Mid-May Update

 Well, we're two weeks into May and we have survived. I still have not even started any of the summer reading prep but oh well. Our department to-do list was becoming unwieldy and I and my staff were getting overwhelmed, so I broke it down into smaller increments, put a lot of things on the back burner, and reminded them (and myself) that we do not have to have the entire summer planned and ready to go, just the first week or two!

So far this month we have cleared out the Activity Room (the construction project manager moved out of the temporary office he was using and we moved the last of the furniture in there), repainted the Quiet Room (twice - turns out the paint was NOT the same color as the walls and we couldn't just touch up sections), and cleared out the last of the supplies that were lying around. Mostly by shoving them into the Create Space.

I rewrote all of the text for the website, our welcome to the department brochure, and wrote material for the new newsletter. My associate then completely redid all of the youth sections of the website and updated the brochure. She's in the process of creating the newsletter. I also realized that there was a lot of confusion over summer events - we partner with a school organization and this summer we are doing a lot with our rec department and people were confused that some events were listed and some weren't and anyways we bumped up a back burner project and my associate created a community calendar. This is just a beginning - we eventually hope to add more community events in general, and she did an amazing job!

I finished the sports in my nonfiction weeding - only the 800s and 900s left to go, and I whittled down the pile of YA nonfiction as well (I went from 5 ranges to 1 and all the extra books have been in storage). I also managed to send May orders, with a separate order for teen materials after the TAB meeting, and also ordered the last of the replacements for our damaged items from the roof leak several months ago.

We've had 14 field trips so far, ranging in age from 4 year old kindergarten to 5th grade and in size from 10-75. It's been exhausting, but the kids are very excited about the new department and it's good to see them enjoy free play time. We debuted a new afternoon storytime - two of our Board members who are also teachers are running it and they went from 6 at the first one to 26 at the second! I also had a big group of (mostly middle school) teens at our Teen Advisory Board meeting and they had lots of suggestions for programs, displays, and decorating the Teen Space and they all took piles of books. Our school collaborator offered the first storytime at the library - she will resume in summer. Unfortunately, all of the issues with the program spaces that I've previously brought up were front and center and although people enjoyed it and we had new faces, it was definitely not ideal. The spaces are workable for a small group like 26 kids and parents. They're not functional for 70 kids and parents, with most of those being toddlers. We spent a long time looking at different resolutions and figured out a solution so she will still be able to offer the planned programs at the library this summer.

In building news, the new HVAC system is running! Unfortunately, we can't touch it until we've been trained on it, so temperatures vary widely. Even more unfortunately, for my temper and well-being, the hotter areas include, of course, the youth department. We've had to open windows to keep things bearable, especially in the program spaces, but there are no screens. Wasps at storytime are exciting, but not in a good way.

Left to do this month - one more week of programs, finish the collection projects, update all of the summer reading materials, plan at least the first weeks of summer reading programs, and the rest of the field trips. We still have giant piles of supplies in the Create Space, but we can't do anything about that until the city has time to come over and install our shelves. Everything else is on the back burner and we'll get to it when we get to it!