Stuffed Animal Sleepover: Christmas Edition!

The Bellevue Public Library hosted its 4th Stuffed Animal Sleepover on December 6, 2014. Due to the busy holiday season the Children's staff decided not to incorporate a party with the stuffed animals' owners into the schedule.  Children were invited to bring in a stuffed animal during the week of the sleepover.  Miss Michelle and I, along with several Junior Friends, had a great time putting on a sleepover party for the animals!  We kept our cameras nearby as we played board games, had a snack, ordered pizza, read stories, helped to decorate a tree, and spent the night at the library.  We even took everyone out for breakfast in the morning!
I hope you will enjoy the movie we put together to help remember our 2014 Stuffed Animal Sleepover: Christmas edition!    You can watch it here or find it on Youtube (search: Bellevue Public Library Christmas Sleepover). 
I'd love to hear your comments and/or suggestions which will surely help us improve future Sleepover movies!
   

Welcome School

This storytime was presented at Welcome School on Friday, December 20, 2013.


Books:

Little Robin's Christmas by Jan Fearnley

I adapted this story and presented it to the children as a flannelboard story.  Children familiar with this story might be able to retell the story!

Minerva Louise on Christmas Eve by Janet Morgan Stoeke

Before I returned to the Bellevue Public Library, the children taught me a funny song and a cute action rhyme!:

Peppermint Stick Song

(tune: "The Grand Old Duke of York")

Oh, I took a lick of my peppermint stick (pretend to lick finger)

And I thought it tasted yummy! (lick lips)

It used to be on my Christmas tree, (draw a tree in the air)

but I like it better in my tummy. (rub tummy)

This Little Elf 

(Imitate all motions)

This little elf likes to hammer.

This little elf likes to saw.

This little elf likes to splash on paint.

And this little elf likes to draw.

This little elf likes best of all to put the cry in the baby doll. 

(Mama! Mama! Mama! Mama!)

I want to wish all the children, teachers and administrators at Welcome School a very blessed Christmas and a New Year that is filled with new friends, new discoveries and new opportunities! 
  ~ Mrs. B. 


                      

Each Outreach Storytime includes activities that support one or more of the five early literacy practices identified as essential in helping your child develop the skills they need before they can learn to read. The five practices – singing, talking, reading, playing and writing –were developed for Every Child Ready to Read®, an initiative of the Association for Library Services for Children (ALSC) and the Public Library Association (PLA).

Christmas With the Animals

This Toddler Storytime was presented at Bellevue Public Library on Wednesday, December 18, 2013.

Books:
Bear's Christmas Star by Mireille D'Allance

Jingle-Jingle by Nicola Smee

The children helped me tell this story, by adding the sound effects!  Children chose to play either jingle bells or wood blacks to recreate the sounds of the horses jangling, clip-clopping hooves.

Songs:

Everybody Say Hello!
(tune: "London Bridge")
Everybody say hello, say hello, say hello,
Everybody say hello, hello Wesley!

(Wesley is my turtle puppet who pops out of my apron pocket whenever we sing this song.  Then he sits quietly on his rock and listens to the stories and sings along with us.  At the end of storytime he says goodbye to the children, gives them high fives, eats pretend food from their hands, blows kisses, and plays hide and seek!


Good Morning!
(tune: "Frere Jacques")
Good morning! (echo)
How are you? (echo)
I'm so glad to see you! (echo)
Wesley is too! (echo)


If You're Ready For a Story
(tune: "If You're Happy and You Know It")
If you're ready for a story, take a seat.
If you're ready for a story, take a seat.
Clap your hands and stomp your feet,
Make your hands all nice and neat.
If you're ready for a story, take a seat.

Playtime Activity:
We took advantage of the season to play another round of Christmas Bingo!
Here are some photos:





Our next Toddler Storytime will be held on Wednesday, January 8, 2014, when I will be sharing some of my favorite New Books that have recently been added to the library's collection.

Each Toddler Storytime includes activities that support one or more of the five early literacy practices identified as essential in helping your child develop the skills they need before they can learn to read. The five practices – singing, talking, reading, playing and writing –were developed for Every Child Ready to Read®, an initiative of the Association for Library Services for Children (ALSC) and the Public Library Association (PLA).

Every Child Ready to Read^® @ your library^®, PLA and ALSC logos are registered trademarks of the American Library Association and are used with permission.

Pajama Storytime

This storytime was presented at Bellevue Public Library on Tuesday, December 10th, 2013.

Books:

Where Do I Sleep?: A Pacific Northwest Lullaby by Jennifer Blomgren, illustrated by Andrea Gabriel

How Do Dinosaurs Say Merry Christmas? by Jane Yolen, illustrated by Mark Teague

The Night Before Christmas by Clement C. Moore, illustrated by Eric Puybaret, performed by Peter, Paul and Mary

I did something rather unconventional and played the audio version of the story shown above - featuring Peter, Paul and Mary - while showing the illustrations from the version displayed below.  I prefer the illustrations by Charles Santore for their uncluttered clarity and nostalgic look.


