frantic monster, HJ does the hokey pokey and then she takes a very long nap

Last week’s storytime was a little bit disastrous, a little bit awesome.

The first storytime was a train wreck.  Since last summer, I’ve been connecting my laptop to the tv with an HDMI cable and haven’t had a single problem with it.  Until last week, that is.  I use the slideshow for lyrics, music, and literacy skills only.  For whatever reason, my laptop connected to the tv just fine, and then, with one minute to go before storytime, it disconnected.  Thankfully, restarting the computer solved the problem.  Unfortunately, by the time it restarted, I was three minutes behind, and three minutes is a big deal when it comes to storytimes.  While I was restarting the computer and welcoming everyone, a mom approached me and asked she could leave her kid in the room while she worked on the computers.  I gave her a very firm no and explained why.  First, kids cannot be unattended if they are seven and younger.  Second, storytime is just as much for the adults as it is for the children.

As you can imagine, I was a tiny bit frazzled as I began storytime.  The one, positive moment came when I read, Where the Wild Things Are. Everyone was absolutely, utterly entranced.  It was magical.



We also sang the preschool hello song, which is different than my hello song and “If You’re a Monster and You Know It,” which was just ok.

After the first book, I got out the parachute and did a quick scan of the crowd. I like to make sure every kid and adult are working together to form a circle and grab the parachute.  That’s when I noticed that the mom I spoke with earlier had indeed, left her child in the room.  I stopped storytime, went looking for mom, who was right outside the room, and made a motion for her to come inside.  I couldn’t do much more because there was parachute chaos going on.

Mom never came inside.  I made a very quick decision to continue storytime and have another conversation with the parent afterwards.  Needless to say I was pretty darn frustrated and even more frazzled, but I managed to get through the rest of the storytime and only messed up Pete the Cat: Five Pumpkins, which is a book you sing.  I couldn’t sing the melody to save my life even though I had it memorized.

Sadly, I didn’t enjoy the first storytime much.  After the parachute was folded up into a “popcorn sandwich,” a little girl was still absolutely devastated that it was being put away.  So while she intermittently cried, I fumbled my way through the rest of the books and songs.  It was a mess.

After the first storytime I collected myself, and then very sweetly had the same conversation with the mom who didn’t participate in storytime with her child.  She not only apologized, but found me a couple hours later and apologized again.

The second storytime went much better and everyone, including myself, enjoyed it immensely.  Because it was my coworker’s storytime, I asked her which elements she would like me to keep.  I sang “If You Want to Hear a Story,” which is her hello song.  I also did the crazy clap fingerplay, and a flannel board goodbye rhyme, which is so stinking adorable, it’s on my radar for next spring.  Basically you say, "See you later..." and wait for everyone to say alligator.  Then, "After a while..." Crocodile!  They loved it.  I loved it.

My coworker also said that the kids can sit there and listen to several stories before growing bored and that she would occasionally ask if they wanted to keep reading or stop for a song.  Such an interesting, organic approach! So I brought four books to read and fully expected to only read three.  Both groups of kids surprised me by picking the book over the song.  In addition to the two books I mentioned earlier, I also brought Happy Pumpkin Day, Mouse, and Hush, Little Monster. The second storytime’s favorite was “Happy Pumpkin Day, Mouse.”

Overall, there is much positivity to glean from both storytimes.  Next time I will keep a better eye out for disappearing adults and also prepare a list of talking points in case it comes up again.  I think I said all the right things and even checked with a manager before having the second conversation with the patron.  However, going over the talking points for why we have smaller, ticketed storytimes prior to a desk shift during coworkers’ storytimes has been very helpful.

Oh my goodness, I almost forgot the hokey pokey.  We pretended to be monsters, and the kids loved it.  They chose fangs and claws and feet.  Next week it's back to toddler storytime and we're reading books about counting together!

Happy Halloween!

We carved our pumpkins just in time this year.

I'm sure it's pretty obvious which pumpkin is Rachel's and which one is the one Robert and I worked on together.

there'll be bluebirds over the white cliffs of Dover

Last spring, toward the end of sweater season, I lost a button on my favorite sweater.  Because it's such a special sweater and goes with any scarf I throw at it, I've been looking for the perfect buttons for months.

I started by digging through all my buttons, then looked at buttons every time I was at any kind of store that had them, and then finally found these:

Just in time for cold weather!

stopping to smell the flowers and fall into ponds

Last weekend was lovely.  Saturday morning Robert and I took Ella to the Overland Park Arboretum and Botanical Gardens.  Ella really did "stop to smell the flowers" several times, much to the delight of the other visitors.  

