by Beth Cronk, Litchfield head librarian
Curbside pickup is tremendously popular at the Litchfield
Library. Meeker County people love their books!
We’ve officially expanded those hours a bit to 12:30-4:30 Monday/Wednesday/Friday.
We’ve been offering additional curbside hours on days when large numbers of
requested items have arrived in the delivery, and we’ll be expanding those
times further.
If you’d like to order some items for curbside pickup, but
you can’t think of specific titles you want, you can go to the main page of the
Pioneerland catalog and click on “New Items Purchased” near the bottom of the
page. Some of Litchfield’s newest books
are on display in the front windows along the sidewalk, so stroll by and do
some window shopping. I’m also posting videos and photos of the new items on
the library’s Facebook page from time to time.
You might think you’re bothering us if you call and don’t
know exactly what you want to order. But for me, those requests can be a lot of
fun. I’ve had people ask for books by a particular author, whatever we have on
the shelf. I’ve had people tell me who their favorite authors are and ask for
recommendations for authors who might be similar. I’ve been asked for a stack of
picture books. Those are all legitimate requests and we are happy to pull some
things together. You could also ask for
some books on a subject you want to read about, whether the books are for a
child or an adult.
If you happen to still have winter reading punch cards at
home and you’d like to get the prize you’d intended to pick up, you can put
those cards in the book drop and talk with us on the phone about which prize
you’d like – or write us a note on the sheet. We can arrange to get those to
you through curbside pickup, especially if we can coordinate that with your
book appointment. We still have mugs, mouse pads, earrings, car chargers, and
candy bars. We even have a couple of the bags that we managed to acquire from
another library at the end of the program, so you could let us know if you
didn’t get one when we ran out this winter. We’ll plan to do a really late final prize
drawing for the local restaurant gift certificates, so that’s another reason to
drop those sheets off. I’m hoping they don’t get lost in the book drop!
The summer reading program will work in a similar way. We
won’t sign kids up this year. But starting the second week of June, we’ll have
summer reading game sheets available to be put in your curbside appointment
bags. When you schedule your book pickup
time, you can tell staff how many kids you need sheets for. Completed sheets can be dropped in the book
drop, and prizes will be given out through curbside delivery, preferably when
the family’s books are being picked up. We recognize that families may be tired
of distance learning and that tracking reading time may not be your priority
this summer. But if it makes your kids happy to participate in the summer
reading program, we want to offer that option. The most important thing is that
kids keep reading and that parents keep reading to them, whether you keep track
of that time or not. Watch the library’s
website and Facebook page for more information about the summer reading program
in June.
We will miss Jan at the library. If you send a retirement card
to her in care of the library, we will be sure to get it to her. Jan deserves
as much celebrating as we can give her for her decades of excellent service to
the community. From what I’ve seen in the past decade working alongside her, I
know she has had a profound impact on so many people’s lives, both children and
adults. She has lived her calling of helping others every day she worked here,
which I’m sure she will continue to do – but on her own schedule.
Congratulations to Jan on her retirement and on her long career at the library!
