Why did the chicken
go to the library?
To check out a
bawk bawk bawk!
Now that you’ve picked yourself up off the floor, there’s a reason for all this hilarity. The theme for this year’s Summer Reading Program is “Funny Business”, and our new summer student employees have been oiling up their funny bones.
The Summer Reading Club is all about summer activities, and reading logs for the happily bookish (Why is the library the tallest building? Because it has the most stories). This year’s theme celebrates both, with a twist of humour.
When I spoke to Hannah and Becca, they were busy planning activities for “That’s Gross” week. Kids who are registered for the Summer Reading Club that week can expect to make their own slime, or take part in a “gross trivia” game show.
“We’re trying to find all the ways to gross out the kids,” laughs Hannah, who has paradoxically nicknamed herself President of Happiness and Hugs. Eeew…gross!
Becca—AKA President of Bravery and Bubbles — is, like Hannah, happy to have a summer job — a little comic relief from the serious business of being a student. She’s heading into her fifth year of a BFA majoring in drama at the University of Lethbridge, where she’s been event coordinator for the Theatre Arts Society, among other things.
Hannah “Huggs” Lunn is a full time student at UBC in the First Nations Studies program with the intention of taking the West Kootenay Teacher Education Program. She has a background in theatre, she’s travelled a ton, she’s helped build a house for a Honduran family, and she’s a certified yoga instructor.
Yoga Day is one of the special activities planned (really funny if you get stuck in your pretzel pose). Skateboarding is also in the works (watch your funny bone!) In fact, watch the website — www.nelsonlibrary.ca/kids — for all the funny stuff (and where the banana peels are all virtual).
Why did the librarian slip and fall on the library floor?
Because she was in the non-friction section.
Ouch.
I love the sudden injection of youthful spirit, smarts, and creativity into our summer program. Watching Becca and Hannah plot — er, plan — a summer of funny business for kids aged three to 12, it’s clear they are both funny and fabulous.
Overseeing it all is Children’s Services Coordinator Nancy Radonich, an old dog with endless tricks who knows that outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend, but inside of a dog, it’s too dark to read (as told to her personally by Groucho Marx).
Registration for Summer Reading Club activities and Reading Log books begins June 23, online or in the library. And then the fun(ny) begins.
Mondays feature a Theatre Club for nine to 12 year olds from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays from 1 to 2 p.m. there’s hijinks for pre-schoolers aged three to five. Wednesdays there are two different sessions for the six to eight set. Thursdays offer special events for all ages (Groucho glasses optional), and Fridays are Lego drop-in for everyone. Fridays from 1 to 2 p.m. is Tweentime for nine to 12 year olds.
There are more details to come, and the website is a great way to get it all: nelsonlibrary.ca/kids and through our Facebook page (be our friend!)
It all kicks off July 3 with a party full of fun, funny, musical mayhem with Hugs, Bubbles, Mr. Mojo and a whole lot of kids ready to laugh all summer long. Oh yeah, and learn cool stuff and read a few books, too.
Knock knock.
Who’s there?
Redda.
Redda who?
Read a lot of books this summer!
If you think your library is up to some funny business, well, you’d be right.
— Anne DeGrace is the adult services coordinator at the Nelson Public Library. Check This Out runs every other week. For more information go to www.nelsonlibrary.ca.