Episode 10-03: Crafting and Making in the Library

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Welcome to Season Ten of Linking Our Libraries! We are so happy to have you join us again! This is the Central Minnesota Libraries Exchange, and our members are all types of libraries and their staff. In this podcast, we talk about the skills library staff need to be successful and to help them to serve their communities.

This season we are talking about library programs – giving you some ideas about different ideas you can try in your own library. It is always good to share ideas across libraries, and we are all better! Each week we will look at a different theme of programs.

This week we are talking about a very standard library program: crafting and making! Check out our show notes page here.

You can get really fancy with this – even setting up an Etsy store to sell things. Or, you can hand out construction paper, glue, and glitter and let everyone go bananas. Today, we will talk about a few programs that are somewhere in the middle of these extremes  – things you might want to try in your own library!

To keep costs down, you can buy your supplies in bulk. And when you have a following of people who come to your programs, ask them what kinds of things they want to do. Especially for those of us who are not naturally crafty, talking with people who are and who do a variety of things will be helpful for you in thinking of new things. And they may also want to donate some supplies to the library, to keep good things going.

Bad Art Night:

A lot of libraries have done these programs. And you have a lot of flexibility in theme, medium, presentation, and everything else. 

The Ontario library has a detailed program for this program.

  • Participants can make as many pieces “Bad Art” (sculptures, paintings, collages, etc.) as they want, and in the final 20 minutes we’ll set up a Bad Art Exhibition. Everyone can browse and cast 3 votes for their favourite pieces of Bad Art. The winner gets the trophy. 

Materials:

  • Canvases
  • Paint
  • Wooden & Styrofoam forms
  • Glitter
  • funky tape
  • old magazines
  • clay
  • glue
  • rhinestones & stick on pearls
  • plastic animal figurines
  • dry noodles
  • markers, crayons, pencils, paper
  • boxes, toilet paper rolls, egg cartons, etc.

Bad Art Session (45 minutes)

  • Freestyle access to craft materials
  • Volunteer adults manning the glue gun station
  • Fun music plays
  • Slide show of inspirational bad art projected onto wall

Exhibition (20-25 minutes)

  • Everyone picks their “best bad art” and sets it up on a long table
  • Cardstock tent labels are set up to display the names of each work of art
  • Every attendee is given 3 ballots and can cast votes for their favourite bad art

Award Ceremony (5 minutes)

  • While ballots are counted, snack & buttons are given out, photos are taken of all the Bad Art
  • Trophy is dramatically presented to the creator of the Best Bad Art

Tile Art:

L.P. Fisher Public Library in Woodstock, New Brunswick held this as a family art night event. You can make that your own process: invite 20-somethings, serve wine, make it a singles event, have only teens, or enjoy the family aspect.

“It is a process-oriented, intergenerational program that allows people of all ages, whether they think of themselves as “artistic” or not, to try their hand at something creative. There is no defined outcome, so people can experiment and enjoy the process of play, something that is very good for relieving stress.”

Tile Art requires the following materials:

  • 4- or 6-inch glossy subway tiles
  • Permanent Sharpie markers (various colors)
  • Spraybottles filled with rubbing alcohol
  • Clean paintbrushes
  • Cotton swabs
  • Clear coat spraypaint
  • Baby wipes for easy clean-up

People were asked to draw and color a very simple design [with markers on their tile]. Abstract or geometric designs worked really well.

“Once they were finished drawing, people were encouraged to spray the rubbing alcohol over their image, and as the ink from the Sharpie markers liquefied and became malleable, the participants could manipulate it using paintbrushes, [cotton swabs], or even simply tilting their tiles back and forth and letting gravity take over.

“If a participant was unhappy with the way their tile looked, they simply sprayed on more rubbing alcohol, wiped the design off and started over. The alcohol also helped the colors become very vibrant. After drying for a few hours, the tiles were sprayed with a clear coat to protect the design. Participants were able to pick them up the following day.”

They have a video on the Programming Librarian website, linked in the shownotes.

Upcycled Jewelry

The Saratoga Springs (NY) Public Library discussed this program on the Programming Librarian website. 

“The library is the perfect place to educate people about and display upcycled items to showcase their benefits. The first upcycled program we offered came about organically. A colleague who often wore interesting earring and necklace sets told me she made them all out of inexpensive costume jewelry. For a few dollars, she would buy gaudy costume jewelry with 100-plus beads on them to break apart. She would then use the beads to make multiple pieces of her own combinations: including earrings, bracelets, etc.

When I discussed this idea of upcycling jewelry at a staff meeting, my colleagues were excited to participate and donated old and/or broken costume jewelry. The library already had fishing line, so all we had to invest was $10 for a set of six jewelry pliers. And ta-da! Our upcycled jewelry program was born.

To promote the program, I encouraged patrons to bring their own pieces of broken jewelry, giving them an opportunity to fix something old or mix and match to create something new.

This fun program requires very little skill and can be done for little to no money. To help mitigate costs and offer visual inspiration to attendees, I suggest checking to see if your library has books on the subject that you can bring to the class. You can also use the books for a display to promote the program.

I also suggest looking at yard sales and thrift stores. They’re great places to find low-cost costume jewelry and other materials with upcycling potential.

Finally, consider playing music and offering tea or snacks at your program to create a welcoming atmosphere.”

