The Grafton Public Library is proud to be part of Grafton Celebrates the Holidays and is very pleased to host musician David Polansky in concert, Sunday, December 8th at 3:00 p.m. at 35 Grafton Common. David Polansky’s music is frequently humorous, sometimes serious, and always clever and engaging. Join us for a concert of holiday tunes and be prepared to sing!
The library will also be open from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. for cocoa and candy canes, letter writing to Santa, and story times read by one of Santa’s Elves. Be sure to leave time to follow our first-ever Storywalk, that starts and ends at the library and goes around the Grafton Common. Goodie bags will be available for children. Everyone is welcome!
For more information or questions, please contact Beth Gallaway, Director, at 508-839-4649 or graftonlibrary.ma@gmail.com.
The Grafton Public Library is very excited to add a new item to our collection – electronic GAMES!
From Mario Kart, Lego Star Wars,and Just Dance 4 toPortal 2, Halo 4, Zumba Fitness 2, and Sims 3, we now have games for all ages as well as all platforms.
The games can be checked out for 3 week periods with 1 renewal (as long as they have not been placed on hold). Please limit yourself to no more than 4 per family. A complete list follows.
If we do not have a game you are looking for, try searching the C/W MARS catalog to request it from another library. HINT: You can limit format to software/video game–the last option on the format list.
This is a great way to “test drive” a game you have been wanting to try before you buy it, or play for the fun of it, or for parents to preview a game for their child.
Got fines? The Grafton Public Library is once again be accepting nonperishable food donations in lieu of overdue fines, now through December 31. Donations are accepted at the Library at 35 Grafton Common, Mon-Thu 10am-9pm and Fri-Sat 10am-5pm.
We ask that borrowers use their own sound judgment to make a food donation equivalent to the amount of fines owed. Food for Fines may not be applied to the costs of lost or damaged materials or other fees, such as faxing, photocopying or replacement library cards.
All contributions will go to the Grafton Food Bank. The Grafton Food Bank distributes baskets to Grafton families in need of food assistance during the holidays and throughout the year.
Non-perishable food of all kinds is needed, but especially welcome are gifts of jellies, juice, canned fruit and peanut butter. Personal toiletries, e.g. soap, toothpaste, etc, are also always needed. Donations of dented cans or items past their expiration date will not be accepted, as they may not be safe to consume, and will only have to be discarded.
We thank the public and the Library Board of Trustees for their support of this wonderful program. If overdue fines are stopping you from using your card, please take advantage of this program to bring your account current before the end of the year. During the rest of year, there are options to work off fines, replace materials at lower costs, and set up a payment plan so your card can remain in good standing.
The Grafton Public Library will CLOSE at 5 pm on Wednesday November 27, and CLOSED all day Thursday, November 28 and Friday, November 29 in observance of Thanksgiving. The Library reopens at 10:00 am on Saturday November 30.
PAWSing to R.E.A.D. is a reading enrichment program for beginning or hesitant readers in grades one, two, and three. Participants read to a therapy dog once a week for a half hour for five weeks. Amidst the giggles and tail wagging, readers’ confidence, fluency, word recognition, and comprehension improve!
The dogs and their handlers are therapy team registered and certified through Delta Society Pet Partners, Tufts Paws for People, and have completed the Reading Education Assistance Dogs workshop. We regularly visit schools, hospitals, and group homes. The animals are groomed before each visit – bath, teeth brushed, and thoroughly brushed.
The PAWSing to R.E.A.D. WINTER SESSION will begin Wednesday evening January 15th in Room 33 (second floor) of the Municipal Center and run each Wednesday until February 12th. There will be two time slots – 5:00 to 5:30 and 5:45 to 6:15 with 4 spaces available per time slot. If your child could benefit from participating in this wonderful reading enrichment program, please register by calling the Children’s Room, Grafton Public Library at 508-839-4649. Space is limited, so register early! Boo, Clementine, Biscuit, and Jack are ready to read! Any questions or for more information, please contact Amanda Diurba at 508-839-3908 or adiurba@verizon.net.
The Grafton Public Library will be CLOSED Monday November 11 in Observance of Veteran’s Day. Additionally, the online catalog Evergreen will be down for updating from 6 PM Friday November 8 to 7AM Tuesday November 12. Thanks for your patience!
