In the 6 weeks of our Summer Reading and Creativity Programs:

You read for 1017 hours.

You wrote 32 stories and more than 30 songs and poems.

You created untold oodles of great illustrations, pop-up and lift-the-flap embellishments, home-made books, and illustrated alphabets.

Thanks for sharing them with us! See you next year!

The Free Library of New Hope and Solebury is delighted to announce the winners of the 2009 Summer Writing Contests. The theme this year was Be Creative @ Your Library. The young writers took this advice seriously! We received more submissions than ever this year, and all judges agreed it was harder than ever to pick the winners. In fact, for the very first time we had a tie.

Some day these writers will be creating your news stories, novels, and favorite movies. Keep an eye out!

The Summer Reading and Creativity Programs at the library are made possible through a generous grant from the Haley Foundation. This year, Farley's Bookshop kindly sponsored the Pre-K through Grade 4 Writing Contest. Grand Prize stories from these groups will be displayed at Farley's at 44 South Main Street in New Hope. You know you live in a great community when it includes so many talented and creative kids as well as a truly great independent book seller.


Kindergarten/Grade 1 Winners:
Gianna Ferlazzo - Grand Prize (co-winner) for The Ants Go For a Walk
Kyle Northrup - Grand Prize (co-winner) for B.B. Finds a Home
Anthony, Nicholas, & Jack DePalo - Best Adventure Story for The Big Adventure of the Three Friends
Sophie Farina - Best Animal Story for Sophie's Book
Morgan Miele - Best Counting Book for The Ants
Chris O'Brien - Best Beach Story for My Vacation to Ocean City, NJ
Kevin O'Brien - Best Travel Story for My Trip to Wildwood
Riley Star Ramirez - Best Fable for The Bear that was Getting Picked On
Cecilia Schmidt - Best Family Story for Cecilia and the Flower


Grades 2 - 4 Winners:
Tommy Fendler - Grand Prize for Going to the Jungle
Ray Brady - Best Book of Architecture for Houses for Sale; Best Book of Words for A Be See; and Best Superhero Story for SuperSmall
Grace Farina - Best Animal Story for Monkey Chamberoo and Daisy
Anthony Ferlazzo - Best Adventure Story for The Four Adventurers
Sophia Francesco - Best Autobiography for The Story About My Life
Zach Griffiths - Best Sports Story for The Owl Olympics
Madison Pierce - Best Science Fiction Story for The Girl Who Didn't Listen and Best Battle Story for The Sword of Fate
Anna Schmidt - Best Story about Friendship for The Three Best Friends
Emily Walton - Most Familiar Story for The Bug Family


Winners from the Young Writers’ Reading Club:
Danny Fendler - First Prize for Operation Alluvium
Emily Madara - Second Prize for Mummy Dogs
Helena Penfold - Third Prize for The Troubled Tormentor
Igor Lupisella - Fourth Prize for The Day My Life Changed Forever

Honorable Mentions to Isabella Farina, Anthony Ferlazzo, Hannah Mailer, Isabella Mailer, Parker Miele, Vanessa Northrup, and Kaylee Tao


Congratulations to All!

Here are some ideas for your book and stories this week.

Week Five– Be Creative at your library!

Crazy Mixed-Up Stories

This was Storytelling week at the library.

We hope you’re busy making up your own stories for the Story Contest. Grand Prize winners will be displayed at Farley’s Bookshop. We need to see all your stories by Saturday, August 1. Yipes!!! That’s pretty soon!!!

Still having trouble with ideas?

How about taking a story you know well and mashing it up?

Ken Geist moved the Three Little Pigs underwater and turned it into a great book: The Three Little Fish and the Big Bad Shark.

Bob Hartman pulled a quick switch to write The WOLF Who Cried BOY.

David Conway mashed together many Mother Goose rhymes to create The Great Nursery Rhyme Disaster.

