Book Crush Party this Saturday!

Teen Book Crush Party!

Saturday, February 14th @ 2PM!

In the Bates Auditorium!

Celebrate your unrequited love for a fictional character, Target characters you love to hate, Rewrite romance novels to end badly, List your Top Ten Ways to Break up with Someone, and List your Top Ten Worst Dates all in a little book you will make yourself! Refreshments provided.
717-396-9313 extension124
akantner@lancaster.lib.pa.us
Look for me on Facebook!

Chinese New Year - February 7, 2008 marks the beginning of the Year of the Rat

Get ready to celebrate The Chinese New Year on February 7 and welcome the Year of the Rat. According to World Book Online Reference Center (which you can use at Power Library through our website ), "the Chinese New Year is the most important festival of the Chinese calendar. The date of the Chinese New Year is based on the cycles of the moon." Spending time with family is a big part of this holiday. "Places are set at the table for absent family members to symbolize the unity of the family. Special foods that symbolize good fortune for the new year are served. For example, rice cakes, called nian gao, are a popular food for New Year’s Eve dinners. The Chinese word nian means year, and gao means high. This food signifies achievement in the new year. Children bow to their parents and grandparents to wish them a long life. Gifts of money in red envelopes are given to children to wish them luck and wealth in the new year." Another popular part of the holiday includes special dances with dragon costumes as well as parades in many Chinese communities.

Chen, Tung-Ling Li. "Chinese New Year." World Book Online Reference Center. 2008. [Place of access.] 3 Feb. 2008

We have a variety of picture books, fiction and non-fiction books about Chinese New Year and the Chinese Culture. You can even find out more about rats. Check out our online card catalog to reserve a book or stop by Youth Services and we'd be happy to help you find some great reads about this exciting holiday. Have a prosperous New Year!

Here are a few links about this holiday and the Chinese calendar.
http://www.educ.uvic.ca/faculty/mroth/438/CHINA/chinese_new_year.html

http://webexhibits.org/calendars/calendar-chinese.html

Happy Holidays!

Happy Holidays from everyone here in the Youth Services Department.

...Including our Guinea Pigs!

Cottontail has Holiday Cheer.

Flopsy says Bah-Humbug!

Boo-tiful Costumes

We're in the Halloween Spirit here at the library. Even if you don't celebrate the holiday, we'll never pass up the opportunity to have a little fun. Have a peek at the costumes found today at the library.

Spider Witch

Hippie

Severus Snape (Potions Master)

Cat in the Hat

Witch



Gypsy/Pirate

Jester

Pumpkin

Virtual Pumpkins

Our thanks to Renee at the Library System of Lancaster County for pointing out this fun fall website to us...go create your very own virtual pumpkins!


http://www.coasttocoastam.com/timages/page/pumpkin_sim.html

Closed on Monday...

Lancaster Public Library and it's branches will be closed on Monday, October 8th for a Staff In-Service Day. Our regular hours will resume on Tuesday, October 9.

Homemade Valentines!

Are you in need of a fun way to commemorate Valentine's Day this year? The library is pleased to provide a table and supplies in the children's area for you to create your own personalized Valentine greetings for those you want to share with. In addition, a box is provided on the table for you to drop generically made greetings that will be delivered both to residents at Conestoga View and Millagro House here in Lancaster.

This unique opportunity gives you the chance to help yourself as well as other individuals in the area.

See you in 2007!

As of 5:00 p.m. today, Friday, the Library is CLOSED for the holiday weekend. Regular hours will resume on Tuesday, January 2nd at 9:00 a.m. From all of us at the library, have a safe and happy New Year's celebration, and we look forward to having you visit us throughout 2007!

Final Movie Marathon Rundown

We thank you for your attendance so far this week at our movie marathons, and we invite you to close out the week with our "Snow" theme tomorrow, at the following times:

9:30 a.m.-- Cool Runnings

11:15 a.m.-- Snow Dogs

1:00 p.m.-- Ice Princess

2:45 p.m.-- Snow Day

Warm wishes to you and yours!

From everyone at Lancaster Public Library, we wish you the most wonderful holiday season, and a successful start to 2007! For information on our holiday hours and schedule, please see our post from yesterday.

Movie Marathons to Start Tuesday

During the week between Christmas and New Year's, many kids are off from school, and families are looking for something to do. Next week, the library has your solution, as we present movie marathons on different themes each day Tuesday through Friday. On Tuesday, all of our films have a holiday theme. The brief descriptions of each film are from the Internet Movie Database (at www.imdb.com) a great source of move information anytime!

Here's the rundown for Tuesday's films:

9:00 a.m.-- It's a Wonderful Life (An angel helps a compassionate but despairingly frustrated businessman by showing what life would had been like if he never existed.)

Appx. 11:15 a.m.-- Miracle on 34th Street (A department store Santa tries to convince a little girl who doesn't believe in Santa Claus that he is Santa Claus, and winds up going on trial to prove who he is.)

Appx. 1:oo p.m.-- Scrooge (An old bitter miser is given a chance for redemption when he is haunted by ghosts on Christmas Eve.)

