What a whirlwind!

My posts have been lacking as of late, and I do apologize for it. Getting married seems to suck out every ounce of energy, time, and sanity from everyone involved! Now, I'm married and am slowly recovering from the exciting whirlwind, back to thinking more seriously about things in libraryland.

Before I left to get ready, I worked on a website for 2nd grade's Texas unit. You can check out the website I made here! Carrie and I wanted to make it user friendly, with all the info about Texas on one page. It's a little challenging to find facts about our great state, but we perused many encyclopedias and things to make sure we got what we needed. I cited things as best as I could.

This website project got me so excited; making things is what I love doing best. Weebly is so super easy and lets you be creative in ways you never thought possible. I have a personal website on there, too, which needs heavy updating! Now that I'm more confident in my Weebly skills, I may revisit that idea in the future.

Another fun thing we've all started doing is displaying what we're reading! We all have laminated pieces of paper saying "Mrs. So-and-so is reading ____". Mine is hanging on the back of my monitor, and is super awesome. I love how it is keeping me accountable to reading, and is a great conversation starter with the kiddos.

Right now, I'm finally reading A Series of Unfortunate Events. I know! I should have read it a long time ago. I wasn't sure what to think of it when it first came out, but I think I may like it better now than before. We'll see :)

FanGirl trend: Divergent

I thought I was done with trilogies, series, sagas, or whatever you want to call them. You know the type of books that are milked until they have sucked all the energy, love, and money out of their fans. Harry Potter was the most rewarding (obviously), while Twilight left me disgusted with myself. Had I really invested my time in a series I decided that I didn't like anymore? (I left out the word "hate" because I'm trying to be more positive, but my distaste in Twilight leans more towards that word than any other in the English language).

Plus, I'm older now. Who has time for that? Midnight releases (so 11th grade), t-shirts, Hot Topic paraphernalia. Pish-posh. Though I think I'm too mature for series books, I still watch cartoons and read children's books. Go figure.

Regardless, dystopian literature is my thing. It has been since I was in middle school; my love for the unknown, an underdog defeating an evil power--ah, my heart sings when it's being wrenched, apparently.

I had heard about the Divergent series, and how a movie was being made of it. Having been burned by the entirety of the Hunger Games experience, I'd decided to read at least the first book before the movie comes out. At least.

Turns out I pretty much love this series. I'm not a true fan, I suppose, as I've not caught up with the series (a little under halfway through Insurgent at the moment) but I'm excited to see where Tris and Four wind up. Ahh! This goes to show that anyone can enjoy series books, especially if there's enough action, suspense, and a little bit of romance (just a teeny bit, for now).

I love getting to put myself in the characters shoes, especially when you first enter this world. It's all so foreign and militaristic, but that's just society in general. The whole selection process for leaving your faction, and in turn your family, is terrifying. I don't know if I could have done what Tris did!

With that being said, I don't believe I would be Dauntless or Abnegation. I think I lean more towards Amity myself. And that is perfectly fine with me.

Peggy Sharp's Book Extravaganza (or so it should be called)

My first year at Greenhill, I had no idea about professional development or what that really meant. It had never applied in any job I'd had before, but assumed it was long lectures, or classes and workshops that would enhance my position greatly. Each workshop I attend has some benefits, though some are not always evident the minute you walk out of the seminar.

That's not how Peggy Sharp is.

I was told last year that she was one of the most phenomenal, excited educators who still worked with children. She LOVED books, had various lessons to go with books for varying ages, and had great ideas for book promotions, apps, and all sorts of things.

Fortunately, I was able to see her this past Monday through Region 10 Education Service Center in Richardson, Texas. Not far from our school, I always appreciate and glean a lot from the sessions there. It's exciting to get to meet all kinds of teachers, librarians, and assistants (like me!). Terry Roper is basically the head honcho when it comes to the library gatherings, and she always does a great job of finding presenters.

Is it sad the thing I was most excited about was getting her fabulous book of the latest children's titles, coded, of course, for their appropriateness for different ages, grades, and if there is additional lesson content in the back of said book. If you haven't been to see her, or cannot, find someone who has and grab their book! She seems to go a million miles an hour at times, which is why a highlighter and a package of sticky notes is essential to a successful Peggy Sharp seminar.

This was her first stop on her yearly book tour; it is also her last year of doing this! It's sad, but exciting for her. She's a very hard worker and should get to enjoy her time in retirement if that's what she pleases.

One of the ideas I love (and Carrie and I even loved last year) is printing a color picture of the cover of a book, and creating a "review folder". Inside the folder, which is a colorful file folder, are a few reviews from different journals and publications, as well as what other students have said. There is also the blurb from the inside jacket of the book. The most compelling part is the back of the folder has a copy of the first page of the book. Authors know that's where you must suck your readers in; they have just a limited amount of time to grab their audience.