How about you? What would happen if Cinderella got lost running away from the ball and stumbled into the gingerbread house from Hansel and Gretel by mistake? What if Rapunzel’s witch got sick of her and sent her to Hogwarts? What if SpongeBob kissed Sleeping Beauty?

Get us your stories and reading logs by August 1, please. If you’ve completed a story or log, we’ll see you at the picnic August 4!

Here are some ideas for your book and stories this week.

Week Four – Be Creative at Your Library!

Stories from Songs

This week at the library we made up our own songs.

If you missed Annie’s Super Songwriting program, check out her website here:
http://www.notebookrecords.com/

You might also want to link to some great music sites for kids from this list at the Internet Public Library:
http://ipl.org/div/kidspace/browse/amm3000/

Meanwhile, we hope you’re working on your stories. Contest time is coming up soon! Stories are due by July 31. We’ve gotten some stories already, and we hope to read yours, too.

Still looking for new ideas?

Stories can come from songs!

Think of music you like. If it doesn’t already have words of its own, can you think about how it makes you feel and then write words for it? How about drawing what it makes you feel or think about?

Can you make up new words for a favorite song, and draw pictures to go along? Or can you imagine what might have happened to make someone sing that song?

Can you make up a whole new song and write it in your book?

Here are some ideas for your book and stories this week.

Week Three – Be Creative at Your Library!

Stories from Science

This week at the library we saw Piccirillo Sciencetelling (http://www.piccirillo.org/)
And found out how to mix stories and science.

Here are some ideas to take home with you.

To learn all kinds of cool science facts, check out the KidSpace Science Links at the Internet Public Library.

The Internet Public Library also has great links to all sorts of sites where kids can be creative. Some of these will help you learn to write terrific stories. If you write the best story ever – but after our contest at the library is over – there are some sites here that will help you show off your work online so everyone can read it.

What happens when you put science and stories together? Anything you imagine!

Lots of comic books mix up science and stories. There are also books called “science fiction” which tell strange and wonderful stories that may be based on new ideas about science. These are stories about experiments, strange planets, spaceships, time travel and much more. Try it out! What if your best friend was a secret space alien? A robot? A time traveler from the future? A caveman in disguise?

Here are some ideas for your book and stories this week.

Week Two – Be Creative at Your Library!

Inspiration All Around!

This week at the library we saw Nature By the Yard (http://naturebytheyard.com/)
and found out how inspiration waits in our own backyards.

If you missed the program, it’s not too late to find out more!

Take a visit to a wild and wonderful place – your own backyard. Just sit still a moment. Look around you. Stay still and listen. Who’s sharing the land with you? How about the sky? What are all those creatures doing? Do they have stories to tell?

Look around at the trees as well. How old do you think they are? What kinds of stories could they tell you if they wanted? Imagine a nice long conversation with a tree in your yard.

What could a tree teach a squirrel? Do you think that bright red cardinal is a secret superhero?

It would be great to remember a perfect summer day. Why not draw a picture?

Look here to see what other young naturalists are doing:
http://monarchbfly.com/about/

And here's a special project some of us worked on:

Ever here of SPIDERman or BATgirl? At the library we have a cool book about LADYBUG Girl and BUMBLEBEE Boy. Lots of superheroes share names and special powers with creatures you can find in your own backyard. Here's a quick little worksheet to help you imagine your own Backyard Super Hero. This could be the start of a story for our story contest.

Back Yard Super Hero

Superhero Name: ___________________________________________

Secret Identity: ___________________________________________

Is Partly Human and Partly: ___________________________________

Super Powers: ______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

Best Friend: _______________________________________________

Sidekick: _________________________________________________

Most Evil Villain: ____________________________________________

Villain’s Special Power: ________________________________________

Very Best Adventure Ever: ______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________

Here are some ideas for your book and stories this week. This week we start making books. If you didn’t already get your make-a-book kit, pick it up at the library.

Week One – Be Creative at Your Library!

Where Do I Start ???

Sometimes it’s hard to know what to put in your book. Try thinking about books you like. How about books about animals? Alphabet books (“A is for…”)? Counting books?

