The End of an Era

I'm pretty sad right now. But at least I have a good reason to be sad.

I was recently offered a full-time LMS job at a school in New Hampshire. I am so honored that they chose me to work with, and to oversee their school's library program.

I should be very excited- but I'm not quite there yet.

I am really going to miss working at YMS. I'll miss:

-making up the questions for the weekly Jolly Rancher Trivia

-planning the Halloween event

-teaching my Scary Stories/urban legends enrichment classes

-JALA (Junior Awesome Library Assistants) meetings

-chaperoning the 7th grade camping trip

-speaking in Friends quotes with my co-worker all day

-eating lunch while playing games with students

-being referred to as Mrs. Mermaid

-having random, somewhat creepy dolls 'gifted' to me

-my tie dye, taco lanyard with my collection of ID badges

I guess I knew from pretty much the beginning that I wouldn't be a library Ed Tech at YMS forever; when I was explaining my leaving to one of my favorite students the other day I equated it to her staying in middle school forever. We need to be able to grow, and learn new things, and meet new people, and staying in one job just because you're afraid to move on would be like not moving up grades, just because you'd be afraid that the work will be harder, or that you won't know all the people in your classes.

When I told one of the longtime staff members that I was leaving, she made me realize what my time at YMS signified. It was not my first job, but it was my first grown-up job (full time with benefits). During my time there, I got married, bought a home, had a child.  .  .it was like I was being initiated into adulthood.


So I am moving along my own path, and hopefully I don't get lost.

Tin, Man

I have always had a fascination with the Victorian era. And with early photography. And with Death. These three subjects often overlap, as they do in the book Beyond the Dark Veil: Post Mortem and Mourning Photography from the Thantos Archive, which I read and blogged about earlier this year.

I'm a Caitlin Doughty fangirl too, so I follow her on social media, and she recently posted an article titled The Strange Allure of Decayed Daguerreotypes.

I have more than a few old photographs of people whom I do not know; I have collected them from flea markets and found them in books from thrift stores. I have two tin type pictures that I am especially fond of, and both of them show the same signs of decay as the daguerrotypes in the article.

Both of them came to me; the first one I literally stepped on in a field in Maryland. I was picking through the remainders of the Crumpton auction, and the tintype was face-down in the dirt. I wondered what the small piece of metal might be, and when I flipped it over, I discovered it was a portrait of a baby.

The second one was in a box of dollhouse miniatures that I bought at a church tag sale:

I love how the author of the article explains why these decaying photos have such a haunting quality:

"[They] become, and are changed by, use or experience. The faces become lost, like features reflected in a misted bathroom mirror. The body shapes and small fragments of skin are recognizable but their function or meaning has been usurped by organic patterns of decay which alter the image into strangely beautiful and alluring works of art open to imagination."

A Magical Makeover

I love to paint furniture. Taking ugly, discarded chairs and tables from the roadside and using them as canvasses to express my passions has become kind of a drug for me.

Recently, we had some furniture painted by the Advanced Art students. They painted some stools, a chair and even a book cart so that we can have even more color and personality in our library space. They did a great job:

Can you guess which books they used as their inspirations?

Years ago, I picked up one of those really ugly, 1970's, wood octagon end tables. I didn't remember to take a photo of it before I started working on it, but it looked similar to this one:

I meant to give it a makeover last summer, but it ended up just sitting in my yard as a catch-all for when we had cookouts and people needed a place to set a bottle or a plate down.

But these students' pieces moved me to put some thought into it, and think about a book that inspires me (and a book that I had not used yet as a theme for painted furniture). I decided to work some magic on that ugly little end table.

I used a few pages from a discarded copy of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, and decoupaged the top. Then I used a paint marker to hand letter the wonderful Dumbledore quote:

I selected a few pages from a ruined illustrated edition of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, and put those around the panels:

I found the wing furniture knobs on clearance at Hobby Lobby for a dollar each, and turned them into golden snitches by painting a marble and affixing it with industrial-strength adhesive:

I love how Harry seems to have his eye on the golden snitch.

I might still put some fun images on the inside of it, but at least it looks a lot nicer than it did before.

Dollhouse News

I was recently gifted this large, handmade dollhouse. 

The picture doesn't really convey its size very well, so here's a picture of my three year old son standing next to the house:

It's almost as tall as he is!

Luckily, I have plenty of  some a little space left in my house. There's no way I would ever turn down a dollhouse of this quality, with such fine craftsmanship. It definitely needs some repair work though:

It was wired for electricity, but some of the lights worked while others didn't, and some of the wires looked iffy, so I ended up removing the wiring. I like all my houses to be safe and durable so that kids (and I) are able to actually play with them, not just look at them.

I am considering making it over into Orchard House, in order to satisfy my long held desire for a Little Women dollhouse. I feel like that attic is just perfect for Jo's writing desk, and a cozy corner for the Pickwick Society to hold their meetings in.