The Night Before Christmas or, A Visit From St. Nicholas by Clement C. Moore, illustrated by Charles Santore

I also shared a poem, titled "The Stranger" from:

Christmas is Coming by Charles Ghigna and Debra Ghigna, illustrated by Mary O'Keefe Young

and a few jokes from:

Jingle Jokes: Christmas Riddles to Deck the Ha Ha Halls by Katy Hall and Lisa Eisenberg, illustrated by Stephen Carpenter

Each Pajama Storytime includes activities that support one or more of the five early literacy practices identified as essential in helping your child develop the skills they need before they can learn to read. The five practices – singing, talking, reading, playing and writing –were developed for Every Child Ready to Read®, an initiative of the Association for Library Services for Children (ALSC) and the Public Library Association (PLA).

Our next Pajama Storytime will be on Tuesday, January 14th, 2014 at 7 PM!

Christmas With the Animals!

This storytime was presented at Bellevue Public Library on Wednesday, December 11th, 2013.

Books:
Minerva Louise on Christmas Eve by Janet Morgan Stoeke

Christmas For 10 by Cathryn Falwell 

 
Songs:

Everybody Say Hello!
(tune: "London Bridge")

Everybody say hello,
Say hello, say hello,
Everybody say hello,
Hello Wesley!

(Wesley is my turtle puppet who pops out of my apron pocket whenever we sing this song.  Then he sits quietly on his rock and listens to the stories and sings along with us.  At the end of storytime he says goodbye to the children, gives them high fives, eats pretend food from their hands, blows kisses, and plays hide and seek!)


Good Morning!
(tune: "Frere Jacques")

Good morning! (echo)
How are you? (echo)
I'm so glad to see you! (echo)
Wesley is too! (echo)


If You're Ready For a Story
(tune: "If You're Happy and You Know It")

If you're ready for a story, take a seat.
If you're ready for a story, take a seat.
Clap your hands and stomp your feet,
Make your hands all nice and neat.
If you're ready for a story, take a seat.


Playtime Activity:

Today we played a nice long game of Christmas Bingo!  I pulled this off the internet and laminated the pieces for long-term use.  Here is the website I used, but there are many others!  Try searching "Christmas Bingo", "Children's Christmas Bingo Printables", etc. We used red and green M & M's for the markers.  Ask your child for ideas of what you could use for markers!
 

 Next week's theme: (More) Christmas Stories!

Each Toddler Storytime includes activities that support one or more of the five early literacy practices identified as essential in helping your child develop the skills they need before they can learn to read. The five practices – singing, talking, reading, playing and writing –were developed for Every Child Ready to Read®, an initiative of the Association for Library Services for Children (ALSC) and the Public Library Association (PLA).

Every Child Ready to Read^® @ your library^®, PLA and ALSC logos are registered trademarks of the American Library Association and are used with permission.

December's Momaha-Bellevue Story Time!

Presented at Bellevue Public Library on Thursday, December 5, 2013, in partnership with Momaha, the Omaha World-Herald's online community for moms.

 

As children arrived for Story Time they joined in a sing-along!  We all grabbed some jingle bells and sang... "Jingle Bells"!  Some of us got in the spirit by putting a red dot on our nose as we sang "The Reindeer Pokie"!

Since I know you'll ALL want to sing this at home, here are the words:

The Reindeer Pokie
(tune: "The Holie Pokie")

You put your antlers in,
You put your antlers out.
You put your antlers in
And you shake them all about.

You do the reindeer pokie
And you turn yourself around.
That's what it's all about!

You put your hooves in...
You put your fluffy tail in...
You put your red nose in...
You put your reindeer self in...


We called another audible this month and changed our Storytime theme.  We were very pleased to welcome Kathryn Stahl, an actress and teacher at The Rose Theater!
 

Our audience was a little smaller than usual, probably because of the low temps and wind chill.  Brrrrrrrr!


Here are the 3 wonderful stories Kathryn shared with us:

My Red Balloon by Eve Bunting, illustrated by Kay Life

 

Henry the Christmas Cat by Mary Calhoun, illustrated by Erick Ingraham

~ and ~





Into The Forest written and illustrated by Anthony Browne

 



Kathryn brought along 2 sets of 2 tickets to the Rose Theater's current production of "Narnia: The Musical", which were given as door prizes.  Our congratulations to the families who won the tickets!  Perhaps after you attend the show you can leave a review on this blog post!!

As children were getting ready to go back out into our frigid Nebraska evening they each picked an item from our door prize table:

We ended our evening with milk and 3 varieties of delicious cookies, provided by The Cake Specialist.  We thank Jayme and Ryan from The Cake Specialist for their generous support!

Here are a few photos and a video clip from the event:

Our next Momaha-Bellevue Storytime will be held on Thursday, January 3rd at 7 PM. 

 

I hope to see you there!

 

  ~Mrs. B.