The pictures look great in this article!

Crafting and Making Kits

You don’t need to do a formal program; you can set up maker or craft kits that people can use on their own schedules. The St Paul Public library has a collection of kits they let patrons check out to take home:

  • Kits for fun, hands-on activities! Learn new skills and discover new passions. Kits that contain fun (and occasionally zany), hands-on activities!
  • We are dedicated to supporting lifelong learning. These kits allow you to learn new skills and potentially discover new passions.
  • Each Maker Kit contains all the materials to do an activity: equipment, books, supplies, suggested activities, tips, and resources.

A few of the kits:

  • Personal Archiving Everything you need to preserve your old photos, negatives, film or slides in digital formats.
  • Stop Motion Animation Make your own animated movies with poseable figures and a flexible camera.
  • Podcasting Do interviews on the go or record ambient sounds with this portable recorder.
  • Weaving Create a pattern and make your own wall hanging or other woven masterpieces with this loom and accessories, including yarn and twine.
  • Make Your Cat an Internet Celebrity Make your kitty a star – or just have fun- with this camcorder and all the accessories for a mini-movie. Catnip toy included!
  • Karaoke Tap into your inner diva and entertain friends with a karaoke kit, which includes a karaoke machine.
  • Spinning Kit Spin your own yarn for knitting and crocheting.
  • GoPro Kit Document while you go, make and do with this wearable camera.
  • Vinyl Record Care Kit items for cleaning vinyl records and styluses.

Kits to take home

They have a variety of other maker programs on their website.

  • Innovation Lab For tinkerers, entrepreneurs, artists, hobbyists, inventors, and the just plain curious. Free membership is required
  • Createch Tech lab and art studio for teens.
  • Tinker TuesdaysGet hands-on experience learning a new craft at home or share your knowledge and experience with a group!

There are thousands of other crafting and making projects you can find for your library. Today is just to get you started thinking about some new ideas! Go, and be creative with your programs – and have some fun with your patrons.

Books Read

Now, let’s get to the part of every episode that is everyone’s favorite: sharing books! We will link to these books on our shownotes pages, and the link will take you to Amazon. You probably know this, but when you click one of our links and then buy anything at all from Amazon, they give us a small percentage of their profits. That support really helps us, and although it’s anonymous so we won’t know it was you – we appreciate you taking the time to help us!

Hannah Brooks looks more like a kindergarten teacher than somebody who could kill you with a wine bottle opener. Or a ballpoint pen. Or a dinner napkin. But the truth is, she’s an Executive Protection Agent (aka “bodyguard”), and she just got hired to protect superstar actor Jack Stapleton from his middle-aged, corgi-breeding stalker.

He’s got her heart.

Jack Stapleton’s a household name―captured by paparazzi on beaches the world over, famous for, among other things, rising out of the waves in all manner of clingy board shorts and glistening like a Roman deity. But a few years back, in the wake of a family tragedy, he dropped from the public eye and went off the grid.

They’ve got a secret.

When Jack’s mom gets sick, he comes home to the family’s Texas ranch to help out. Only one catch: He doesn’t want his family to know about his stalker. Or the bodyguard thing. And so Hannah―against her will and her better judgment―finds herself pretending to be Jack’s girlfriend as a cover. Even though her ex, like a jerk, says no one will believe it.

What could possibly go wrong???

Hannah hardly believes it, herself. But the more time she spends with Jack, the more real it all starts to seem. And there lies the heartbreak. Because it’s easy for Hannah to protect Jack. But protecting her own, long-neglected heart? That’s the hardest thing she’s ever done.

January Cole’s job just got a whole lot harder.

Not that running security at the Paradox was ever really easy. Nothing’s simple at a hotel where the ultra-wealthy tourists arrive costumed for a dozen different time periods, all eagerly waiting to catch their “flights” to the past.

Or where proximity to the timeport makes the clocks run backward on occasion—and, rumor has it, allows ghosts to stroll the halls.

None of that compares to the corpse in room 526. The one that seems to be both there and not there. The one that somehow only January can see.

On top of that, some very important new guests have just checked in. Because the U.S. government is about to privatize time-travel technology—and the world’s most powerful people are on hand to stake their claims.

January is sure the timing isn’t a coincidence. Neither are those “accidents” that start stalking their bidders.

There’s a reason January can glimpse what others can’t. A reason why she’s the only one who can catch a killer who’s operating invisibly and in plain sight, all at once.

But her ability is also destroying her grip on reality—and as her past, present, and future collide, she finds herself confronting not just the hotel’s dark secrets but her own.

At once a dazzlingly time-twisting murder mystery and a story about grief, memory, and what it means to—literally—come face-to-face with our ghosts, The Paradox Hotel is another unforgettable speculative thrill ride from acclaimed author Rob Hart.

Conclusion

This was a quick overview of a few ideas that you might want to use in your library. Be sure to check out the show notes for links to everything discussed today. We are looking forward to chatting with you all season! We will have more ideas to help you keep your library running well, and strategies to help you serve your community.

And if you want to hear more book suggestions, be sure you are also subscribed to our other podcast: Reading With Libraries. Short episodes drop every Tuesday, and we look at different aspects of Minnesota. This season we look at a different historic site across the state each week, and then suggest six books that reference the site. Join us each week!