I recently began the process of reconstructing my Secret Garden, too. I made this scene years ago, but with the different moves I've done, it was damaged beyond repair. I was saddened, because I take a special pride in the dollhouses/scenes that I create on my own from scratch. The previous one had a base of styrofoam, and walls made of floral foam with drywall compound and real stones on the outside:

It looked great, but it was really heavy, and it did not travel well.

Here's a sneak peek of the new and improved Secret Garden:

The base is styrofoam, a piece that was the perfect size and shape. There was a cut out already in it, so I decided to make a little pond for the garden. I need more practice with making realistic water.

I was able to salvage everything from the old one except the walls, and I had a few pieces in my stash that I am adding into this scene.

I have a variety of other dollhouses set up in my house, and one currently out on display at the Dover Public Library, but these two are the ones I am working on the most lately.

Library Lock-In!

I am old. I know I am old because it takes several days for me to recover after one later-than-usual night.

Last Friday, my co-worker and I hosted the first ever Library Lock-In sleepover. It was an idea that came up a few months ago. Sports teams get play-offs and banquets, chorus and band kids get concerts and showcases, library kids get a fun sleepover. It's a culminating event for them; they worked just as hard this year as kids who participate in athletics and other clubs, so we agreed that they deserved something. So, two of our active JALA (Junior Awesome Library Assistants) wrote up the official proposal and protocol.

The school principal approved the plan.

So, we set our plans into motion. The kids began arriving around 5:30. They hung out in the open gym, playing games until the pizzas arrived. We all went upstairs, and chowed down on pizza and other snacks that the kids brought with them. We made them clean up afterwards, and then we did some ice-breaker, team-building type activities since we have members from grade 5-8, and some of them don't really know each other.

After we did a few, we gave them the freedom to play cards, or games, or make art journals from discarded library books, or just chat with other club members.

some art journals

Soon, it was time for cake! Two of our 6th grade members generously brought in a cake to share, and the cake had our official yearbook photo on it:

our cake with our yearbook photo on it

I put on an episode of Are You Afraid of the Dark? since it was starting to get dark, and most of the kids love the scary stories stuff (the ones that don't like scary stories found other things to occupy themselves).

watching a little Are You Afraid of the Dark?, in the dark

Afterwards, our male students had to depart, because we did not have a male chaperone for the sleepover. I think they had a good time anyways though.

After the boys left, the girls began the process of changing into pajamas, scouting out the best sleeping areas, blowing up air mattresses and unrolling sleeping bags.

When that stuff was all set, they had more free time to read, continue watching Are You Afraid of the Dark?, work on their art journals, and stuff their faces with junk food.

Lights out was at midnight.

We did not have any real behavior issues; we made it very clear to them all at the beginning of the evening that if anything went wrong, we would never be able to approve another lock-in, so the pressure was on them  to not ruin the chances of future fun times.

I told some friends about this plan, and they could not believe I was willing to stay at school on a Friday night, with 25 students, sleeping on a futon for no extra pay. The way I see it, is if these kids are eager to spend extra hours in the school library, talking and playing games,with me and my co-worker, then that just means we are doing an excellent job.

They love the library. They are making new friends and getting to know kids they didn't know before. They enjoy our company and trust the two adults in the program.

I can't help but be proud of them, and our library program.

Breakerspace Mindset

I had an unexpected, but valuable interaction yesterday at work.

I have written about Makerspaces and Maker mindset pretty frequently, but there is a related concept called Breakerspace. Breakerspace refers to a space/time in which students are encouraged to explore and investigate the inner workings of various technology/

There is a particular student who is struggling quite a bit this year- he often walks out of his classrooms when he is experiencing anger, distress or frustration. We believe strongly that libraries can be sanctuaries, especially for students who struggle emotionally and socially, so we try to work with those students (and their teachers and paraeducators); it's better to have the students come to the library than to roam around unattended.

The student who came in today wandered around for a few minutes before going back into the Makerspace area. I have an old film projector which was a prop for the Escape Room we held last month (more on that in a future post).

When I went back to check on him, he was fiddling around with it, and he said "I wish I could take this apart, so I could see how it works inside."

Since it's my own film projector, and I know it doesn't work, I went and got a couple screwdrivers from our tool drawer. He was pretty surprised that I was so willing to let him take the thing apart, but I really didn't mind.

We unscrewed panels, looked at the gears inside, I noticed that the film reel is maked Eastman Kodak Rochester, NY so I told him that my mom used to work for Kodak and Rochester is my home city.  .  .
We got to talking about old film and old movies, so I showed him the Georges Melies picture "Trip to the Moon", which he was familiar with already because he's seen the movie Hugo.  .  .

I was glad that this student was enjoying himself, and that he was engaging with me, and hopefully getting something out of it.