O Christmas Tree

Every year our city's Chamber of Commerce holds a Christmas tree decorating contest among the local businesses. People in the community can vote for their favorite tree by bringing a non-perishable food item to be collected at the business. Here is our library's tree from last year:

We made it entirely out of old reference books, then strung a lighted garland around it. We had a contest for patrons to guess the number of books we used - 235!

This year we created a fireplace, and just put a little tree on top:

Yes there is a stocking for each staff member. :)

Book Display: These are a few of my favorite things

Staff picks is always an easy book display. I typed up a sign that says, "Try some of Carrie's favorites! 'I have a 4-year-old and an almost 2-year-old. These are some of the books they ask to read again and again, and most of the time I don’t mind. :) ' "

I have another dozen or so books written down that I can pull from as these ones go out.

Are any of these your favorites too?

Book Display: When you have no idea what to do...

Sometimes I get stuck in what to display on my hallway shelf. It sits by itself, away from the rest of the books. I've used it before for things like Readbox and Blind Date with a Book, but have been stumped the last few months with what to do with it.

I don't remember where I first saw the idea to display books based on their color, but it came to mind with St. Patrick's Day (and March Madness, with my alma mater making it to the Elite Eight...). I featured the color green for a few weeks, and just recently changed it to yellow -- makes me think of sunshine and spring, which is sure having a rough time arriving in Michigan this year.

Display: Blind Date with a Book

My director decided for the month of February to create a "Blind Date with a Book" display upstairs in the adult area. All staff are to pick five books and wrap them up, and write the barcode on the outside. I thought it would be fun to do something similar with the kids books downstairs!

I chose 16 books to start, all from my "J" (chapter books) section, and I tried to choose ones that are part of a series or at least have more available by the same author. This will hopefully get kids interested in a new author they might never have tried before. Some of the ones I chose are Frindle by Andrew Clements, Redwall by Brian Jacques, Magyk by Angie Sage, and Clementine by Sara Pennypacker.

Inside each book is a "Rate Your Date" bookmark for kids to fill out and let me know what they thought of it. As an incentive for kids to participate in this, each time they turn in a bookmark their name will be entered into a drawing for a prize on or around March 1.

There was quite a bit of prep work for this display, in choosing the books, looking and typing up read-alikes, wrapping them, setting their status to "display", creating the header. But I really like making displays, and I think this one will be lots of fun!

"Don't judge a book by its cover!"

"Check out a wrapped book, take it home, and unwrap it. Show it your favorite spots to read. Get to know each other. If you hit it off, introduce it to your friends! There won’t be any awkward feelings if you don’t like your date, but you might find the match of your literary dreams!"

"Fill out the “Rate Your Date” card inside the book, and turn it in by March 1 to be entered to win a prize!"

Lots of ideas for this display were found on Pinterest.


Edited to add: Two days after putting up this display, 14 of my 16 books are already gone... Guess I have to find some more!!! 

Book Display: Readbox

I came across this idea on Pinterest a few times and thought it was cute. This is my little shelf in the hallway that I often don't know what to do with... I found a piece of red cloth that drapes over the top and along the inside of the shelf back, behind the books (you can't see that very well in the picture).

In case you want yours to look just mine :) here's how I did it: I took a full size piece of red posterboard and created the letters for "readbox" in MS Publisher -- the font is Comic Sans, font size 467 (2-3 letters per 11x8.5 landscape page), and changed Format-->Font-->Outline. Printed and cut. The arch overtop I cut freehand. The words on the bottom say "SAVE a dollar, READ the book!"

I chose books from the kid's section that have been made into movies:

• Doctor Dolittle
• Peter Pan & Wendy
• Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
• Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
• The Wizard of Oz
• How to Train Your Dragon
• Charlotte's Web
• Stuart Little
• Mary Poppins
• Beezus & Ramona
• The Tale of Despereaux
• The Invention of Hugo Cabret
• Inkheart
• Bridge to Terabithia
• Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
• The Secret Garden
• Mr. Popper's Penguins

There are obviously tons more out there, and I'll probably fill it in with others as these get checked out!

Book Display: Caldecott Winners

We have a small bookshelf in the hallway between the elevator/bathrooms and the children's area. From what I hear, no one ever seems to know what to fill it with.

Someday I'm hoping to get around to making recommended reading lists (specific age groups, topics, etc.). In the meantime, this little shelf holds a few Caldecott medal winners, with a sign saying "Need a book idea? Try a medal winner!" and a booklet I printed off of the current 2013 honor books and a list of all past winners.

I need to refill it every couple of days, so I know they're getting checked out. Maybe eventually when I get my reading lists together this display will rotate through those recommended books. I've found if kids can see the covers of books, they're much more likely to take one home!