Kasson Library Staff Would Like Say Thank You

The Kasson Library staff would like to thank the sponsors, volunteers, children and their parents for making our Making A Splash Summer Reading Program another huge success. Without all of you it would be impossible to have the great program we have year after year.

Library Director Bonnie Adams and Circulation Donna Kirchgatter

Children's Librarian Ingvild Herfindahl

Circulation Mary Kramer

PICTURES! PICTURES! AND MORE PICTURES

Our staff member Donna Kirchgatter has been faithfully taking lots of pictures for all of our many programs and events. Take time to look at the pictures of storytime, Underwater Adventure program and especially our grand finale.

Thank you Donna!

Additional pictures of all of our events can be found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/kassonlibrary/

Make A Splash

The Kasson Public Library had their Make A Splash end of the summer reading party at Veteran Memorial Party on Wednesday, July 28 at 10:30. There were over 220 people that enjoyed our party, entertainment, games and library store to spend their library bucks that they earned reading this summer.

We had 662 children register for our library reading program. 218 children returned reading contracts for a total of 7,454 hours read in eight weeks. Jessica G. read for a toal of 200 hours and was the grand prize winner. The number of hours read ranged from 5 hours to 200 hours. Congratulation kids!

The library staff-Bonnie Adams Library Director, Ingvild Herfindahl, Children's Librarian, Circulation staff Mary Kramer and Donna Kirchgatter worked very hard this summer with programs that centered around the Make A Splash theme.

Additional pictures of all of our events can be found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/kassonlibrary/


Families at the party

SING & DANCE WITH MJ- Michelle Jones/Performer

GAMES

LIBRARY STORE

Thank You To Volunteers at End of Summer Reading Party

Library Director Bonnie Adams and Children's Librarian Ingvild Herfindahl would like to thank all of the volunteers that made our Make A Splash Summer Reading Program finale yesterday a great success. Without these dedicated volunteers we would not be able have games available for the children to play or a library store where the children spend their library bucks.
The volunteers said they all had a great time and enjoyed interacting with children of all ages. They look forward to helping next year. Thank you!

Additional pictures of all of our events can be found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/kassonlibrary/

Sandy Riedel & Lucy Baker-Shell Dig

Lori Hopkins & Mike Adams-High/Low Card Game

Pat Coy-High/Low Card Game

Earlene King-Frog Toss

Lois Gardner-Lolly Tree

Ryan, Erin & Kelly E.-Store

Devon & Kaylee Z.-Store

Gary Wallin-Store

Kristi Tuner-Store

Judy Wagener-Store

SING & DANCE WITH MJ

Michelle Jones of Sing & Dance With MJ performed at the library's big party on Wednesday, July 28th celebrating the end of our Make A Splash summer reading program.


Michelle has been a repeat performer over the past five years at our library and is a great entertainer for all ages. Michelle gets everyone in the audience up and moving with familiar stories and songs land the little ones especially like to sing and dance along with her.


Thank you Michelle for your time and wonderful sing and dance program.
Additional pictures of all of our events can be found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/kassonlibrary/

Sing & Dance With MJ

Michelle Jones of Sing And Dance With MJ will perform a FREE show at the start of the library's Grand Finale in the Park on Wednesday, July 28th at 10:30 am. This event will be held at Kasson Veteran's Park.

Bring your children and family to this FREE highly entertaining musical show which encourages children to sing, dance, and move. Everyone there will be singing and dancing in the park.

Library will Closed For 2 hrs Wednesday, July 28th

The Kasson Public Library will be closed on Wednesday, July 28th for two hours 10-12 am during our Summer Reading Make A Splash Event. The library staff as well as volunteers are needed to work at this event at the Veteran's Park in Kasson. We are sponsoring a grand finale a culmination of our summer reading program and the children who have signed up for the program are welcome to attend. We will re-open the library at 12 noon.

ENVITE

I was looking for something fun to put on the blog for Friday and I ran across this and tried it. Very fun!!

Send online invitations in three easy steps with this online invitation service.
1. Pick the design you want to use.

2. Enter the information, including the host name, contact information, place of the event, time and date. You can also add some interesting features to the invitation, including asking guests to bring something, allowing guests to help pick the date and time of the event, or even requesting payment from guests.

3. Enter the email addresses and send. Guests who respond that they will be attending will also get reminders before the event. The default is 2 days before, but you can customize that.
This is a very easy interface and creates invitations that will get attention with their colorful look and professional feel. Give it a try!

