Cheetahfabulous and a Great Artist

It was Cheetah Fabulous at the NRPL book festival. Deborah Gregory charmed everyone with her creative wares as well as wowing everyone with her Cheetah Fabulousness (Little girls "Are you really the author?"). At the table next to her, the illustrator, R. Gregory Christie was available to sign books (snagged this one for my library). An incredible talent and a really nice guy to boot. We already have a number of his books in the library but not this one which I was really pleased to get. He has also illustrated a new series by Nikki Grimes that looks terrific. A real pleasure to meet both of these talented people.

Library windows

The windows are painted and ready for the kids to come and Be Creative as is our theme (us and the rest of NY State and half the country). Just in time for our book festival today and tomorrow - I met the fabulous woman behind The Cheetah Girls series and a super talented artist - more on them tomorrow when I can do them justice. For now, just grooving on the beautiful (home) silence. That rockin' to the festival Library was NOISY!

Hey! Wake up - we're back!

We being The Bear, Charlotte, and myself. Such good stuff out there, who can stay away? All three of these books knocked me out - the poetry by children in Salting the Ocean and Come and Play are stand-outs for reading and for teaching, the photos in the latter are from the Magnum Photos collection and are fantastic.

Hip Hop Speaks to Children includes a cd recording of many of the poets - hearing Langston Hughes and Eloise Greenfield , Nikki Giovanni and Gwendolyn Brooks is amazing. Perfect for teaching a class of poetry, for reading, for listening, - this would make a great gift, too, even for grown-up librarians (just sayin').