New Year, New Books!

I just LOVE reading new books to the kids!! I always tell them that these are BRAND NEW books, and NO ONE has heard them in story time - they get to be FIRST!!! They love that and we always have a good time with them!!

Opening Song: Shake My Sillies Out - Raffi

Book: The Croaky Pokey! by Ethan Long

Song: Humpty Dumpty

Book: Homer the Library Cat by Reeve Lindberg

Song: Itsy Bitsy Spider

Book: The Artist Who Painted a Blue Horse by Eric Carle


Craft: In Honor of Homer the Library Cat - Cat Faces!!

Mondays Kittens

I think I accidentally forgot to plan story time, oops!!! Luckily, there are always a couple themes that have plenty of books to choose from if you are a last minute planner as I seem to sometimes be! But, it turned out great - LOVE those toddlers!!

Opening Song: If You're Happy and You Know It from Favorite Children's Songs CD.

Book: I Love Cats by Barney Saltzberg

Rhyme: Hey Diddle, Diddle

Book: Kitten for a Day by Ezra Jack Keats

Song: I'm a Little Teapot

Book: Cat the Cat Who Is That? by Mo Willems


Interactive Playtime

Meeow Monday!

Oops, I kinda forgot to plan story time... But, I pulled something together pretty quick, and it turned out great!!! And I even managed to pull together a theme!! Thank you, thank you!

Opening Song: If You're Happy and You Know It from Favorite Children's Songs CD.


Book: Meeow and the Big Box by Sebastian Braun


Song: The Cat Says Meow (To the tune of Farmer in the Dell)
The cat says meow,
The cat says meow,
It likes to purr and run and play,
The cat says meow!

Book: What Will Fat Cat Sit On? by Jan Thomas


Activity: Wiggle toes, wiggle fingers, wiggle nose, wiggle ears.

Song: Twinkle, Twinkle

Interactive Playtime

Kitten for a Monday

YAY for Monday!! I love having the toddlers first thing on Monday mornings! They always make me smile! This week, we read some stories about Kittens!

Opening Song: If You're Happy and You Know It from Favorite Children's Songs CD.


Book: Where to Sleep by Kandy Radzinski


Rhyme: Hey, Diddle Diddle

Book: Kitten for a Day by Ezra Jack Keats


Rhyme: Humpty Dumpty (by request!)

Book: Cat the Cat, Who is That? by Mo Willems


Interactive Playtime

Meow Monday

Happy Monday, everyone!! I hope y'all had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday!! Mine was spectacular, I got to travel home to visit my family!! It was great to see everyone, but I was not sad to leave all that snow behind!

I was also excited to get back for story time!!! Today's Toddler Story Time was all about cats!

Opening Song: If You're Happy and You Know It from Favorite Children's Songs CD.

Book: There Are Cats in This Book by Viviane Schwarz


Song: Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes

Book: I Love Cats by Barney Saltzberg


Rhyme: Hey Diddle Diddle

Interactive Play Time: I bring out the toys and other books at this time.

It was a great little story time!!

Fabulous Wednesday!!

***don't forget to enter my latest GIVEAWAY!!!***

Happy Story Time day, everyone!! HOOOORAY!!!!!!

I found some great books about cats this week, so that's our theme!!

Opening Song: Shake My Sillies Out by Raffi

Have You Got My Purr? - Judy West (A great story, with animal noises and chances for kid participation!!)

After our first story, we chanted Kitty Cat, Kitty Cat. Ok, so, it's really just a doctored up version of Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear, but it totally worked for this theme!

Kitty Cat, Kitty Cat, Turn Around
Kitty Cat, Kitty Cat, Touch the Ground
Kitty Cat, Kitty Cat, Reach Up High
Kitty Cat, Kitty Cat, Blink Your Eyes
Kitty Cat, Kitty Cat, Dance on Your Toes
Kitty Cat, Kitty Cat, Touch Your Nose
Kitty Cat, Kitty Cat, Pat Your Knees
Kitty Cat, Kitty Cat, Sit Down, Please!

