Another Day At The Desk....

This week was spring break, which usually means we're busier.  Because the weather was rainy, we didn't have quite as many people as I would normally expect, but it was steadily busy most of the shift.

Almost right away there was a near disaster that I just barely caught in time to avert.  I was straightening up in an area near the the single-stall family restroom and I kept hearing the water running for a long time.  Finally, I went over and knocked on the door, then found it was unlocked.  I opened it to find the water in the sink running full blast, and the sink full to the very top, about to overflow!   Thank goodness I caught it in the nick of time before it overflowed and flooded the floor.  I don't know if it was done maliciously or not, but sometimes kids are just tall enough to push the handles back, turning the water on, but then can't reach far enough to pull them back to turn the water off.

I also got the chance to see one of our semi-regular families; they also use one of the branches closer to where they live.  When I first met them, they had two kids who were big Pete the Cat fans, so every time I saw them I would let them know about any new Pete the Cat books we had gotten in.  At the time they were expecting a third child, and that little baby bump is now an active 2-year old who has also become a Pete the Cat fan, so they were there to get some books for him, but couldn't find them since they had been re-cataloged in the last year after the creative team of Dean and Litwin unfortunately parted ways, and Dean retained all rights to the character of Pete that he created.  So the books are now shelved under Dean rather than Litwin, so I showed them where they were with a brief explanation.  

I love being able to get to know these young families and see the kids grow up; that is probably my favorite part of working at the library.  It's so neat to get to know them as babies and toddlers and watch them grow as they graduate from board books to picture books, then to see them start reading by themselves.  It's always a little sad when they graduate from Storytime to kindergarten, but then we get to see how they blossom when they start school.  We may not see them as often after that, but when we do they have plenty to tell us about school and new friends.  Then as they get older there are school projects and papers to help with, and the challenges of reader's advisory and finding things they haven't read yet and keeping up with their changing interests. I haven't worked at the library long enough to see the kids I've met grow up to bring their own children to storytime, but I hope to!