This was our favorite flower.  

Saturday afternoon Robert and I took Margo and Josie to a different park and they went swimming for the first time.  Well, Josie definitely went swimming.  Margo chose to sit in the water and shoot me death stares.  At this park there was a pond with a stepping stone path over a shallow part of the pond.  Because my sense of humor is a touch diabolical, I decided to walk each of them over the stepping stones (Robert sat in the car with whichever dog wasn't being walked).  According to bystanders (we had a crowd), Margo jumped in the first time.  I was too busy trying to get myself across to notice this.  After jumping in, Margo sat in the water and stared at me, as if she was saying, "you got me into the mess lady, get me out of it."  So I scooped her up and put her on the stepping stones again.  She definitely fell in the second time, and once again, she sat in the water and gave me the exact same stare.  It's possible Josie will have to teach her how to swim.  Josie fell in the first time, allowed me to scoop her out, and then jumped in towards the end and swam the rest of the way.  Her attitude was clearly, "I'm over these stupid stepping stones.  There's got to be an easier way to do this."  It was hilarious.  

On Sunday I took Ella for a wagon ride in a different neighborhood and we found a Little Free Library with dog biscuits!

Robert also spent some time playing fetch with Josie while I struggled to keep Margo entertained.  Margo hasn't figured out the fetch thing out yet, which is ok.  What isn't ok is that she grabs the ball away from Josie like a jerk, and then runs away with the ball so Josie can't bring the ball back.  It's hilarious though.

I definitely have a favorite puppy at this point.  Something about the way Margo looks at me lights me up.  She also enjoys walks as much as I do, maybe even more.  And when I let them out to potty first thing in the morning, she likes to sit with me on the porch for a few minutes for cuddles and hugs. 

Ella and the puppy nuggets

Have I told you I've been leash training the puppies?  It has been tough work, but a couple days ago Miss Margo officially made it to Walking Buddy status.  I started leash training them by taking them to the end of the street and back, then around one block, two blocks.  Now we go as long as they want, or until they lose focus.  They know their names really well and also how to sit.  They are learning 'leave it,' which is the command I use for pretty much everything and everybody, from squirrels to humans.  They are also doing well with the 'stay' command.  Though I've tried to walk them together, they just get too distracted and forget their manners.  Because of this, Robert sits with one puppy while I walk the other and then we swap.  Robert has successfully taught Josie how to play ball and learned that Margo likes to fetch but prefers something that's not a tennis ball.  

What does Ella think about all this?  Well, she still gets her wagon rides.  Plus it's possible she may even like the little puppy nuggets.

These videos were caught by our security cameras.  Enjoy!

hokey pokey bossy toddler style

At the first storytime last week everyone was eerily quiet and zombie-like, including myself.  Sadly last week's theme was "Be Who You Are" and not the Boo-tiful Books theme I'm doing next week.

Because we couldn't pretend to be zombies the entire thirty minutes, I decided to be louder and weirder in the hopes the zombies would turn into toddlers.  It worked a little too well.  By the time we began reading the second book everyone was so wound up, they struggled to pay attention.  But no matter, we still had a wonderful time.  The toddlers in my second storytime started out a little shy but warmed up to me by the end of it.

I began storytime with our hello song, Raffi's Shake My Sillies Out, and Five Little Hot Dogs.  In the first storytime, one little boy despised the BAM part of the hot dog rhyme and put his hands over his ears each time we came to the word.

After the first songs and rhyme, we did a quieting-down fingerplay and read Be Who You Are by Todd Parr, which both storytimes liked.

After Be Who You Are, I brought out the shaker eggs and encouraged everyone to take two this time.  There's a reason we have two hands, right?  We did a few shaker egg warm-ups - high and low, soft and loud etc.), followed by the songs, Roly Poly and one of my standbys - Everyone Can Shake/Tap/Clap/Wave.  I've done the Roly Poly song before but not with shaker eggs and this song is the reason I encouraged everyone to take two eggs.  While moving our hands up and down, out and in, we shook also shook the eggs.  I think it went well.  While we were doing the roly poly song in the second storytime, one toddler put her eggs on her ears.  I decided to go with it and everyone chose funny places to put their eggs (nose, knees etc.).  The next time I use shaker eggs I'm definitely going to include this in some way.


