You can check out fifty new books each visit.

Check out up to 50 beautifully illustrated books about dogs, pirates, monsters, famous people, the Titanic, dinosaurs, garbage trucks, pelicans, princesses, fairies and goblins each time you visit.


That'll motivate your child to read.

This Friday afternoon, May 18,

Come meet Rico and Karat the Bunny, our new GB Book Buddies! They'll be coming all summer, once or twice a week depending on interest, ready for you to read them a book. Rico is an eight month old labradoodle and Karat is...a rabbit.

Oh, those Fairy Books!  Who would have thought they lexiled higher than The Magic Tree House books -- and some of them higher than novels by James Patterson!  

You're Invited: Childrens Book Week Party, Friday, May 11 @ 4:00 pm

Special Guest Stars:
Carrot the Book Buddy Bunny 
& his Dog Sidekick will be here 
for Book Buddy Sign-ups (but they won't get cake.)
Celebrate

Childrens Book Week

with us

Friday, May 11 at 4:00 pm

Scavenger Duckhunt

cake with icing

Duck prizes 

Legos!!!

We are looking for

LEGOS

and

DUPLOS

for our summer reading program

so if you know any

LOST LONELY LEGOs

Please bring them in

and we’ll give them a good home.

Sunshine State Winner for 2011 - 2012

for ALL grades!!!

Sure, I loved reading about Alcatraz and his war with the Evil Librarians, and I loved Alvin Ho and the magic in The Magic Half, and those wonderful stories in Where the Mountain Meets the Moon...but I am so impressed that the book all of you thought the most amazing was this realistic, inspirational story. You readers are the best!


The new books are out, and here are the lists:
Grades 3 - 5

Sunshine State Young Reader’s Award Program

Master List of Titles 2012-13

Grades 3-5

Amato, Mary     Edgar Allan’s Official Crime Investigation Notebook

Holiday House                        2010                             AR 4.7   Lexile 650

Beaty, Andrea    Attack of the Fluffy Bunnies       

Amulet Books                         2010                            AR 5.7   Lexile 790

Behrens, Andy   The Fast and the Furriest    

Alfred A. Knopf                        2010                           AR 5.0   Lexile 660

Cronin, Doreen     The Trouble with Chickens          

Balzer + Bray                          2011                            AR 3.8    Lexile 570

Epstein, Adam & Jacobson, Andrew     The Familiars          

Harper                                     2010                            AR 5.0   Lexile 920    

George, Jessica Day     Tuesdays at the Castle       

Bloomsbury                             2011                            AR 6.4   Lexile not yet Published @ 850

Graff, Lisa     Sophie Simon Solves Them All            (PB To Be Published by September)

Farrar Straus Giroux               2010                            AR 3.4   Lexile 680

Holm, Jennifer     Turtle in Paradise  

Random House                       2010                            AR 4.1   Lexile 610

Jennings, Patrick     Guinea Dog       

Egmont USA                            2010                           AR 3.7   Lexile 600

Marino, Nan     Neil Armstrong is my Uncle and Other Lies Muscle Man McGinty Told Me           

(PB To Be Published by September)

Roaring Brook Press              2009                            AR 4.3   Lexile 670

O’Connor, Barbara      The Fantastic Secret of Owen Jester           

Farrar Straus Giroux               2010                            AR 4.7   Lexile 770

Selfors, Suzanne     Fortune’s Magic Farm   

Little, Brown                            2009                            AR 6.2   Lexile 680

Smith, Clete Barrett      Aliens on Vacation

Disney/Hyperion Books          2011                            AR 5.5   Lexile 770

West, Jacqueline     The Books of Elsewhere: The Shadows

Dial Books Young Readers    2010                            AR 5.1   Lexile 770

           

Winston, Sherri     President of the Whole Fifth Grade  (PB: To Be Published by September)

Little, Brown                            2010                            AR 5.8   Lexile 730

