5-23-2025
Summer really is right around the corner. Maybe not the
weather, but certainly the end of the school year. While I still catch myself
making plans for when I am off in the summer, I quickly catch myself and panic
sends me back to making my real summer plans. This week has been a flurry of
activity printing our summer schedules, reading grids, coloring sheets, drawing
tickets, and fliers. All the supplies are lined up on a table ready to go.
This year we are making two big changes to the Summer
Reading Program.
The program and prize drawing are open to all ages. Sign up
begins on Monday, June 2nd. Usually that would be the first day we
set out the grab bags. Kids love the grab bags. As a mom, I have not
appreciated them. It’s been a tradition since the beginning of time to give
children plastic Oriental Trader items that break, get left behind, or end up
in a landfill. I have cringed for three summers as the bags are filled and set
out. What I haven’t done is purchase any new items. We didn’t quite run out
last year; however, we are low enough that (CO)OPERTATION Learn at Little
Prairie Elementary nearly did the trick.
We are now free to start a new tradition. Beginning this
year children will receive brag tags each week. Each one is a different design
with this year’s theme on one side and a saying like, “Reading Rocks” (that’s
the guitar) on the other. At sign up children will receive a cable ring with a
twist lock to keep them on. The cable rings come in five different colors. The
tags come in ten different designs. The hope is they are a more desirable take
away and will serve as a reminder of a fun summer rather than another plastic
mini skateboard with wheels that fall off.
True story, my first summer here I found sets of those
wheels lying on the floor and though they were a tongue ring. After finding a
second, that didn’t seem probable. It took me another summer before I realized
what they actually were.
Each month this summer we do have an adult program
scheduled. No excuses for not coming based on weather. Ben Merens, Consumer
Protection Outreach Specialist for the Wisconsin Bureau of Consumer Protection
will kick us off on June 11th with the presentation Common Scams and
Fraud. The Intergenerational Community Center is lending us their space for the
program which will begin at 2:00 pm.
Scams and fraud have been an issue probably even before
Nigerian princes discovered email. Today they bombard me with countless texts
every week. At first it was election related, now several are threatening
social security. Merens will help take the panic those type of appeals create
and help us avoid their lure.
Reading Now: The Reality of Everything by Rebecca Yarros
Listening to Now: Son of a Witch by Gregory Maguire
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