Shells and Fossils Storytime 7/20-22

This week theme is Shells and Fossils. We were honored to have a special guest reader, KM Kindergarten teacher Rita Buehler. The children throughly enjoyed her stories. Children's Librarian Ingvild talked about some special sea shells she has collected. The highlight of the storyhour was the children chosing their own sea shells and stickers for a memory game they made to take home and share with their families.

Special Guest Reader, KM Kindergarten teacher Rita Buehler.

Additional pictures may be found on http://www.flickr.com/photos/kassonlibrary/








Finished Shells and children working on their projects.

UpComing Events in August

Treasure Beyond Measure

Tuesday, August 17th 10am Kasson Veteran's Park

This great FREE interactive program has children helping the greedy pirate find more than a treasure.

Ice Cream Party

Tuesday, August 24 and Thursday, August 25 10:30 am

As a finish to the summer our storytime will feature learning how easy it is to make ice cream in a baggie. This will but take a bit work but the reward of your own homemade ice cream is priceless.

Friends Book Sale August 12-14 10 am-12 noon

The book sale will be held during the Festival in the Park celebration. There will be two days of regular sales and Saturday for two hours there will be a bag sale of the items left.

Bubbles Storytime 713-15

This week's theme was BUBBLES! The children thoroughly enjoyed the bubble books end especially the bubble activities. Children's Librarian had many containers full of colored soap which the children used straws to make many more bubbles which they took paper and put on top of the bubbles to make great art work. Then the highlight of the storytime was going outside and make humongous bubbles.

Additional pictures of the weeks bubble factory can be found at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kassonlibrary/

7 Superpowers You Act Like You Have But Don't (And How That Messes You Up)

Ran across this blog the other day http://www.dumblittleman.com/2010/05/7-superpowers-you-act-like-you-have-but.html on wishing for things we cannot have or possess. He is right when he said "Stop wishing and get into an action mode to change things and not just wish things would be better." Bonnie

Growing up, I loved comic books. Not only would I read them, but I would spend hours daydreaming about what it would be like if I was a superhero with amazing superpowers. Of course with adulthood comes reality, and so when I grew up I knew it was time to stop dreaming about superpowers.

What is interesting though is how many people - adults - still act as is they have superpowers. They know they don't have them, but they still try to do things that can only happen in comic books.

Here is a list of seven superpowers that, even though they only exist in the comics, we all try to use from time to time. Unfortunately, the more of these we try to do, the less effective we become and the more we just get in our own way.

Mind Control
Mind control is exactly what it sounds like: the ability to take control of someone's mind. A person with mind control powers can force someone to do things against their will, forget events, and even make them fall in love. Sounds great until you think about what the world would be like if other people had mind control powers and could control you!

Even though mind control doesn't exist, many people still waste an inordinate amount of time wishing they could control what others think and do. If you have ever stressed over how someone would react to some news, or whether people would approve of a project you were working on, or simply whether a stranger likes you, then you know of what I speak.

You can not control other people. They are going to think what they think and do what they do, regardless of what you want. They may like you, they may hate you. They may approve, they may disapprove. The sooner you can stop worrying about and trying to control what others do, the sooner you can get on and live your life.

This is not to say that you should do whatever the heck you want with no care about anyone else's feelings. We live in a society, and being polite, courteous, and thoughtful are what make us civilized. However, all you can control is your own actions. Focus on what you can do, do your best, and stop worrying about other people's responses.

Body Swapping
Body swappers were the heroes and villains who could "switch places" with someone else. They would take over a person's body and usually that person would take over theirs. Every single superhero comic at some point had a story with a "body swapper."

If we can learn anything from the large slate of Hollywood swapping movies (like Vice Versa, Freaky Friday, Like Father, Like Son, etc.) it's that everyone has their problems. When you compare yourself to someone else, it's very easy to focus on your negatives and their positives. It's not until you walk a mile in their shoes (or magically inhabit their body) that you realize that they have as many, if not more, problems as you do.

Stop trying to body swap. Instead, focus on what's currently good in your life. Take a minute to appreciate what you do have going for you. And when you find yourself becoming jealous of others, remember that everyone has problems and skeletons in their closet and those people may very well be jealous of you.

Mind Reading

Have you ever had someone screw you over, and you then spent hours trying to figure out exactly "why" they did that? Wouldn't it be great to be able to read their minds and know for certain?

Mind reading is impossible, so we can't know for certain, but that doesn't stop us from making up giant stories about what people's motives and reasoning are. Sadly, these stories are rarely ever right. Even when they are right, they are usually only part of the story.

People are far too complicated for us to be able to easily assign underlying motives and intentions to their actions. When we try to, we usually just make the situation worse. So many people create tremendous stress and problems in their lives by obsessively trying to figure out why people behave the way they do. This is a lost cause.

The key to avoiding this is to criticize observable action, not hidden intent. If you say, "It hurts me when you make fun of my height," that's criticizing an observable action. They can not dispute that a) they made fun of your height and b) it hurt your feelings. If you say, "It hurts me when you try to make me look bad in front of everyone else by teasing me," that's criticizing intent. They can dispute that they were trying to make you look bad and come right back with, "I'm just playing, I'm not trying to make you look bad."

At the end of the day, you have no idea what is going on in someone's head. If you know them really well you might be able to guess, but you still could be wrong. If they are a stranger, you really have no clue. In either case, trying to figure it out is a lost cause. Deal with what you can know and observe, let go of the rest, and you will be a much happier person.

Precognition

Precognition is the ability to see the future. If you had precognition, you would know exactly what was going to happen in the future and therefore you would not waste countless hours wondering and worrying about it.

Since no one can actually see the future, we are all forced to live with uncertainty. Admittedly, this is not the easiest thing in the world to do. Unfortunately, it is the only thing we can do.

Preparing for the future is one thing. Stressing about the future is entirely another. Planning and visualization are great tools, but wasting time stressing, worrying, and complaining about what "might" happen are life stealers. Sadly, the more time you spend in the present obsessing about the future, the less time you usually spend actually preparing to make the future better.

Plan for the future, but live in the present. The future will happen whether you want it to or not.

Time Travel

Ah, wouldn't life be sweet if we could hop in a DeLorean, go back in time, and fix our past mistakes? Of course, if science fiction has taught us anything it's that messing with the past is a bad idea. No matter how careful you are, the space time continuum is easily disrupted.

Even though time traveling to the past is a) a bad idea and b) impossible, so many of us waste time running over the past in our heads, replaying bad experiences by playing the "if only" game ("if only I had showed up on time!" "If only I said something different!" etc.), and overall just wishing things had been different.

Guess what? No amount of wishing is going to change the past. What's done is done. Observing the past for the purpose of learning from our mistakes is smart. Wallowing in the past and wishing things had gone different is crazy.

The next time you find yourself wallowing in the past, remind yourself that you can't change it and bring your focus back onto what you can do right now, in the present, to make things better.

Reality Altering Magic
Have you ever had a moment where you stopped and said, "man, my life sucks"? Probably; we all have. What did you do next? Did you curl up on the couch with a bag of Cheetos and a Law & Order marathon and just spend all day "wishing" your life was better? I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that it didn't get any better as a result...

Attempting to have reality altering magic is like attempting to time travel, only you actually can change the present! You might not be able to instantly change the present, but you can take actions right now to improve your situation.

Once you're in a downward spiral it becomes so easy to give up and just hope things will get better. Hoping and wishing are not strategies! Stop wishing and break out of the downward spiral by doing something, no matter how small, to change your situation. Even the smallest actions can build momentum that will "alter your reality."

Channeled Rage

The Hulk was the one superhero who could literally channel his rage. The Hulk's catch-phrase is, "The madder Hulk gets, the stronger Hulk gets!" (yes, the Hulk refers to himself in the third person). Sadly, the Hulk is the only person who could turn his rage into something good. For the rest of us, rage usually just leads to hypertension, heart disease, and regret.

But boy, it sure is tempting to let ourselves explode, right? You have that moment when you feel your anger rising and you start daydreaming about letting it out. But from experience you probably know that when you do, you almost always regret it.

Giving in to rage usually only does two things:

• You do or say something you wish you didn't


• You just make the situation worse, as the other party is now responding to your anger
  

Channeling rage into exercise, productivity, or any other positive outlet is great. But giving in and acting out of anger is a sure way to just make things worse for everyone.

Instead of blowing up in rage, take a few breaths, remember the big picture, and do your best to let it go. You will almost always be happier in the long run.

Comics are great and it can still be fun from time to time to imagine what it would be like to have superpowers. But when you are ready to come back to reality and move your life forward, let go of the wishing and focus on the simple actions you can actually take to get to where you want to go.

Written on 5/5/2010 by Avish Parashar.

Bedtime Storyhour

The Monday Night weekly bedtime storyhour is tonight at 6pm at the library.

Water Storytime 7/6-8

This week's theme is Water and Water Pollution. The I Spy craft was a great project that used recycled items placed in a jar and rice was added. The the children tipped their jar to find the items placed in the jar. They all had fun choosing their items.

Additional photos of this event can be found on:http://www.flickr.com/photos/kassonlibrary/



Regular Storytime 7/6/10 Over 60 children at this program!

KM Nursery Group 7/6/10