All posts by Angie

Books

August Goodreads!

Hello, fellow book lovers! It’s the beginning of a new month again, so we’re excited to announce our picks for the month of August in our CMLE book groups!

For our Librarian Professionals group, we will be learning about motivation by reading Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us by Daniel H. Pink.


“The secret to high performance and satisfaction in today’s world is the deeply human need to direct our own lives, to learn and create new things, and to do better by ourselves and our world.”

 

 

For our second group, Librarians Enjoying Books, we will be reading The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield


“A love letter to reading, a book for the feral reader in all of us, a return to that rich vein of storytelling that our parents loved and that we loved as children.”

CMLE, Special, Visits

Visiting the Stearns History Museum!

Gallery

We always enjoy visits to our CMLE members, and this visit was extra interesting! One of our members that is not a typical library is the Stearns History Museum. The Museum has an extensive archive and we were lucky enough to be shown around by archivist Jessie Storlien.

As you can see from these photos, she showed us a ton of cool information, and as a Stearns County native myself, I really appreciated seeing all the history available about this area. And it’s all available to the public, although if you have any questions or need to see the archives, the experts like Jessie are available to assist you. Other archivists at the Museum include Steve Penick, John Decker, and Heidi Heller.

As you can see from the photos above, there are all sorts of different resources available to the public. You can find your family history (if you are from this area you will see some familiar names!), scroll through microfilm, or check out an exhibition about the first people to ever live in Stearns County. Do you live on a family farm? Check out your eligibility for the Century Farms program! And one of St. Cloud’s early newspapers, Der Nordstern, is in German so you may want to keep your Google Translate handy!

It was exciting to see the archives where additional resources are kept, including photographs, oral histories, the Myron Hall collection, and even more maps! It was easy to see that there was a lot of work being done to make sure historical documents are preserved in a way that will allow them to be accessed in the future. We got to learn about some of the challenges that face archivists, like rapidly changing technology and processing donated materials.

On our way out, we stopped to visit the room for kids, which had some historical photos of children from Stearns County! We got to admire some beautiful quilts made by artists from the area, and of course enjoyed the grounds outside the museum.

If you have any interest in local or family history, I’d definitely recommend taking advantage of the Stearns History Museum! Keep in mind that the museum is open Monday –  Friday 10 AM – 5 PM,  and Saturdays too, from 10AM – 4 PM!

A huge thank you to Jessie for a fantastic tour and for sharing all of her knowledge!

CMLE, Communication

Celebrate back-to-school and the solar eclipse with CMLE!

Thank you to everyone that responded to our poll to pick a date/time for our back-to-school event! A majority of people picked Monday, August 21st for the celebration and we realized that is also the day of the solar eclipse!

From NASA: “On Monday, August 21, 2017, all of North America will be treated to an eclipse of the sun. Anyone within the path of totality can see one of nature’s most awe-inspiring sights – a total solar eclipse. This path, where the moon will completely cover the sun and the sun’s tenuous atmosphere – the corona – can be seen, will stretch from Lincoln Beach, Oregon to Charleston, South Carolina. Observers outside this path will still see a partial solar eclipse where the moon covers part of the sun’s disk.” Sounds pretty exciting!!

So, our finalized date and time for our combined Back-To-School and Solar Eclipse Party is:

Monday, August 21st
Between 11am – 2pm (although feel free to drop by throughout the day, we will have extra snacks!)
CMLE Headquarters
570 1st St. SE
St. Cloud, MN 56304

Not only will we have solar system themed snacks and music (and eclipse viewing glasses!) but we’ll also have back-to-school decorations, a raffle, and of course, lots of great conversation about libraries and upcoming plans for the school year!

We really hope you can make it to celebrate the start of fall and return to school! Send us an email with any questions.

Check this out:

Tomorrow: CMLE Office Hours!

Reminder: Tomorrow is Wednesday July 26th and from 11am to 1pm we will be holding CMLE Office Hours!

Location:
CMLE Headquarters
570 1st Street SE 
St. Cloud, MN 56307

In a recent poll, many people said they would appreciate having a time to just casually drop in to Headquarters to chat about library stuff. You can feel free to stop in, with no appointment necessary.  Feel free to come talk about library programs, policies and procedures, ask questions, talk about cool things you are doing, or any other library-type stuff! We are available to you.

Lady Grey will also be available to listen to any library issues or fun ideas you may have.

Next Office Hours: Wednesday, August 2nd from 11am – 1pm

CMLE, Communication

Upcoming Wednesday Office Hours

 


Next CMLE Office Hours: July 26th and August 2nd, both from 11am – 1pm!

Location:
CMLE Headquarters
570 1st Street SE 
St. Cloud, MN 56307

 

What are CMLE Office Hours?

Well, in a recent poll, many people said they would appreciate having a time to just casually drop in to Headquarters to chat about library stuff.

So we have established a CMLE Office Hour for you!

Every Wednesday afternoon with an even numbered date, we’ll be here in the office from 11:00 to 1:00, and available for you to visit! (And not only will Mary and Angie be available to chat, Lady Grey may make an appearance as well! She usually has some excellent ideas to contribute! 🙂 )

You can feel free to stop in, with no appointment necessary.  Feel free to come talk about library programs, policies and procedures, ask questions, talk about cool things you are doing, or any other library-type stuff! We are available to you.

Come chat about writing policies, working through materials selections, negotiating with vendors, planning your website or social media, going to conferences as a presenter or an attendee, zines/manga/pop culture coolness, or anything else you want to discuss!

Want to talk about library things, but can’t make it in to the office? Let us know and we can set up a phone call or a chat session instead!

Would you like to just come say hi for a minute, and put a face to our names? Do it!

You can test out the bike desks, see the plants and ever-changing seasonal decorations, and check in on Orville The Official Office Bear! (Really, he’s the heart of the whole operation; so you don’t want to miss out on that!)

See you at Headquarters!