There are books of memories, books with photos, books with letters to someone you love.

Maybe you’d like to try a story. There are stories with words, and stories told just in pictures. There are fairy tales and make-believe stories, and stories about things that really happen. How about “what if” stories? “What if I walked out of the house and met a talking rabbit?” “What if I found out I could fly?” “What if I went to a baseball game and caught a home run ball?”

I bet you already know lots of stories. A book is someplace to keep them safe, and don’t forget: you may have made just one book at the library, but you can make as many as you want tomorrow!

Thanks to everyone who made our opening day of registration such a pleasure! We have about 100 kids signed up so far, and there is still room in some of our programs.

The Young Writers' Reading Club and the Wednesday Read-to-Me Club are full.

There's still space in Saturday Read-to-Me, and in the Young Songwriters Club.

Most Kindergarten-Grade 1 programs in the library are full, but it is still possible to sign up for the club. Kids can still fill in reading logs, win prizes, enter the story contest sponsored by Farley's Bookshop, and join us at the final picnic party.

There are still places in some Grade 2 - 4 programs in the library, and it is also still possible to sign up for the club without attending in-library events. Kids can fill in reading logs, win prizes, enter the story contest sponsored by Farley's Bookshop, and join us at the final picnic party.

Registration for our Summer Reading Clubs will begin Saturday, June 6 at 10:00 AM and end Saturday, June 20 at 5:00 PM.

We offer two read-to-me clubs for preschoolers aged 2 to 5; two summer reading clubs for children entering kindergarten through grade 4; a Thursday evening young writers' reading club for children entering grades 4 through 6; and a Wednesday evening young songwriters club for children entering grades 4 through 6. Details on these clubs are posted below.

Our popular writing contest for kids will return this year as well. There will be contests for kids entering kindergarten and first grade; for those entering second through fourth grades, and for the Young Writers' Reading Club .

This year's theme is Be Creative at Your Library!

The clubs usually fill up very quickly. Please plan to come early to register.

You must register in person at the library during our normal hours. Last year the line began to form about one hour ahead of time. Please note that last year the Wednesday preschool program and the Young Writers' Reading Club were full almost immediately. Many of the presentations for kids entering grades K-4 were full by the middle of the first afternoon of registration. We apologize for the limited sizes of the groups, but we are a very small library with a staff of two paid employees (helped by a terrific group of volunteers), and this is simply all we can handle. Believe me, we wish we could do more!

If you have time to volunteer to help us, especially on Tuesday mornings for the K-4 groups, we would be most grateful. Please contact Caroline at the library to sign up. Thanks!

Young Songwriters Club
For Kids Entering Grades 4, 5, or 6

Meets Wednesday Evenings 7:00 - 8:30 PM
Dates: June 24, July 1, 8, 15, 22, 29

Club members will explore the basic musical and literary elements of songwriting, including rhyme, meter, style, melody, song structure, & more. They will work individually & in small groups to create limericks, poems, parodies, song sketches, & songs. Songwriters' creative output will be performed & recorded at the final session.

This club will be led by New Hope resident Rick Rosen. Rick is the Minister of Music at Church of the Messiah, Gwynedd, where he directs chancel, bell and junior choirs, composes music, produces the Music at Messiah concert series, gives guitar lessons, and otherwise coordinates the musical aspects of the church's worship. Rick is the founder of the male a cappella singing group Cordus Mundi, is currently a singing section leader with the Bucks County Choral Society, and also sings with the Bucks County Choral Society's Chamber Singers.

There is no charge for this program (We thank the Haley Foundation for their generous support of the program, and Biersmith Associates for funding the recording of the final session).

Space is limited to 12 members, so don’t wait to register. Because of limited space, preference will be given to those who are not already registered for another club at the library. Registration opens Saturday, June 6 (10:00 AM—5:00 PM) (lines form before 10:00) & continues through June 20 or until programs are full. You must sign up in person at the library or send a friend to do so for you.

