The Art of Playing Catch-up

My topic today is the Summer Celebration and the fun that was had by over 500 children and adults on June 5th.  This update is a week late, I know, but I have a good excuse - I was taking a bit of much-needed R&R.  Our Summer Reading theme this year is "Be Creative @ HPL" and there was some real creativity on display.  If you come in to the Children's Department, you can see the mural that was painted by the kids during the celebration.  The Art Car is very nicely decorated as well and you will see that if you come down town for the 4th of July parade.

Now storytimes are in full-swing, we have reading programs going for all ages, and everyone is busy with the Summer rush.  Tomorrow is staff day for adding their decorations to the art car too!  I finally cleared my inbox this afternoon, got the tree trimmer scheduled to remove the fallen tree in my backyard, but thankfully, the library sustained no damage from Monday evening's storm.  So all-in-all, life is good for me. And do you see what I did there?  With the title and the post topic?  "Art" - we're doing art.  I'm playing "catch-up" after a vacation...  OK,  I know, lame.

The Return of the Self -Check!

I know I have been using a lot of exclamation points lately, so I apologize for my reckless enthusiasm. In my defense, there has been an avalanche of things to be excited about. Not least is today's arrival of our new self-check machines. Here are a couple of pictures of the new machine over in the adult area:

We will install the second unit in the Children's Department after our big summer reading program kick-off celebration this Friday.

These machines are very easy to use with simple, touch-screen instructions. Besides checking out items, you can log in to view your account status using your PIN. Next time you are in, give them a try. Please do not hesitate to ask for help should you need it!

Be Creative! Summer Fun

School is out, the days are warm - Summer Reading and Summer Celebration at the library are upon us!  One of the biggest, most time-consuming, and most rewarding and fun activities that the library does is happening next Friday, June 5th.  Hutchinson Public Library's Summer Celebration happens from 9am to 11:30am on that day.  We use this big launch party each year to get kids excited about reading during the summer.  Our goal is to keep children interested in reading during summer vacation.  Our theme this year is "Be Creative" at  the Hutchinson Public Library.  We're going to feature a wide variety of arts at the Celebration and throughout the summer programming.  We are even creating an art car for the library to enter into the Hutchfest parade!

The Summer Reading programs are recommended for children ages 3-8.  In July we will also have Family Times twice each week with fun for the whole family.  Please check out what is available - and it is all free!

We also have a program set up for young adults - May 26th through July 30th.  Prizes and fun for tweens and teens when they come in and sign up.

Did you know that there is also a summer reading program for adults?  This summer we will be encouraging grown-ups to "Master the Art of Reading".  Adults can sign up to read and become eligible for fun prizes.

I feel tired just reading back over this list of activity!  But it is a good tired because I know that what we are trying to do here is emphasize the fun of reading, even if you might accidentally learn something new or improve your skills in the process!

Wowbrary is Live! (Plus a fascinating map)

The new Wowbrary service began yesterday with Hutchinson Public Library's initial email newsletter, which you can view here. This is a great new tool, I think. It features all the new items that come in to the library each week. It provides a view of the end-results of what many consider to be the very core of what a library is: civilization's longest-working knowledge accumulation machine. The Hutchinson Public Library might not be as large or have the same vast resources as some, but we do the same thing here and now that all libraries great and small have done for many centuries. We collect things in one spot, now both on paper and in electronic formats, for the purpose of providing people with a handy "set" of all human knowledge. Specifically, our purpose is of course to provide for the information needs of the citizens of Hutchinson and the surrounding areas. Though that might make it seem like I have a lofty view of what our little library means in the grand scheme of things, I believe it to be true.

Grandiose, lofty ideas aside, I encourage you to sign up for Wowbrary and receive a weekly snapshot of what we are collecting.

On to the "fascinating map" portion of this post. Some people probably know that I am something of a pirate aficionado. (Don't forget Talk Like A Pirate Day, September 19th this year!) Mostly I've read about and studied the 17th and 18th century variety of pirate, but I have been following the current rise in piracy off the Horn of Africa with interest. And one of the reasons I have included the Kansas Government Information blog over there on the right is for posts like their most recent one on maritime piracy. A link they included goes to this "live" map of pirate attacks, both successful and attempted around the world. You can click on a map marker and find out the full details of each incident.

So, thank you for visiting, have fun viewing piracy from the safety of your computer screen, and please consider signing up for Wowbrary, it's useful, I promise!

New Tools!

Several posts back I wrote a bit about learning and using new technology. I have also mentioned in more than one post that HPL is trying some new things, including opening a new technology training lab. Recently, some of our staff members have experimented with what are now practically passe social networking tools, Facebook and Twitter.

These recent additions to our toolset, Wowbrary, Facebook, and Twitter have been undertaken in an attempt to better communicate with you, our patrons. On this blog, I created a group of "HPL Links" just below the subscription area at the upper right of the page to help me (and you too) keep track of these tools. You can go to these links, including the HPL website , and find all sorts of useful information about upcoming events, new items, and other news about your library.

Please help us by letting friends and relatives know about these ways of interacting with the library and try them yourself.

Technology Training Lab

As of May 12th the new lab has been officially opened!

What a great evening we had, and look at the crowd! OK, so it was a little warm, but the air conditioning problem turned out to be an easy fix and it is now cool and comfy in the new lab. Tuesday evening was our big kick-off for the new training lab space and we had 72 visitors come through. Kristine, our computer trainer, showcased the new series of classes she's designed. We all got to see the fruits of not only her labors, but the results of all the hard work put in by our great IT and maintenance departments.

I could not be happier with the results. It was a long, hard road to get to this point and many unexpected turns were taken, but we now have a facility dedicated to technology learning. What that means in practical terms is that the public computers will be open to the public all the time now - no more closings for training classes. This reduces headaches for staff and patrons alike. It means more flexibility for times when training can occur, including weekends. It offers the possibility for better hands-on training for staff as we add new tools to make the library better.

If you are interested in learning more about your computer, its software, the Internet, or free online tools check here to register for upcoming classes.

New Service - Wowbrary

The Hutchinson Public Library will offer a new service starting May 20th.  In partnership with the library service company "Wowbrary", patrons of HPL who have an email account can sign up for a weekly newsletter showing the new items added to the collection for the past week.  The Wowbrary service is provided by libraries all over the country, such as the San Antonio Public Library and the New York Public Library.  Samples of what the newsletter looks like can be found here (SAPL) and here (NYPL).

One of the best things about the service is that the newsletters directly link you to the HPL catalog.  You see something you want, click the title and you are sent to the library catalog to place a hold.  It even includes links to Amazon reviews if you want to see what other people have to say about the title.  Another great customization feature is that we will be able to provide links to upcoming library events as part of the newsletter.

If you are interested, you can read more about it here in Wowbrary's FAQ.  If you like what you see, please sign up.  I think this will be a great tool for HPL to showcase the many great new books, CDs, DVDs, etc. that we add to our collection all the time.