After we put the eggs away and did a quieting-down fingerplay, I read Little Humans by Brandon Stanton.  By this point, the first storytime had gone from zombies to kangaroos, and were a little too wound up to fully engage with the story.  The second storytime loved this book.  They had fun shouting out what the kids were doing or wearing.  One toddler kept saying "Lola" while I was reading both books, and early on her mom told me that "Lola" was her daughter's way of saying "dog," since they had a dog named Lola.



Before we sang our goodbye song, we sang If You're Happy and You Know It chicken style.  I found an absolutely hilarious version of this song in one of my coworker's music files and cannot find it anywhere else.  Basically it sounds like a bunch of chickens singing this song.  You flap your wings, fluff your feathers, and squawk real loud.  Sadly, I'm the only who loved this song.  The first storytime, as restless as they were, grew silent and looked at me like I was crazy when I played the song.  I didn't play it during the second storytime.  But the singing chickens will return someday.  There's just gotta be a group of toddlers who love them as much as I do.

We also sang a quick counting song called Ten Little Bubbles.

It goes like this:

One little, two little, three little bubbles.
Four little, five little, six little bubbles.
Seven little, eight little, nine little bubbles.
Ten little bubbles go pop pop pop.

You clap each time you sing the word pop.  It's a lot of fun.  In my first storytime a grandma loved it so much she wrote down the name of it to look up.  Sadly, I couldn't find it when I searched for it.  It was such a hit in my second storytime that a little girl sang it all the way out the room and for about an hour afterwards while she played in our 6 by 6 space.

Because our theme was about celebrating who we are, I asked the toddlers which parts of our body we were going to hokey pokey with.  I was hopeful for silly answers - elbows, noses, knees, that sort of thing.  Instead they were puzzled by this, which puzzles me because it seems simpler than the last few weeks of storytime.  In the second storytime a little girl decided to take control of the situation and help everyone decide what to do next.  This was funny because she was very bossy and serious about it, and she stayed 100% true to the original hokey pokey (arms, legs, head, whole self).

Overall, it was a fun storytime.  Next week the theme is boo-tiful books, which all have something to do with a major holiday that's around the corner but none of the books directly say so.  I'm also swapping storytimes with a coworker next week.  She's doing my toddler storytime and I'm doing her preschool storytime.  We'll have a terror-ific time I'm sure!

Chicka Chicka Boom Boom

I just took down our Chicka Chicka Boom Boom display, which was a huge hit.  

I re-purposed the letters for the next bulletin board, which I'll share when it looks a bit more completed.

squishing macaroons into brownie batter

Though it feels like my days have been a nonstop cycle of planning for storytimes, giving the storytimes, walking the dogs, sleeping (barely) and rushing to squeeze in chores, I've also been spending a fair amount of time in the kitchen.

For a coworker's birthday I made pumpkin-oat chocolate chip cookies that another coworker made a couple times when we both worked at the same branch.  I think it's ok to say the cookies were just as good as hers.  This is the exact recipe, and I wouldn't change a thing.  They're super moist, with just enough chocolate, and they were gone by the end of the day.

That same morning, because I'm insane, I also made cinnamon rolls from scratch, which is something I've always wanted to do.  Let me start by saying I can live without cinnamon rolls.  They don't really have any of my favorite sweet flavors - lemon, chocolate, or coconut.  And there's other breakfast foods I'd rather eat - eggs or oatmeal to name a couple.  But I've been wanting to make them for a few reasons. First, Robert loves cinnamon rolls.  Second, I love the whole idea of making them - covering a rectangle of dough with stuff and then rolling it up and looking at the swirls after it's been cut.  It's darn-near magic!

Anyways, the cinnamon rolls were pretty good as far as cinnamon rolls go.  The icing this recipe called for was atrocious though.  Even Robert wasn't a fan.  So next time maybe I can talk Robert into orange and chocolate rolls?  We'll see.

This is the recipe I used.  I have no idea what magazine I found it in.

I also made a so-so beef and vegetable soup from a recipe I wouldn't use again, pumpkin coffee creamer that is far too good, biscuits I totally messed up and refuse to say anything else about, and these things called coconut macaroon brownie cupcakes with chocolate ganache, which came from the book, Bake It in a Cupcake.  It was a very long-winded recipe that I think I've figured out an easier way to make next time.  Next time I will bake a thin sheet of coconut macaroons.  Then I'll make a brownie batter that has a bit more chocolate flavor (because I'm a chocolate monster).  Then I'll fill a pan halfway with brownie batter, then add the sheet of coconut macaroons, and another layer of brownie batter.  And because the brownie batter will have a better chocolate flavor, the ganache can be skipped.  But the cupcakes I made were pretty great, and I would have never come up with the idea on my own.  

