Jean Little Library: This week at the library; or, All Good Things Must Come to an End

What's happening - in my head and at the library

The last week of summer reading. I don't have the final numbers, but we passed 500 participants this year, which is up by about 30 or so kids. We had record attendance at programs, I hired two new staff members, and pretty much everybody got sick at least once.
I am bound and determined to go prize-free next summer, so we'll see if my director agrees and what the patron response is. I'm also going to try to extend summer reading into August but end programs at the end of July. I'm planning to end the big craft-program extravaganzas and have more performers and just to generally simplify things. What I'm hearing from the patrons is that they like the book as a prize so I'm going to focus on that.
I don't think I ever posted our final Neighborhoods layout. We finalized this at the beginning of summer and although I've only completely changed over two categories (Tales and Go) we've already seen a big increase in circulation. My seven categories and their subcategories can be seen here - I printed them out on colored paper and laminated them. We will be keeping a "general" picture book section and I still have to decide where the zoo books are going, otherwise I'm (hopefully) finished. Er, except for actually pulling all the other categories and deciding which to replace/update, going through the nonfiction, shifting the nonfiction, etc.

Programs

What the kids are reading

Spirit animals
Minecraft books - I am planning to buy the guidebooks that Scholastic is releasing this fall, but I'm really reluctant to purchase the self-published graphic novel/fiction things I've seen on Amazon. I already buy a lot of tie-in stuff and I don't really want to add one more thing.
Lego books
Arthur chapter books (took me forever to find the exact number he wanted - these are not serialized well!)
middle school boy and grandmother looking at the teen shelves - he had finished his required reading and was getting something for fun - I listed off genres until he said he liked adventure, then gave him Dragon and Thief
Divergent - she really, really wanted it right away and fortunately one of our neighboring libraries had some copies on the shelf, so I sent her there.
Fairy books - she wanted Rainbow Magic. I think I need to put something on the floor to lead people to the paperback series. They're not finding them in the new spot.
Tractor books. Yay Neighborhoods!
Books with fish - mom who is painting a nursery wall. She took Trout Trout A Fish Chant

Jean Little Library