Young Writers’ Reading Club
For Kids Entering Grades 4, 5, or 6

Meets Thursday Evenings 6:00 to 7:30 PM
Dates: June 25, July 9,16,23,30, August 6

Light supper at every meeting (please advise us in advance in writing if a club member has special dietary needs, allergies, or restrictions)

It's Young Writers’ Reading Club time again.  This year we will be spouting poetry, telling stories, writing newspaper columns, and taking part in a radio play.  We have some very special guests who will share with us their writing secrets.  Watch out for other surprises to come, and a new mystery party for everyone who completes a reading log or writes a story! 

There is no charge for this program (We thank the Haley Foundation for their generous support).

Space is limited to 15 members only, so don’t wait to register.
Because of limited space in this club and the Songwriters Club, preference will be given to those who are not already registered for another club at the library. Registration opens Saturday, June 6(10:00 AM—5:00 PM) (lines form before 10:00) and continues through June 20 (or until programs are full). You must sign up in person at the library (or send a friend to sign up for you). We are sorry for the limitations, but we are a small library.

Summer Reading Club
For Kids Entering
Grades K—1, or 2—4

Be Creative at Your Library! is this year's theme

Club members will read books and learn how to make their own books. Every in-library event will include a special presentation and time to pick out new books to read at home. Kids entering Kindergarten and 1st grade will be in one group; kids entering grades 2-4 in another. Both enjoy the same presentations. Older kids will also explore storytelling and illustration, if they want. With younger kids we’ll read aloud and tell stories. We will once again hold writing contests with prizes for both groups.

Kids may sign up for each special event at the library individually. You need not commit to coming every time. Kids may sign up for as many programs as they wish (space permitting).

Those who can’t come to the events at the library can still participate in reading and making a book. Any registered child who completes a reading log, or makes a book, may receive prizes and sign up to attend the final party.

All in-library events are Tuesday Mornings 10:30—12:00

June 30: Learn to Make Your Own Book! We’ll start making books today—books you can add to all summer long, and show off at the final party.

July 7: Nature By the Yard Learn about the natural world all around you, and let Nature inspire you to get creative.

July 14: Piccirillo Sciencetelling Science and Storytelling get all mixed up in the exciting adventure Trapped at Tripletree!

July 21: Super Songwriting with Chip & Annie Share well-known songs and write a new song from start to finish. Learn about rhythm, rhyme, beat, and lyric writing.

July 28: Larry Sceurman, Storyteller The Storyteller shares a mix of folk tales, fairy tales, and brand new stories.

August 4: Final Picnic Dinner Party The whole family is invited to pack a picnic and join us for a music and arts program from 6:00-7:30 PM at a
special location.

Every club member will receive a T-shirt upon completion of the first reading log. For every completed log after that, and for making one book, each child will receive a book or similar prize. This year, reading logs will measure time spent reading, not books read. We hope this makes things fairer for kids who read l o n g e r books.

Each child will receive a kit with materials and instructions to help make a book. New ideas for adding to the book will be shared at each in-library event. If you can’t attend the event, the ideas for that week will be available at the library throughout the week, and will also be posted on our website at www.nhslibrary.org, so you can keep enjoying the activities even when you can’t be here.

Club members must have their own library cards, and we ask that they please bring their library cards and the club bags they receive at registration to each event. Any outstanding fines must be cleared and any overdue books must be returned before the club starts.

You don’t have to stay with your child at the library, but we do ask that you please drop off and pick up your child promptly. If you’d like to stay and help us, that would be truly wonderful. We also ask you to be aware that children must be able to behave. Children who misbehave can ruin an event for everyone else, and we do reserve the right to ask misbehaving children to leave the program. We’d hate to do that, so please be sure your child is signed up for the appropriate group and events. Thank you.

There is no charge for this program (we thank the Haley Foundation for their generous support).

Space is limited, so please sign up early! In-library events are often full by late in the afternoon of the first sign-up day.