Grades 6-8

Allen, Crystal     How Lamar’s Bad Prank Won a Bubba-sized Trophy

             Balzer + Bray      2011    AR 5.4 Lexile 550

Carmichael, Clay    Wild Things                          

             Front Street     2009         AR 5.7   Lexile 890

Catanese, P.W.   Happenstance Found

             Aladdin      2009 AR 5.4   Lexile NC700

Flores-Galbis, Enrique     90 Miles to Havana  

              Roaring Brook Press      2010 AR 4.8    Lexile 790

Gaiman, Neil     The Graveyard Book

              HarperCollins      2008 AR 5.3   Lexile 820

Grant, Katy     Hide and Seek

              Peachtree      2010 AR 4.6   Lexile 700

Greenwald, Tommy     Charlie Joe Jackson’s Guide to Not Reading

             Roaring Brook Press      2011 AR 5.8   Lexile 830

Korman, Gordon     The Juvie Three

             Hyperion      2008 AR 4.9   Lexile NC730

Park, Linda Sue     A Long Walk to Water : Based on a True Story

             Clarion Books      2010 AR 5.0 Lexile 720

Patterson, James     The Dangerous Days of Daniel X

             Little, Brown      2008 AR 6.3   Lexile 680

Philbrick, Rodman      The Mostly True Adventures of Homer P. Figg

             Blue Sky Press 2009   AR 5.6   Lexile 950

Rallison, Janette     My Fair Godmother

             Walker      2009                      AR 5.2   Lexile 760

Rorby, Ginny      Lost in the River of Grass

              Carolrhoda Lab      2011               AR 4.2   Lexile 750

Vigilante, Danette     The Trouble with Half a Moon

              G.P. Putnam’s Sons 2011       AR 4.4   Lexile 600

Woods, Brenda     Saint Louis Armstrong Beach    

              Nancy Paulsen Books      2011             AR 4.1   Lexile 660

Summer Book Club

            

       You know what might be fun…

A  summer BOOK CLUB

     For SUPERREADERS

        --  like you – (we’ll need 6 to sign up)

                       To meet and talk

                                  and maybe eat cookies or something

           And you know what might be fun if we did Fairy Tales,

yeah, Fairy Tales

like

the first week we could do Cinderella.

    We could read Ella Enchanted and maybe A Little Princess because     that was kind of a “Cinderella” story and maybe some of you have read other books you’d like to suggest.

 It might be fun. Talk to Ms. T.

Coming soon... No, they're HERE!!!

We have all the Lego Ninjago books in...well, sort of in. We own them but they're checked out. So put your name down for them, or look for them on our spinners.  

We got these Bella Sara books. About magic horses. Any takers? They're in the regular juvenile books under the author's last name, Brown.

Some evil person just talked me into reading Fablehaven by Brandon Mull, and it was so exciting I had to skip through the last 30 pages to read the ending. 

April Fool's Day program for the Madeira Beach Rec Center

Great seeing the Madeira Beach Rec Center at Gulf Beaches today. Forget Easter -- April Fool's Day is right around the corner so the subject was funny stuff at the library.

• I read two favorites, The Boy Who Cried Ninja by Alex Latimer and Chicken Butt by Erica Perl. (Chicken Butt is sooo inappropriate, but amazingly, none of you kids seemed offended.)
• I showed some joke books and informed my visitors that they're almost impossible to find, hidden between sports, magic and poetry, so if you're looking for joke books in a library, just ask the librarian.
• I passed out some jokes. See full list below.  I gave them ten minutes to read them and practice them. BEFORE I passed them out, I should have read them one or two knock knock jokes myself. It was important to model the reading of a joke to them. I let them trade jokes in for ones they really liked, I let them practice on each other in whispers, and I told them it was important when they read one to punch up the pun so their listeners would get it. It was really fun.  Everyone wanted to read, some wanted to go twice, and even the little ones who really couldn't read their simple jokes were reading away. It was important for me to stand by their sides and play the straight man for them.  (Which dinosaur is the smartest? Me:  Which dinosaur is the smartest?) This makes sure everyone can hear and attention stays on the reader.
• I talked about an April Fool's Day joke I had made: a bottle of nail polish tipped over onto a piece of wax paper so that it looked like it had spilled on the counter. I talked about jokes and April Fool's Day stuff.
• Drum roll. I told them the camp counselor, Carrie, had offered to let me throw a pie in her face. We had talked about it before and I told her that really, she would tip it up into my face while I stood there with the pies ready, my arms at my side. But she didn't evidently trust me (!!!) and I told the kids I had to take Ms. Carrie and give her a talking to. I reassured her and the pie landed in my face. I must say, she was very timid about execution.  A pie -- and then another -- in the face is quite an experience. Always remember to bring a change of clothes that day. Lucky I had a clean shirt.
• We made a craft of trick rings. The girls used some large foam hearts I had, but the boys had to cover wooden beads with tinfoil. Then insert a pipe cleaner through the bead hole. This is your new "ring" and goes on the outside of your hand. On the inside of your hand, on the palm side, you put a small piece of sponge, and hold that in place with the rest of the pipe cleaner as you twist it closed. Then practice your trick routine.  For girls, show off your beautiful ring, "Look what I made in craft!" take the other person's hand, and then give them a W-E-T squeeze. For boys, say, "I have the ring of power! Feel my powerful grip, and then give them a W-E-T squeeze."