All services requiring a library card will still work – please visit our Digital Branch to:
The Grafton Public Library is pleased to announce an upgrade to the shared online catalog over Veteran’s Day weekend! From 6PM on November 8 through Tue Nov 12 at 6:59 am, the online Library Catalog (Evergreen) will be offline for an upgrade.
We thank the public in advance for their patience on Saturday, November 9; there may be a delay in processing checkouts and returns due to the downtime, and new library cards will not be able to be issued. You will be able to search the catalog at bark.cwmars.org, but no holds can be placed.
To help the off-line system work most efficiently, we ask that patrons limit the amount of material to be checked out as much as possible.
All authenticated services—museum pass reservations, Mango Languages, Indieflix, OverDrive eBooks and media, Oxford Art online, Teen Health and Wellness, and HeritageQuest—should still work.
The online Library Catalog (Evergreen) will be back up Tuesday morning, Nov. 12th at 7:00 a.m.
Improvements over the past few months include the ability to limit to specific formats, such as DVDs and eBooks, a Ratings display for items such as movies and videogames, and more information about a title on the initial display (so you tell at a glance what format the item is in—book, DVD, audiobook, etc.). On the staff end, patron fines are now in red, so we can alert you when there are fines and fees on the patron account. Evergreen version 2.4 includes additional functionality and features.
Please call us at 508-839-4649 if you have any questions.
Drop in at the Library to do your solitary writing in solidarity! Tue, Wed & Thu evenings from 7-9pm, and Fri from 10am-1pm. We’re also hosting an editing session on Sat. Nov. 30 from 10am-1 pm. Please visit our online event calendar for a complete list of events.
posted on behalf of Jennifer Mentzer
It’s eleven a.m. on November first, and how many words have I written? None. Nada. Zilch. A big fat zero.
On any other day, this is pretty much the way it’s supposed to be. I don’t make a point of sitting down to write something each and every day of the year. But this year is different. This is the year I’ve decided to participate in NaNoWriMo.
NaNoWriMo is short for National Novel Writing Month. The challenge is to write a novel (or close to it) in one month. Fifty thousand words, to be exact. That works out to 1667 words per day – about seven pages in 12-point type. A challenge not for the faint-of-heart, that’s for sure.
It’s an idea that has caught on like wildfire. Started in 1999 with just over two hundred writers, NaNoWriMo has grown to include hundreds of thousands of people and billions of words. This year, some of those words will be mine.
Like many librarians, I have visions of being an author. Not a writer, so much, but an author. Someone whose work is found on the shelf at the library, someone who has published something that someone else actually wants to buy. There’s a picture book, a chapter book for kids and an adult novel all in embryonic form on my laptop at home. The picture book and the others are unrelated. The chapter book and the adult book, though, are two versions of the same story.
I’d wanted to write a children’s chapter book about something that happened to me when I was growing up. It was one of those times that is distinct in my mind, even though I couldn’t tell you much else about the year I was ten. Something very bad had happened in the world, and I was very curious about it. My parents, trying to do their duty, tried very hard to shield me from all the news. They hid the copies of Time and Newsweek, kept tight control on the TV (we didn’t have a remote yet) and deferred my questions. They stymied my every move and kept me in the dark, and I was mad. Protected, perhaps, but mad.
As I began to write the story of a young girl being shielded from the world she craved to know, I found that I needed to write the story of the tragedy. I needed to explore how someone who was there felt about being so close to something so powerful, so difficult, so life-changing. And thus, my adult novel was born.
Since I already have some words committed to the page, I’m not writing for NaNoWriMo in the purest sense. The ultimate object is to begin with a blank piece of paper and start from word one. In NaNoWriMo parlance, I’m a “rebel.” And I’m also a little afraid. This is a big challenge. Am I up to the task? Will anything I produce be worth reading? What happens when I go on vacation next week?
As the month goes on, I’ll find out. And, if you read here regularly, so will you. Hang on. It’s going to be fun!
The Grafton Public Library is proud to be part of Grafton Celebrates the Holidays and is very pleased to host musician David Polansky in concert, Sunday, December 8th at 3:00 p.m. at 35 Grafton Common. David Polansky’s music is frequently humorous, sometimes serious, and always clever and engaging. Join us for a concert of holiday tunes and be prepared to sing!
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