Squishing the macaroons into the batter was surprisingly cathartic and brought me much joy.

Once again, I'm not sure what magazine this is, but this is the pumpkin creamer we've been using.  As you can see, it is incredibly sinful.  

Next time I'm in the kitchen I'm going to make biscuits that actually look like biscuits!   

you put your wipers in

Storytime was a giant success this week.  A friend of mine brought her eleven-month old to the first storytime, which was his first storytime, and he smiled the entire time.

After our hello song, we sang Raffi's Shake My Sillies Out, which is a huge hit at my branch.  It was a permanent fixture of the preschool storytime last spring.  Both the storytimes were thrilled to hear it again.



After Raffi's song and one of my good ol' regular fingerplays, we read/sang Old MacDonald Had a Truck, which was hands down, the favorite thing in both storytimes.  Both groups sang the entire book with me, and it was such a beautiful, fun experience.  I was really surprised when they persisted through the sounds of each vehicle, even though the words were smaller and sometimes tongue twisters.  In my second storytime there was a dad who looked just like a farmer.  He was wearing a red and black plaid shirt with jeans.  He also sang with a low, lovely voice that was just as clear as could be.

After our first book, I pointed to the giant circle I had taped on the floor earlier that morning and asked if anyone knew why it was there.  There were lots of excited murmurs, which completely exploded into shrieks of joy when I unfurled the parachute.  We did a few exercises with the parachute - lifting, holding it in different hands, and shaking it like wild people.  This was followed by Wheels on the Bus and London Bridge is Falling Down.  In the London Bridge song, I had all the toddlers go underneath the parachute while the adults stood on the outside to lift, lower, and wave the parachute over the toddlers' heads.  I used a recording of this song, and it had a few long musical parts where there wasn't any instruction.  The toddlers just stared at us with confused faces while we waited for the next instruction.  Because of these awkward moments, next time we'll just sing it without music.  The last song we did with the parachute was the popcorn song by Barenaked Ladies.  In the first storytime I tossed "popcorn," aka beanbags, on the parachute and everyone popped the popcorn, aka shaking the crap out of the parachute.  In the second storytime, I let eveyone toss a piece of "popcorn," which was a lot more fun.  The last time I used the parachute and we did the popcorn thing, I used beach balls.  Though they didn't stay on for long, they were much more enjoyable than the bean bags, which just clumped in the middle and vibrated like sad, heavy popcorn.  When we folded up the parachute, I told everyone to "help me make a popcorn sandwich." Before they knew what was happening, the parachute was tucked away like a good sandwich, and no tears were shed about the sudden loss of the beloved parachute. Overall, it was total, complete, parachute success, and I'm looking forward to the next time I bring the parachute out.  

 
After we put the parachute away in the first storytime, we did another fingerplay to calm everyone down, and when that didn't quite work, I asked everyone to take a few deep breaths.  The first breath we took was a little boring.  We all took a big breath in.  Then we let it out.  For our second breath I asked everyone to breathe in, and then blow it out like a ferocious lion.  This was much more fun.  And it worked!  Everyone quieted down for the next story.

We read Where Do Freight Trains Sleep at Night, and due to time and restlessness, I omitted a few pages in both storytimes, which nobody noticed.  This was followed by...Five Little Hot Dogs!  They really love Five Little Hot Dogs.  We will definitely be doing it again next week.  Who knew it would become a permanent fixture?  Or that I would be hearing it every night as I'm trying to fall asleep?



For our hokey pokey this week we pretended we were school buses, which was quite the stretch of imagination.  I asked everyone to name parts of the bus and then what part of the body they would like to represent that part of the bus.  We did wheels (feet), people (fingers for the first storytime, the whole body for the second), wipers (arms), and doors (also arms).  They were definitely more excited about naming parts of a bus than they were about naming parts of a butterfly.

Next week's storytime is all about loving yourself and others.  And also hot dogs.  Five greasy hot dogs since you are curious and not at all tired of hearing about them.

Robert has a new cast!

He will wear this thing for four weeks.  Progress!

Today we went grocery shopping and I had to drive the wheelchair cart thing out to him.  In the twenty or so feet I had to drive the thing, I ran into a lady, was cut off by a cart (which caused a collision), and, fueled by frustration alone, morphed into the Hulk so I could lift/drag it the rest of the way to the car.

Robert, dressed in a hefty bag to protect his cast from the rain, deftly swung himself into the wheelchair and proceeded to zip around Wal-Mart like a Nascar driver (a very courteous Nascar driver).