This was a GOOD TIME!!!

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Yeast.

Yeast who?

Yeast you can do is laugh at this joke

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Tibet.

Tibet who?

You want Tibet on who it is?

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Beth.

Beth who?

Beth wishes on your graduation.

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Meg

Meg who?

Meg up your mind.

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Cosmo.

Cosmo who?

You Cosmo trouble than anyone I know.

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Kenya.

Kenya who?

Kenya please keep quiet in there. I’m trying to sleep.

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Mile.

Mile who?

‘Mile, I’m going to take your picture.

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Wanda.

Wanda who?

Wanda buy some candy?

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Donut.

Donut who?

Donut be so dumb? You know very well who I am.

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Lettuce.

Lettuce who?

Lettuce in and we’ll be good.

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Justin.

Justin who?

Justin case I don’t see you, happy birthday!

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Owl.

Owl who?

Owl be your best friend if you open the door.

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Spook.

Spook who?

Spook-etti with meatballs is my favorite food.

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Ooze.

Ooze who?

Ooze gonna open the door?

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Oscar.

Oscar who?

Oscar what she wants for dinner.

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Leggo.

Leggo who?

Leggo the door – I’m trying to get in!

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Weirdo.

Weirdo who?

Weirdo you think you’re going?

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Yah.

Yah who?

Ride ‘em, cowboy!

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Gorilla.

Gorilla who?

Gorilla cheese sandwich for me, please.

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Phil.

Phil who?

Phil up the tub with warm water. I’m taking a bath.

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Voodoo.

Voodoo who?

Voodoo you think you’re talking to?

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Boo.

Boo who?

Oh, don’t cry, it’s only me.

Knock, knock.

Who’s there?

Annie.

Annie who?

Annie body wanna play with me?

What do you call a worried dinosaur?

A nervous Rex. (wreck)

How do you stop a charging dinosaur?

Take away his credit card!

What do you call a tyrannosaurus rex when it wears a cowboy hat and boots?

Tyrannosaurus Tex!

Did you hear the joke about the dinosaur egg?

It cracked me up!

What do you call a dinosaur that never gives up?

A try-try-try-ceratops.

What do you get when you cross a dinosaur with fireworks?

Dino-mite!

What do you call a fossil that doesn’t want to work?

Lazy bones.

What do you do when a dinosaur sneezes?

You get out of the way!

Why did the dinosaur put on a bandaid?

He had a dino-sore.

Why doesn’t the T.rex skeleton attack museum visitors?       

She has no guts!

Which dinosaur is the smartest?

Thesaurus!

What dinosaur loves pancakes?

Tri-syrup-tops!

What do monsters read in the newspaper?

The Horror-scope.

What happened to the two mad vampires?

They went a little batty.

What do you get if you cross a long-fanged, purple-spotted monster with a cat?

A town with no dogs.

How do you talk to a giant?

Use big words.

What do rabbits sing to each other once a year?

Hoppy Birthday.

What do you call a bear with no teeth?

A gummy bear.

Summer? You've GOT to be kidding!

You know how Santa makes those toys way in advance? That's how I start planning my summer reading program. I'm trying to come up with programs that will make your great brains even larger, and this summer I thought it would be A-M-A-Z-I-N-G if I were to reveal 

the greatest library secret ever.

Here's the deal with Dewey:  Supposedly, when Mr. Dewey was inventing his method of putting books (and for books, read KNOWLEDGE) in order, he thought like a caveman.

100: the caveman is trying to answer Who Am I? There are a lot of books there about astrology and dreams and that kind of thing.