Nobody Asked Me! - Steve Henry (Super cute - and perfect for story time!!!)


Next, we did the Five Little Kittens Countdown. First we counted to five, then we counted backwards from five. Then we did this chant, with actions to go with it!

Five little kittens
Heard a lour roar
One ran away
Then there were four!

Four little kittens
Climbing up a tree
One slid down
Then there were three!

Three little kittens
Deciding what to do
One fell asleep
Then there were two!

Two little kittens
Having lots of fun
One went home
Then there was one!

One little kitten
Feeling all alone
Ran to his mother
Then there were none!

What Will Fat Cat Sit On? - Jan Thomas ( I LURVE Jan Thomas - always a story time hit!!!)


Then, it was time for our craft! It was a really easy one today, but it was totally purr-fect (sorry, I just had to!). I actually modified this craft from the DLTK Kids website. Instead of making that craft, I printed out the template of the cat's face, enlarged it, and printed it off on card stock. Then, I cut out the eyes, punched holes on the sides of the face with a one hole punch, and tied black yarn to each side. Cat masks!! They were a huge hit!!!



I'm super excited, as always on Wednesdays, for FMRNS!!! WHOOOOOT!!!!! Last week, A and I decided on Casino Royale, so this weeks feature will be the 2005 drama TransAmerica with Felicity Huffman. We've got some great ones coming up that I'm really excited about!! And not only that, there's still ANTM, and Hell's Kitchen!!! Wednesdays seriously rock my face off!!!

Purr-fect Tuesday!

I've decided that today's story time will be filled with cute and cuddly kittens!!! Here are the super cute books I found for story time today:





And, as always, it's FMRNS Night!! WHOOOOOT!!!! A and I are psyched about the return of American Idol!!! Personally, I love the audition part of AI - seeing the best and the worst, and of course seeing the reactions of all the judges and contestants. Do you enjoy the auditions, or do you wait to tune in until the top 24 or even top 12? Or do you not get into AI at all?

Our feature of the evening is The Quiet Man from 1952 with John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara. I hear it is THE Irish movie!! They say that the color of Ireland, Green, can be seen in every shot of the film - but not in any of the actor's costumes. Internet Movie Database has lots more Quiet Man Trivia - if you are interested!!

Tuesday = Best Day of the Week

I LOVE Tuesdays. People go on and on about Fridays and Saturdays, and I really enjoy those days, too. But Tuesdays...

Tuesday is the day when I have my Preschool story time. I get to read fun stories to sweet little kids who just LOVE Miss Real!! We always read 3 stories, do a finger play or a song and watch a short video based on a book. Then we either do a craft, or just a coloring page. Sometimes, the kids give me their coloring pages as a gift, and LOVE that I proudly display them behind the Children's reference desk.

I always do a theme. Last week it was cows. This week we are having "New Books," brand new books that were just ordered and delivered to the library.



The other reason I love Tuesdays is because of Fabulous Movies Real's Never Seen Night. My friend "A" and I have been getting together every Tuesday for the past 3 years. Before that, our movie watching was more sporadic. "A" became my first friend when I moved to Nashville. The whole fabulous movie thing started one night while "A" was asking me if I had seen this movie, or that movie... And I hadn't. "A" decided that he was going to take it upon himself to educate me, and I am so glad he did!!! Some of the movies on the list that I hadn't seen before FMRNS was developed include:


The Color Purple
Jaws
Gone With the Wind
The Graduate
Charlotte's Web
Indiana Jones (all of them)
Several Audry Hepburn movies
and pretty much all the Hitchcock movies.
We watch movies from every genre and decade. We have now watched over 150 movies.

The movies aren't the only thing, though. We always have a fabulous dinner, some great snacks, and our reality talent competition of the moment (American Idol, America's Next Top Model, or the current obsession, So You Think You Can Dance) And we laugh...a lot. In fact, we have been known to laugh so hard that our tummies hurt and we have tears rolling down our cheeks. We call that "A's Pilates." We always have so much fun!!!

Tonight's feature:

Cocoon