This year’s Children’s Parade was a glorious way to kick off 4^th of July celebrations. We had eighty-one children and parents participate. Many of the children will, however, need a stern talking to before they get their temps as they broke a cardinal rule. Never pass the police officer. While Chief Swendrowski led the start of the parade, using the high school’s bus lane provided many of the bicyclists the opportunity to lead the finish. Perhaps we should add bike races to the final celebration on July 28^th.

This week is a short one for the library as we will be closed for the holiday and the carnival. Miss Maria will appreciate the breather as Friday’s Art Attack has been quite popular. The first week was a bit slow with eight participants, but now that summer is in full swing last week’s craft had twenty-nine participants plus their parents. This will definitely be a program we run again next summer. Miss Maria has also brought up the possibility of offering it one Saturday a month during the school year as well.

Moving forward with a program like Art Attack will be made easier with the new website we are soon to reveal. Our current website is only sixteen months old; however, six months after it went live, our provider announced his retirement. Prairie Lakes Library System stepped in and provided funding for a web designer and will host the new site. One of the changes we’ll make is in converting our calendar feature to the event management service LocalHop, also provided by PLLS. That’s a fancy way of saying our new calendar will allow us to add events with built in registration. This will be used for future Art Attacks and events such as the returning Sourdough Made Simple.

The final service PLLS provides its libraries that we are beginning to implement is Patron Point. That service allows us to send a variety of emails to patrons. The first of which went out this week. It provided information on adult programming for July and August. The two August events, Sourdough Made Simple and Sourdough Bake Off, include links to LocalHops registration page. The new website isn’t live yet, but the registration process is ready. For patrons without email, a call or visit to the library will allow for easy sign up. Benefits of using LocalHop include setting limits to the number of participants, but allowing for waitlist as well in case someone cancels and email reminders before the event so fewer people forget they signed up.

More next week on other features of the new website and upcoming programming.

Reading Now: Moira’s Pen by Megan Whalen Turner (Short Story collection from the Queen’s Thief series)

Listening to Now: Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride