The Summer Reading Clubs kick off today, Monday, June 15 at your Main Library and South Branch Library locations. As a reminder, the Mockingbird Branch Library will remain temporarily closed throughout the reading club months. Stop by and pick up your reading club bags and join us for a summer of fun activities, both inside your library and virtual. Most things have remained the same, but this year will bring some changes as well.
First, we will not be offering programs inside the library until July. Even so, we’ll still have activities for you to engage in with our Virtual Club. Feel free to participate in a host of fun activities for the summer that you can complete online, designed by library staff. There’s activities for all ages including for those to like to write, craft, answer trivia, decipher clues, and more. All activities will be available throughout the reading club so there’s plenty of time to engage in as many as you’d like.
By submitting your completed reading logs during the summer, as well as participating in a host of our online activities in our virtual club, you also have the chance to be entered into prize drawings that we’ll be doing at the end of the Summer Reading Club.
Storytime sessions will return in July with Preschool Storytimes offered Mondays at 11:15AM at the South Branch Library; Toddler Times on Tuesdays at 11:15AM at the South Branch and 11:00AM on Wednesdays at the Main Library; and Mother Goose on the Loose will be offered on Thursdays at 11:00AM. Registration is not required but we will be limiting the number of guests that can attend so no more than 50% of the room’s capacity is inside our story rooms.
Virtual Book Club sessions will be offered and presented online as Zoom meetings. There will be a Mystery Monday Club and a Brown Bag Club aimed at adults ages 18 and older until we return to our regular in-house meetings. Kids will delight in great activities including increased Super Storytime events based on popular fairy tales, crafts, visits from Joy Harsh the Zoo Lady), weekly STEAM sessions, and so much more.
As an extra treat, on Saturday, June 20, we’ll be at the Abilene Zoo at 1:30PM and 3:00PM providing storytimes and telling you about the reading club during their World Giraffe Day event. Come find us at the Pavilion where we’ll be sharing a host of silly books featuring the tallest animal at the zoo. It’ll be a great time for the family. Later, on Tuesday, July 14 at 2:00PM, we’re partnering with H-E-B in the H-E-Buddy Book Event at your Main library. H-E-B will be on hand to give out copies of the book "The Nuff," which features a great message about you’re just enough being the person you are. There will be readings of the story, a chance to take photos with Buddy, and treasure hunt, and more, plus a book will be provided to each family that comes out.
There will be so much fun to be had during this Summer Reading Club of firsts. We invite everyone to come out and participate in all we have to offer and help us to show to the community that your library truly is a popular destination for summer fun in town.