Adventures in Reading

Here’s a teaser! Stay tuned this weekend for all the details!

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Here we GOOOO!

Below are the instructions to get you signed up on BEANSTACK…either on your computer or mobile device. We’re going to use this to track ALL sorts of reading and activities this summer!

Our program here at the Tioga Community Library will actually begin Monday, June 8th; HOWEVER, North Dakota State Library starts TOMORROW! Check out their Facebook page for all sorts of great activities starting tomorrow…and LOG them into your BEANSTACK program – EVERYTHING you do counts toward our program here, too!

If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to send me a message on Facebook or at library@cityoftioga.com.

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This is to notify the public that there will be two library board meetings tomorrow, Tuesday, April 14th, 2020. Both meetings will take place via Zoom Meetings.

The first meeting is a special meeting/annual meeting. It will begin at 5:oopm CST.

The second meeting is our monthly board meeting and will begin at approximately 5:35pm. The meeting ID for both meetings is 996 2899 9895 and the password is library.

Below you can find the agenda for each meeting, as well as the meeting ID, password and a link to join. Anyone is welcome to attend.

Annual Meeting

AGENDA
Tioga Community Library Board
April 14, 2020 5:00pm
Special Meeting/Annual Meeting
Zoom Meeting information
https://zoom.us/j/99628999895?pwd=UUV4RDdDTVg4eE5sYlB3Ni9qbTBaQT09
Meeting ID: 996 2899 9895
Password: library

1. Call to Order; Roll Call
2. Additions and/or changes to agenda
3. Quorum for Annual Meeting
4. Library Director Report and Budget
5. Election of Library Director
6. Adjournment

Monthly Library Board Meeting

AGENDA
Tioga Community Library Board
April 14, 2020 5:35pm
Zoom Meeting
https://zoom.us/j/99628999895?pwd=UUV4RDdDTVg4eE5sYlB3Ni9qbTBaQT09
Meeting ID: 996 2899 9895
Password: library

1. Call to Order; Roll Call
2. Additions and/or changes to agenda
3. Approval of minutes
4. Library Director Report
5. Old Business:
   • Finance Committee/Budget
   • Grant Committee
6. Next meeting date, time, and place
7. Adjournment

Here are some of those links I promised to get up for you all…this first post is for TumbleBooks.

First up: k-6 eBooks. User name: tumble735 Password: books

Next up…MATH! User name: tumble2020 Password: A3b5c6

And here’s the links for grades 7-12 eBooks. User name: tumble2020 Password: A3b5c6

Are Audio Books more your style? Audio books for ALL AGES!

User name: tumble2020 Password: A3b5c6

Or maybe you like romance? User name: tumble2020 Password: A3b5c6

If you have any questions about this, please feel free to email me at library@cityoftioga.com or message the library on Facebook during our time of closure!

In case you didn’t see this on the library’s Facebook page, here it is again:

☘️☘️ANNOUNCEMENT…but this one is a good one!☘️☘️

I had an IDEA yesterday as I was hauling all my work stuff into my house for the rest of the month.

We might not me able to have our normal activities in the library, but I most definitely can bring some of them to you RIGHT HERE!

Preschool story time will CONTINUE, just a little differently. This Tuesday is St. Patrick’s day, and I am signed up to read at the elementary school. After I’m done, at 11am, I will start a Facebook live here on this page, and we can read the same stories I have picked out for the elementary school. If you can’t join us live, that’s okay… It’ll be up on the page after the live is over and you can watch at your convenience. Have friends in other cities/states that might like to join us? Give them our Facebook page name! Maybe you know someone with elementary age kids whose schools are shut down…INVITE THEM TOO! The more, the merrier…🤗

This will be the test run and as long as it goes well, we can plan a few more things like this online for this weird time in limbo. If it works, I’ll keep it, even when we’re open again to the public. It’s not a perfect solution, but it’s a little something I can do to help keep our library spirit alive.

☘️☘️☘️Come back on Tuesday at 11am for story time on Facebook… I have a special St. Patrick’s day already planned out! ☘️☘️☘️

***March 16th edit: with our schools closed this week, I won’t be reading at the elementary school. Anyone is definitely invited to watch the story time!***

It’s almost spring! However, I saw the forecast for this weekend with measurable snow SO I guess it’s North Dakota’s last attempt to hold onto winter!