200: Who Made Me? Religion and Mythology.

300: Who are all these Other People? Books about government, armies, etc.

See here for more info: Dewey and the Caveman

Each week, we'd have a performance about a different SUBJECT instead of just a different...whatever, and we'd cover all the Dewey categories.

It would work like this:
Week 1: 000s. Tony the Balloon Guy is going to give a lecture about the Dewey Decimal System using balloon art!  You've never seen this in your school library!
100s and 200s. Week 2, brought to you by Animal Rescue and the following books: Vet Volunteers, Puppy Place and Animal Ark.: 100s & 200s. The 200s are about religion and self help. I'm betting a visit from animals and a speaker from Animal Rescue will make you want to start turning those pages this summer. Because that's who we're going to try to adopt -- an animal shelter! 
Week 3: The Police!  Bring your eyes and brains to this session, because the police are going to talk about how to use them. Think you're good at noticing things? Get ready to be tricked.
Week 4: Star Wars & Legos. Ms. Travis is breaking the budget and buying  Legos! Extra points if you come in character. Not into Legos? Ms. Travis has some wooden castle kits for you to build!

Week 5: 500s. Mathemagic Night! Everyone gets a deck of cards, dice and dominos. And don't think you'll be playing with animal rummy cards! We'll be doing the real deal.
Week 6: Mad Science Would our summer be complete without them?

Week 7: Cesar Domico, our magician. (Didn't think we could have a summer reading program without him)

Week 8: Puppet Talent Show.  We'll make some of these cute little bozos, and while we're at it, we might as well learn VENTRILOQUISM!!! And I'm borrowing some gigantic puppets so we can put on our own show.


Week 9: Geocache at the Library. Using Dewey instead of a GPS, see if you can find the treasures hidden here!




Oh, and of course we'll be doing our online summer reading logs again!


Thanks for helping me MAKE IT WORK! I'd love to hear from you.

Halloween Party!!!

Marlena, the dead safety patrol. Thanks for saving my life at this Halloween Party, Marlena!  I couldn't have done it without you!

A beautiful pirate.

A Ninja with swagger.

Menu:

Graveyard salad bar. Mud (chocolate pudding), dirt (1/2 box chocolate Teddy Grahams, smushed), gummi worms, candy pumpkins, gruesome sprinkle candies from the dollar store.

Candy served in a black plastic goblet placed in a black cauldron. Add hot water to the cauldron and then drop a few small cubes of dry ice in. (Dry ice tips: break up into smaller chunks; it stops bubbling when its coated with frozen water, and that doesn't happen as quickly if you use a lot of little chunks instead of one  big one. I forgot to add green food coloring to the water, which would have made it bubble green vapor.) Big hit with the kids, of course, who accused me of trying to poison them, although they still, fascinated, reached through the dry ice vapors for the eyeball candies.  Marlena passed it around for me.

Witches' Toes. Cocktail franks look pretty disgusting right out of the package, but when you slice out a little nailbed from one end and decorate with blood red barbecue sauce, no Tinkerbell will touch them. Very tasty; full of protein and nitrates.

Craft:  Using permanent marker on styrofoam plates, the kids then attached white garbage bags cut into strips to the bottom. The finished product was a ghost with a nice swishy body who could hang outside.  The faces were very scary this year. The one I made was an innocent little surprised ghost, but I saw a lot of teeth on the ghosts they drew.


Story:  After the kids were all cranked up on sugar, I gathered them up for the last ten minutes for a ghost story.  They loved it!  It was my favorite The Man Who Tricked a Ghost by Laurence Yep, and they were a great audience.

How about Winter the Dolphin!!!

Aren't we proud!  We knew Winter back before he was a movie star! 

Winter the Dolphin August Adoption Update

Have you ever seen a dolphin paint? If not, you should stop by CMA sometime soon because Winter has been painting up a storm! She has been signing copies of her book Winter's Tail, and decorating picture frames for our summer interns as they prepare to return to school. How does she manage to paint you ask? It can be tough to imagine that a creature without hands, arms or legs could be capable of painting, but if you know anything about the staff and volunteers at Clearwater Marine Aquarium, you know we don’t only solve problems, we eat them for breakfast. The way we taught Winter to paint, along with our other dolphins, is by taking a pool ring, wrapping it with a soft but sturdy gauze material, and affixing a paintbrush to it. We then slide the ring around Winter’s rostrum (remember that’s her beak) and ask her to move her head around. We hold a book or canvas up to this moving paintbrush and presto! Dolphin Art! Paintings by Winter are available at CMA's gift shop, and many days you can catch her at her hobby in the main pool!

