Meetings.....

An organization I to which I belong had its regular meeting last week in Charles City. This group is called LINC. It stands for Libraries in North Central (Iowa). It is a legitimate group composed of the directors of the larger libraries in our part of the state. However, its by-laws include such items as:
PURPOSE
A. To share ideas, information and experiences among the administrators of member libraries.
B. To develop and promote administrative level continuing education opportunities.
C. To write and administer cooperative grants or preferably to encourage others to write and administer them for us.
D. To have lunch at every restaurant of acceptable quality in North Central Iowa.
So, although we do meet to share ideas and plan for the future of library service in our area, we also enjoy one another's company and have a good time in the process. This meeting had a rather somber tone. Two of the long time directors were attending for the very last time. Virginia Ruzicka of Charles City and Carol Bailey from Belmond are retiring. Virginia's acerbic sense of irony has kept us laughing through the worst of times and Carol has led us all by example in her quiet, gracious manner. I have traveled to conferences around the country with each of them. Librarians make the very best traveling companions. As a group we are patient and resourceful and not easily flustered. I will miss both of them. Each in her own way was kind and nurturing to me when I was new at my job and uncertain where to begin.

Barb Shultz, area administrator, shared information she learned at a meeting held earlier last week in Pleasant Hill. It appears that the state library's proposal to roll the library service areas into the state library will come to pass. The state legislature issued a request (demand?) last year that a plan be developed to spend less, while delivering comparable service to Iowa libraries. Apparently, this innovative new plan will save around $22,000 of a multi-million budget. The library service areas furnish us with invaluable advice, moral support and information that make every librarian's job easier and improve library service to all Iowans. I'm afraid this is a glaring example of that old adage "penney-wise, pound foolish."

On a brighter note, we learned all about our new language learning program, BYKI. If you are interested in learning to speak another language, contact the library to get signed up. After that one visit to the library, you will be free to go through the lessons on your home computer as fast or as slowly as you like. It is an amazing program and would have been unaffordable to a library our size without the help of Barb Shultz at North Central Library Service Area. Barb formed a consortium to give us group buying power. The Recorded Books Company, the provider of BYKI, had never supplied this service through a consortium before, but was willing to work with us to make it available to north central libraries. I'm working through the lessons in Spanish. I'm learning lots-mostly how much one can forget in 30 or 40 years.

You can read about BYKI and more in our newsletter found on the library's webpage www.humboldtpubliclibrary.com Just click on Bookmarks.

Last week a couple of our former library kids got married. I’ve lived in Humboldt almost nine years and I watched these two grow from middle school to married couple. Kayla was a member of our Teen Advisory Board for several years. Adam was our hero when we first started video games at the library. Dance, Dance, Revolution was our first adventure into gaming. Adam knew all about it and the younger kids thought if DDR had Adam’s approval, it must be socially acceptable. Those two helped get our teen library corner and programs off the ground. We are grateful for their contributions.
Attending that wedding made me realize that this is probably the time of year I ought to tell you about wedding-planning resources at the library. I usually don’t think about it until late spring when the invitations begin to arrive in the mail. By then, summer weddings are all planned. It’s too late for the library to help out.
First, we have a subscription to Brides magazine. Sure, like any other magazine, this one is chock full of advertising. Isn’t that the fun of all fashion magazines? Even a bride on a budget can drool over the designer gowns and track down a less expensive version. Any mother of a bride could tell you that bridal magazines are expensive. Check out an armload of them at the library when planning gets underway.
One of my favorite wedding guides is Wedding Goddess: A Divine Guide to Transforming Wedding Stress into Wedding Bliss by Laurie Sue Brockway. This book is about five years old, but it hasn’t lost any of its punch. It divides the whole process into do-able chapters, beginning with a “What Is your Bridal Personality” quiz to get you started off in the right direction. A Wedding Goddess is a Bridezilla but with more grace and poise. The bride will still have the perfect day of her dreams, but she accomplishes it with tact and a winsome smile.
Green Wedding: Planning Your Eco-Friendly Celebration by Mireya Navarro is filled by ecologically sound suggestions such as : the invitations shouldn’t require trees to die, and the food should be local, seasonal and should never have said “moo”. Some of the photos in this book scream “hippy, dippy wedding” or “I got married in a cow pasture”, but many of them don’t. Many of them are gracious and classy. Whatever your style, it never hurts to hug a tree.
How to Plan Your Own Wedding and Save Thousands Without Going Crazy by Tracy Leigh is another one to consult. It’s loaded with charts and checklists. There is a short list of duties for every member of the wedding party and lots of I-probably-wouldn’t-have-thought-about it lists, such as the right time of day and location for various styles of tuxedoes.
Colin Cowie Wedding Chic: 1001 Ideas for Every Moment of Your Celebration is worth looking through for no other reason than to appreciate the lovely photos. No one I know can afford to do the stuff in this book (cuffs for the reception room drapes made of a particular variety of roses?), but it is full of many wonderful ideas that could be adapted to any budget.
The Portable Wedding Consultant by Leah Ingram is full of the practical stuff. Rules and rules of thumb for almost any decision a bride or groom may be required to make. One thoughtful nugget I read in this one says “Remember that planning the wedding is a dress rehearsal for the rest of your life.” I think that must mean that if all the members of each family are still speaking to all the members of the other family when the wedding is over, the marriage may have a pretty good chance at success.
Stop by the library. We will start you off down the aisle on the right foot.