This time of the year always seems a little crazy for me. Everyone is still getting a cold or flu or other illness and we’re all just ready for the warm weather. We’ve had to cancel a few of our story times, either because I knew there was a whole bunch of sick kids, or my own kids had been exposed to something or, in the case of last week, I had been exposed to some “yuck”. The last thing I want to do is get everyone else sick (I did manage to escape the yuck!). I appreciate that everyone was considerate and I didn’t see many sick kids at the story times we did have! We did our best to clean the library surfaces every day, hoping to ward off the germs, but you know now that I think back, I certainly didn’t wipe down every crayon, marker or pencil in the library. You can only do so much, right?? Just keep in mind that the sick season isn’t over yet, and everyone will certainly appreciate the consideration in keeping your sick kids (or self) out of public places when you are able. Thank you in advance!

I know the library hours have been a bit sporadic lately, and I do apologize. It gets tough to cover all the hours I would like to be open when the staff (of staff children!) get sick. I appreciate everyone’s patience as we all hold on through the rest of the winter sick season!

That being said, we’re on track to have story time this week, both for the PK kids at 10:30am Wednesday and 4:00pm for the K-2nd graders on Wednesday as well. We had our very first multilingual story time the on February 26th and it was a great time! Lisa Ledbetter read us a story in Spanish and the preschoolers got to mix up their own paint. We kept it contained in plastic Ziploc bags, with minimal mishaps! (One was exploding green paint on the library director’s white sweater…I learned a valuable lesson that day not to wear white on story time days! PS – it was TOTALLY my own fault!)

Our second multilingual story time is set for BOTH story groups on Wednesday, March 25th. Sarah Wright will be sharing with us about sign language! If you are able, it will be lots of fun I’m certain. For the 4pm story time that day, I welcome anyone who is interested to come in…we won’t limit it to 2nd grade. Usually I pick the stories based on the age group, but for the multilingual times, I think that afternoon group can include the whole town if they’d like to come! The more the merrier!

With springtime right around the corner, I guarantee that there are other library directors throughout North Dakota thinking the exact thing I’m thinking: SUMMER READING PROGRAM IS COMING! I’ve been to the prep meetings, and this year is destined to be good. The theme is “Imagine Your Story”…if you happened to hear the last time I was able to chat with Jim Prather at KTGO radio, you heard that this means we’ll be incorporating lots of fairy tales, legends, folklore, and the craft ideas are endless! I have a huge manual that I am getting lots of great idea from, and I’m excited for the summer to get here. It will be a large undertaking, particularly for someone who has NEVER put something like this together. I made sure one of the classes I took this year in grad school talked about public library programs so I could pick the brains of my classmates! Still, chances are good I’ll be asking for some volunteers this summer so if you’ll be in the area and are interested in helping in any capacity, keep your eyes open here and on the Facebook page for announcements!

We also received a grant this year to have a weekly STEM club, which I was able to push off at least temporarily due to the large amount of activities that were happening for the school kids. But we DO need to get that going VERY VERY SOON, or we will lose the grant money. SO, I’m working hard this week to finalize all the details and I will post the announcement VERY soon!

Now just a bit of “not-so-good” news. Let’s take into consideration all that I just talked about: sickness, story times, summer reading program, grad school, STEM club…PLUS all the regular day to day tasks that come with running a library, my family, the remainder of my life activities…oh yeah, and at least SOME sleep – something has to “give” or it will be my health or sanity! Although I managed not to catch whatever my kids had last week, by the time Friday came and I was back at work, I realized pretty quickly that I AM WIPED OUT. It’s easy to think you have it all together and you’re just plowing through everything until you have to take a break from your daily grind and realize that you’re exhausted. As much as I do not like to cancel anything, or say NO to other ideas, I’ve realized I need to. For right now, the only day of the week that I typically do not have to work or run all over the place for activities for myself and my family is Saturday. I really need that day to be free…including to possibly sleep in if I can! For that reason, I’m “suspending” the Saturday morning HIIT class and kid’s story time/fitness class. I’m not saying “cancel” just yet, because I do believe I will at least revisit the idea of putting them back into the schedule sometime in the future. For now, I need to give myself a totally free day, and I appreciate your understanding!