Appx. 2:30 p.m.--White Christmas (After leaving the Army after W.W.II, Bob Wallace and Phil Davis team up to become a top song-and-dance act. Davis plays matchmaker and introduces Wallace to a pair of beautiful sisters (Betty and Judy) who also have a song-and-dance act. When Betty and Judy travel to a Vermont lodge to perform a Christmas show, Wallace and Davis follow, only to find their former commander, General Waverly, is the lodge owner. A series of romantic mix-ups ensue as the performers try to help the General.)

All four of these films are rated "G" for enjoyment by your whole family! We hope to see you here!

Please remember to shop tomorrow!

For those of you now in the last phase of your Christmas shopping (only 9 more shopping days as of today) we remind you that if your holiday lists have someone looking for a book or other item that our partners at Barnes & Noble may have available for sale, tomorrow, Saturday, is the day to shop. Remember to take your voucher (which we hope you picked up at the library, or you can download a new one here: http://www.lancaster.lib.pa.us/lcl/lib/lcl/bnbfvoucher_0001.pdf) so that the Youth Services Department here at the library can benefit. We'll be putting any book fair funds to good use in 2007, so we look forward to your support tomorrow!

A few cool candids...

Here are a couple of photos from Wednesday night's snowglobe making program, where families of all age ranges participated and had a good time.

Another holiday film

As part of our busy December, we'll be showing "Prancer" this coming Monday at 6:30 p.m. to complete our holiday Movie Monday series.

Movie marathons are coming later in the month (more details on those next week) and in January, our movie nights become "Fairy Tale Theater."

Craft Series to Conclude...

Last night, we had a terrific response to our Snowglobe Making activity, with 30 people in attendance here at the library.

Families are invited to return next Wednesday, as we revive the annual tradition of making gingerbread houses at the library before the holidays. The gingerbread house making will start at 6:30 p.m. Pre-registration by next Tuesday is strongly, strongly encouraged so that we make sure to have enough supplies on hand. Pre-register your family by calling 239-2124.

Holiday Toy Recall

Just as an FYI for parents, Wal-Mart has issued a recall on a holiday toy. Check this link for more information...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16205505/

Holiday Craft Series Continues

12 people were here for our first ever Cookie Icing Night on Wednesday. Our "holiday craft and activity series" will be continuing next Wednesday, December the 13th, with your chance to make a homemade snow globe! We hope you'll join us for this event!

Happy Birthday, Santa...just a day late!

Did you know that yesterday was Santa's official birthday? One of our groups of librarians, the Association for Library Services to Children (ALSC) have put together some very cool web links with information on one of the most famous people in the world. Take a look through some of them!

The Saint Nicholas Center, http://www.stnicholascenter.org/Brix?pageID=23,
is certainly the Virgin Mother-in-Law of all Nicholas sites, with excellent historical, cultural, and artistic resources, including a kids section. A must for any internet stocking.

http://www.livius.org/ne-nn/nicholas/nicholas_of_myra1.html
The second-best site in the English speaking realm for information on the origin and evolution of "Saint Nicholas, Sinterklaas, Santa Claus" in the historical record and popular imagination.

The American Antiquarian Society has a fantastic online exhibit of the transformation and history of St. Nick, and Christmas in general, in the United States, with images of many rare and famous book covers and artwork.
http://www.americanantiquarian.org/Exhibitions/Christmas/index.htm

Did you know that Rev. Clement Moore LIED about the authorship of "The Night Before Christmas?" One Henry Livingston was the actual author, and you can read excerpts from the Don Foster book which proved this, here:
http://www.iment.com/maida/familytree/henry/sources/authorunknown.htm

The site also has a page of evidence for this literary hoax the Clement foisted upon a zillion editions of that poem. It has news articles from when this fraud was uncovered, as well as poetry by Livingston and Moore for students to decide for themselves.
See: http://www.iment.com/maida/familytree/henry/writinghenryjr.htm

It turns out that Livingston was the first person in the 13 Colonies to use the politically-incorrect phrase "Happy Christmas,"in a letter to his future wife in 1773:
http://www.iment.com/maida/familytree/henry/writing/letters/tosally73.htm

Another urban myth refuted: The modern image of Santa Claus - a jolly figure in a red-and-white suit - was created by Coca-Cola?
http://www.snopes.com/cokelore/santa.asp

Speaking of "The Real Thing," this site got permission from Coke to post many of the Santa advertisements which have appeared in the last 75 years.
http://www.hillmanweb.com/xmas/xmascoke.html

Create a Cool Christmas Cookie!

As part of this year's holiday celebrations, come to the library on Wednesday, December 6th at 6:30 p.m. for your chance to hand decorate and ice Christmas Cookies. It promises to be a lot of fun!

Make it a Muppet Holiday!

Our Monday Muppet Movie Nights have been a success thus far. We invite you to join us this Monday, December 4th at 6:30 when the Muppets celebrate the holiday with "A Muppet Christmas Carol," being shown in the Bates Auditorium.