackson's cousins), some storytime graduates, and a great group of regulars. Here some of them are showing off their candy airplanes they made and otherwise having fun.

Wii Fun

Patrick and Hannah need to jump at the same time to get the mining cart across the chasm.

















Rebecca & Kathryn concentrate on the Wii game.


















Patrick & Hannah lean to make the mining cart make the turn.


















Audrey & Sierra work together to get the mining cart to turn left on the Wii game Outdoor Challenge.