That’s your March Madness update! Enjoy the nice days as we start to see them more and more…with as long as winter really is up here, we should always remember that spring and summer ALWAYS make an appearance if we’re patient for long enough!

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Exciting news! Tomorrow is the first day of our multi-lingual story time for the preschool story time! We will be having this the final Wednesday of every month to start! I’m really excited to start this for the kids.

Tomorrow, Wednesday February 26th at 10:30am, Lisa Ledbetter will be sharing a story in Spanish and English with our preschoolers. The book is called “Mix It Up!” or “¡Mézclalo Bien!” by Hervé Tullet. This is a great opportunity to get children hearing and becoming more familiar with other languages. We’ll also do a craft that is related to the story.

So come on out tomorrow morning at 10:30am to the library and join us for the first of many of these story times. I’m also looking to include sign language and as many other languages as we can possibly incorporate.

If you or anyone you know is multi-lingual and would like to help with the program, PLEASE contact me via email, telephone or even just pop into the library to talk with me. I would love to also be able to share this with the older group eventually and the more people who can share different languages, the more we can give to our young patrons!

We are ready to start our morning HIIT class! There was a GREAT amount of interest in all 3 days I offered and I’m really looking forward to starting!

First the details:

I will have waivers that need to be signed prior to the first class. You can do this the first morning, or stop in the community center/library on Monday to sign it ahead of time. This class will be taken with the understanding that you are releasing me, the library, the community center and the city of Tioga from ANY liability. You are participating at your own risk.

Class will be held in the gym at the community center. Because we are having class prior to the center opening, you will need to enter through the NORTH ENTRANCE, off Signal Road. Please bring the shoes in which you plan to workout…do not wear them outside as we don’t want to track snow, sand, water, salt, etc onto the gym floor. There are cubbies in that entry way for you to store your belongings while you’re working out. There are also locker rooms available for changing. Please keep in mind that I need to drop my kids off at school prior to coming to the community center, so I will not be arriving more than about 5-10 minutes prior to the start of class.

This class is open TO MEN AND WOMEN! All fitness levels are welcome, but you are responsible for your workout intensity. HIIT tends to be a higher intensity, faster paced workout. You can modify as needed, but as the instructor, I will be presenting to the class in what is the higher intensity level.

This class will be Tuesday and Thursday morning, starting at 8:45am. We will be done by 9:30am . I’m going to have a warm-up, cool-down and between 30-35 minutes for the actual HIIT section. For HIGH INTENSITY INTERVAL TRAINING, that’s really all the time you need for a fantastic workout!

I’m also going to do a Saturday morning class. We will start this class at 8:45am the first week. We can discuss the first week whether or not those of you on Saturdays would prefer an earlier start time…this class can be a little more flexible, but I’d like to try an earlier start time so we can be done and get on with our Saturdays. Saturday is also a day that I may not be able to keep regularly, as child care issues could occasionally be an issue. Ii will post notice of cancellations as early as possible.

I do need to address the subject of bringing your children. For now, we are not able to allow this. We are meeting before the community center opens, and there is no chaperone for the play area and they are absolutely not allowed to be in there alone. The rest of the community center is off-limits…this is a non-negotiable rule of the community center. I understand this could mean some people are unable to attend but for now, we just cannot allow children to come along. We could potentially find a way to make it happen in the future but at the beginning, it is not going to be doable. I appreciate your understanding!

Here is the LINK for the sign up:

SIGN UP SHEET

Please sign up, and I will email/text you with the definite start date. I’m about 99% sure it’ll be Tuesday, but we might have to start Thursday instead! I’m excited to get started with everyone!

I have a special request – If you, or anyone you know, is able to knit and/or crochet and would be willing to teach a small group, would you please get a hold of me at the library? You can email me at library@cityoftioga.com, call me at (701)664-3191 option 2, or send me a message via the library’s Facebook page. Thanks in advance!

MON: open 10-7

TUE: open 10-7

WED: open 10-6 
** preschool story/craft time - 10:15am

THU: open 10-7

FRI: open 10-6

SAT: CLOSED...they will be setting up for the Halloween events on Sunday!

**I am still waiting on the next items for our new STEM/STEAM club activity…it will be soon!

**ADULTS – I am planning for our first book club to begin late next month, provided all the books get here. I will make another post this week about the details, and with a sign up sheet!**