 

Skippyjon Jones Party

On Friday, September 23 @ 4:00. 

we had a fun Skippyjon Jones Party.

Thanks for coming!

We made tissue paper flowers, learned some Spanish, listened to some Skippyjon Jones stories, and ate cheese & crackers.

Congratulations to Brannen on guessing estimating the number of jelly beans in the jar. He was right on!

And thanks again to everyone who let me paint kitty whiskers on your faces! I hope it washed off!

Stopping by the library

Brannen and Delaney with the reading bear.

I thought I would be sooooo lonely when school started, but in the last two days I've seen Danny & Ashley & Brannen & Delaney & lots & lots of good friends.

The Last Day of Summer Party

The Last Day of Summer Party

Friday, August 19 at 4:00

Enjoy a root beer float with us &

play Ms. Travis’

You Really Wouldn’t Want

to be Going to a One Room Schoolhouse

game

Suncoast Seabird Sanctuary

we did it we did it we did it
Suncoast Seabird Sanctuary
I went to the Suncoast Seabird Sanctuary last night, and sure enough, there was Miss Kitty. She lives in a big cage with three other owls as you come in. She seemed asleep when I first started watching her, and she was completely ignoring the big dead white rat draped over a branch in front of her. But while I watched, she opened her eyes, spun her head around, and stared at me. I said, "Hey, Ms. Kitty! Enjoy the rat!  It's a gift from the kids at Gulf Beaches Public Library!" And I swear she winked at me.

YES!!!  We Did it!

 

Little Gizmo came to visit today, and even though she didn't fly loose, she was pretty darn cute. And when I checked reading-rewards at the end of the day, we were OVER 40,000 minutes!  Yes!!!

Ms. Kitty is now officially adopted by the

Gulf Beaches Public Library

Crystal in China!!!

What's China really like when you are Chinese? Crystal will tell all.  We're dishing up the latest -- with noodles. Many thanks to our corporate sponsor, Zom Hee, for supplying us with their delicious noodles to practice chopsticks. Check out their tasty menu at www.zomhee.com. I never knew how to hold them before. Now I can eat noodles with chopsticks!

Get in the mood!
Go to http://www.usdiner.com/Chinese/ and print out your name in Chinese! Here's the name tag I'll be wearing today. Cool, huh?

Mad Science Summer Reading, Tuesday, July 19 at 2:00

We were spinning, popping and booming this week at Gulf Beaches Public Library!

Ooh, this green slime feels delightful!

No, I'm not scared of that genie in the test tube. Not at all.

Awaiting the Big Boom!

The hard part is stopping...

Face Painting Workshop

This is the before picture: clean water, fresh brushes, new packs of paint. Oh yeah, and clean faces.

 Then Vic arrived and things started happening fast. He demonstrated strokes and sponge work on Sam.

And Ben's mother did a fantastic makeover on Ben!

Annie looks look the sweetie that she is, doesn't she?

And hearts look great on this young lady too!

Most of the faces were beautiful...

Some were funny...

 

And then some were just plain horrible!

 But all in all, we had a great time, and many, many thanks go to Vic for sharing his expertise AND his balloons with us! Vic, you are the soul of generosity!

Do-It-Yourself Facepainting Summer Reading Program, Tuesday July 12 @ 2:00

Puppet workshop, Tuesday, July 5

Jerry Bickel from Bits 'n' Pieces Puppet Theater showed us how to draw cats (or draw their heads anyway -- mean square shaped heads, elegant triangular heads, goofy round heads) make puppets out of them -- really just some tape and a piece of cloth! -- and be cats. I heard some brilliant mewing and meowing. Great job, cat puppeteers!
First we drew cat heads.
Then we decorated them & gave them bodies.

Now they're gorgeous.

Jerry is acting out the story with the old woman and the old man whose lives would be perfect if they had a nice cat.

How many cats were there?  Oh, yeah, hundreds of cats...