Library love on Etsy

So I have been quite enjoying Spring Break. I was lucky enough to get two weeks off! It has been very nice. What's even nicer is that the first three chapters of thesis have been graded... A + ! May 31st is just around the corner!
In the mean time, April 8 - 14 is National Library Week! If you are unfamiliar its a week to celebrate libraries all across the country! In honor of National Library Week I created a treasury list entitled, Love for the Library. Here are some of my favorite items featured in the treasury.

Oxford Library Scented Candle from Roxie Speth

The library does have its own distinct sent. I certainly would not want a candle that smells like my library. However the Oxford library, from the description sounds like a place satisfying scent! Its a quite manly combo of smells including sandalwood and hints of leather. Go check out the etsy shop Roxi Speth! They have more fun literary themed candles including Dumbledore's Office and the Shire.





Just Books t-shirt from To the Moon and Back

There is a lot of vintage librarian iconography of library pin ups and the sexy librarian stereotype but I really like this new take on that same idea. Also I wonder who she's "wearing" Vonnegut,  ? or maybe some of the classics like Withering Heights or Jayne Eyre?
I can go on and on with bad jokes here.
Anyway, To the Moon and Back has plenty of other great vintage designs so go check it out! 




Dragon & Knight bookends from Knob Creek Metal Arts

I am a sucker for book ends and totally fell in love with these. They even caught the attention of my curmudgeon husband! I looked at some other items from Knob Creek and was amazed at the talent and skill level required to make such amazing pieces! Go check out the shop!

April Fool's Day

April Fool's Day is quite the fun kid friendly holiday so I decided to create an April Fool's program for the library. Here is how you can do it in your classroom, library or at home.

Great read aloud for April Fool's Day

Generally with a library program you need a story to go along with the theme of the program! There aren't too many great books for April Fool's to read aloud but Guess Again by Mac Barnett does the job. Mac Barnett is quite the funny man. This book features silhouettes and a little poem about what it could be and the audience is tricked every time! (My favorite is the Viking)



I had a hard time figuring out what craft to make. After researching some April Fool's Day facts I saw a picture of a Court Jester and had an A-HA! moment and the kids decorated and made their own Jester hats. It was pretty simple to make. Just a few construction paper triangles (of varying colors) then attached it to an oak tag strip used for the head band of the hat. To jazz things up a bit I put out some markers, scrap pieces of paper (junk that we needed to get rid of) and let them decorate until their heart's content. When they were all done we stapled up the hats and they were on their way. To make it look more court jester-y I took a marker and curled up the triangle on the top.

May the odds be ever in your favor

The Hunger Games movie finally came out and I feel that I wouldn't be a proper nerd craft librarian if I didn't comment on it.

http://geektyrant.com/news/2012/3/30/the-hunger-
games-fun-series-of-propaganda-posters.html

For those of you that are unfamiliar with the movie or books, the Hunger Games was the first part of a trilogy of Young Adult novels by Suzanne Collins. The story centers on Katniss Everdeen who does her best to survive in a dystopian country of Panem ruled by the Capital. Every year a boy and a girl are chosen from one of twelve districts to complete to the death, all of which is broadcast all over the country. Essentially its like Running Man with teenagers.

It seems like more than ever Hollywood has been scooping up books for big screen adaptations and this always gets readers a little scared because they can screw it up very badly! (For examples see the Grinch, Alice in Wonderland, the Golden Compass etc. we can go on and on ). I was really nervous going into the Hunger Games because I loved the books and they were amazing. I was also really curious to see how they were going to do certain things. Luckily for me and the other Hunger Game fans, Suzanne Collins actually wrote the screen play. The Hunger Games movie was good, that's not to say it was completely perfect, but I am here to pick out what I loved about it and what I wasn't too crazy about.

The movie over-all was a great cinematic experience. The film captured the same tone of the books, that feeling of despair and sadness from living in the world in which the districts of Panem are enslaved and live in proverty to support the Capital. Film also captured the setting quite well. I had always pictured District 12 and the Seam to be an industrial waste land and was not disappointed when the film took a slightly different take when the film's District 12 resembled 1930s Appalachia with quaint little houses and it being a mining town.I loved how this drastically contrasted with the lush futuristic Capital complete with cyber punk looking citizens. I was pleased with how the books honored these aspects but I also enjoyed how the film portrayed the game makers. While reading the books I had a hard time visualizing the behind the scenes of the arena and loved that the film took us there.

Casting was another score. All of the major characters were cast perfectly from Katniss, Cinna, Haymitch, Peeta. My personal favorite was Stanley Tucci as Cesear Flickerman.However I do I have one big gripe with this movie and it involved the casting! The character Gale is a minor character in the first of the trilogy but he becomes part of the love triangle and all that jazz. From how he was described in the book and how district 12 is portrayed this movie really expect me to believe that Liam Helmsworth is Gale? During the reaping if Katniss looks like a hill-billy farm girl, why the hell does Gale look like a Gap model?! Just makes me more Team Peeta all the way.

The movie has been out for a while and just like the books, it has stirred up some controversy. A lot of people are saying it is an American-ized Battle Royale (which is a great movie by the way) I can see how it is with the obvious kids fighting to the death part. However a big basis of the book series is on the spectacle the government makes the games out to be. Which thanks to Katniss, then spurs revolution. So to those people saying it ripped off something else...you can make the argument that everybody has ripped off everybody.. get over it! This next bit of controversy I read on Jezebel. Apparently some fans of the books are racists pieces of garbage.

http://jezebel.com/5897416/bad-news-hunger-games-amandla-stenberg-
knows-about-the-racist-tweets

I am shocked by this! I mean our President is black for crying out loud! I don't want to end on a bad note so to cut the tension here is a funny poster from Geek Tyrant.

If you want to see some more Hunger Games themed funnies check out this post from Michele at Short Girl, Long Island.