Registration opens Saturday, June 6 (10:00 AM—5:00 PM) (lines form before 10:00 AM) and continues through June 20. You must sign up in person at the library or send a friend to do so for you. Please come ready to tell us which programs fit your schedule.

Read-to-Me Club
For Preschool Children Ages 2 – 5

For 2009, you may choose either:

Wednesday Mornings, 10:45—11:30
Dates: June 24, July 1, 8, 15, 22, 29

or

Saturday Mornings, 10:45—11:30
Dates: June 27, July 11,18,25, August 1,8

Children must be accompanied by an adult

There is no charge for this program (We thank the Haley Foundation for their generous support).

This is a fun story-time group. We’ll read stories aloud from books. We’ll make up brand-new stories together. We’ll create craft projects and play music with rhythm band instruments to go with the tales we tell. Kids and parents will keep reading logs to win t-shirts, books, and other prizes.

Space is limited, so sign up early!
The Wednesday group always fills up very quickly, often within an hour.

We are sorry, but we are a very small library with only two staff members, and there is a limit to the number we can accommodate! Registration opens Saturday, June 6 (10:00 AM—5:00 PM) (lines form before 10:00) and continues through June 20 (or until programs are full). You must sign up in person at the library, or send a friend to sign up for you.

The 2009 Summer theme is Be Creative @ Your Library!

We're in the planning stages now, so please contact us with ideas, suggestions, comments, complaints, or questions.

We have not yet set our dates for 2009. The Bridge Street canal bridge, just a block or so away from the library, is being rebuilt and the construction is forcing a great deal of traffic onto Ferry Street, right in front of the library. We'd like to start our programs after construction is complete, but PennDOT cannot give a clear answer as to the expected completion date. The original date was in mid-June, which would have perfect for our normal start in the last week of June, but it now seems unlikely that construction will be complete by then.

We'll let you know as soon as we do. When dates are set, we'll list them here on the webpage.

Thanks for checking in!

The Free Library of New Hope and Solebury is delighted to announce the winners of the 2008 Summer Writing Contests. The theme this year was Catch the Reading Bug (at your library). Some day these guys will be writing your news stories, novels, and favorite movies. Keep an eye out!

There is an extra special honorable mention awarded to Chris O’Brien, the only preschooler to participate, for his book Library.

Kindergarten/Grade 1 Winners:
Zach Griffiths – Grand Prize Winner for Ladybugs
Raymond Brady - Best Adventure Story for Home Sweet Home
Gianna Ferlazzo – Best Summer Vacation Story fo My Day at Avon by the Sea
Sophia Francesco – Most Stories Written for The Egg and the Chick, The Numbers Book, and the Colors Book
Samantha Frank – Most Beautiful Bug Story for The Bugs I Love
Morgan Miele – Most Creative Design for The Bug Book
Harrison Missell – Most Creative Fable for The Tortoise Beats the Hare at the Finish Line
Kevin O’Brien – Best Travel Story for 17 Hours to Disney World

Grades 2 - 4 Winners:
Aaron Frank – Grand Prize Winner for If Flies Played Baseball
Dana Bandurick – Best Illustration for Little Worm
Anthony Ferlazzo – Best Biographical Story for A Fun Day at the Midway Fair
Hannah Mailer – Most Creative Un-Written Story for her performance art story
Parker Miele – Most Exciting Story for Bugs
Zach Nangle – Best Research and Very Best Title for Would You Be a Wood Bee?
Emily Walton – Best Family Album for Family and Bugs

Winners from the Young Writers’ Reading Club:
Hannah Jordan – First Prize for Just Around the Corner
Sarah Summerson – Second Prize – Girls at Jackson Forest
Helena Penfold – Third Prize for Crimson Fangs
Isabella Farina – Honorable Mention for Where the Jewels Go So Do You
Daniel Fendler – Honorable Mention for The Shrink Ray and Me
Nicholas Leuser – Honorable Mention for Delaware