Overall, her presentations are sharp as ever; she likes to engage the educators like she would students in a classroom. It helps solidify ideas that she's given to us.

I'm sad to see Dr. Sharp go, becoming a birder and natural-trail hiking guide; I am thankful that I have been able to see her and utilize her booklists, teaching, and her encouraging spirit in our library.

Vaguely library related

Sometimes, I feel that it's necessary to update with things that are of personal interest and vaguely library related. Or at least that's what I'm telling myself this very moment, as I type this.

Someone on the AISL list serve sent out a link to a fabulous dress. It's way out of my price range, as far as dresses or anything I would wear go. But it's so cute and I'm going to stalk it until it is 60% off.

Say whaaat?

Though I do like clothes, I don't know how this dress would look on me. I also don't know how I feel about being that nerdy. It is cute, though!

Mwahaha--Halloween!

I'm super excited to be able to decorate the larger library space this year. Now that we are included in the entirety of the library, we can stretch out a little, maybe put a few pumpkins, and some spooky gravemarkers. Um, well, I already did that part.

My desk looks awesome! (Except I cannot hang garland very well.)

My dead flowers. 

One side of spooky.

The other side of spooky!

Not so spooky, but just cute and fall-y.

Sea of (mostly) orange books!

Our "Must Reads" shelf. This month is all about the creepy/spooky/insert-Halloween-adjective-here.

I think it looks pretty darn awesome. I'm sad that I won't be here on Halloween or the day after (well, I'm getting married two days after...), but I hope everyone enjoys these decorations. Oh, and remember, when the winter holidays come around...

You haven't seen nothing yet.

This past week

The past week, or two, has been CRAZY busy in the absolute best way.

Except for Monday.

Monday was the day we had a flood in one of the conference rooms (it technically belongs to technology, but we also use it occasionally). There was a devilish, little white hose spewing water, along with the knocking around the contents of the cabinet it had lived in, which had been going on for perhaps a couple of days. Things in our work room were soaked!

We lost some cardboard boxes and some paper, which wasn't necessarily bad, but the water was standing in our work room! It had soaked through the carpet, a little into the library and an adjacent conference room, and a tiny bit in the Lower School Learning Commons. After the strain of that day, things were much better!

Carrie and I helped 4th grade with a really cool data research project. Well, she worked with them a lot--I helped when they were in the new Lower School Learning Commons. It was fun to help them search for things, or even encourage them to think of creative ways to search...even sometimes to the point of just telling them to maybe find something new. That was perhaps the most difficult part.

We also got a new book order in, found out we had a bunch of books randomly donated to us, and another stashed of books that had been donated who-knows-when that we are fortunate to have! Getting books ready is always a challenge. Now that I'm posted at the circulation desk, it's an ever exciting challenge to get everything covered while checking little ones out. I don't mind; it's kind of fun to make it a challenge against myself.

This following week will be a little lighter in some ways. We're preparing for our next book order, and next Monday, I get to go to Region 10 for a professional development course with Peggy Sharp! She is a very dedicated educator, who absolutely knows everything about books. Seriously. I'm pretty sure you could name any title at all, and she could give you a lesson plan or fun song to go with it.

I'm also working on the promotional video for the library. So far, I've taken about an hour or two of footage and need to set up times to interview people. This is a creative challenge for me and that is something I dearly love. Fingers crossed it will be awesome!

Libraryland Update

This week in some ways has gone by fast--the amount of classes we've seen some days, the Founder's Day rally (which is always fun!), and our book order's arrival have all helped us to push through our first 5 day week.

The beginning of this week was slower-paced. The letter days we started out with had large gaps in them, leaving us with lots of space to read about books, and sneak in some Insurgent reading time.

I'm trying to become more active in reading, and have started using GoodReads to log my books. It's so helpful! Though I think I created it a long time ago and pretty much had just one friend on it, I've found a bunch of people in my circle and love seeing what they're up to. It's exciting to find people excited about reading :)

Seriously, I feel sometimes that I am a bit slow at reading; I hate the stories to end, and the characters to go away. I know the Divergent trilogy will be ending this October, but I still am reading Insurgent soooo slooowwwly. That's okay, I guess. Just delaying the inevitable.

Another thing I've been reading, is one of the lesser-known subreddits on the social networking site Reddit. Granted, there are a lot of, how shall we say, weirdos on Reddit, but I've found the people on /r/libraries to be educated, excited, and passionate about their jobs. I kind of stumbled upon them on accident, through looking for craft resources online.

I may post a real live book review this weekend! Fingers crossed.