Once a month, the kids and I wake up at 8am on a Saturday to get to the Library Book Sale before it opens to the public. It is the ONLY thing that gets us up this early… even church starts later.
We are library LOVERS. Truly. We are at the library a MINIMUM of 3 times a week- and we have 3 great ones to choose from. Two of those we can walk to.
I am a huge proponent of library access, and I am constantly shocked when I learn that libraries are being viewed as “going out of fashion”. We were on a library trip to a park when our group was stopped by an older man who said, “LIBRARY? I didn’t think your generation USED libraries.” He was not being kind… but I have heard this a lot- whether it was intended as kind or not.
Why the library?
There are plenty of studies that show why we need GOOD libraries in every community- but I will share my family’s personal journey and why we LOVE the library.
As a young family in Tucson, the library is where we found friends and then continued to meet those friends at story times and events. Jared worked all the time and I was alone with 3 kids under the age of 4! The library was somewhere we could go that had a/c, bathrooms and PLENTY of entertainment. If I needed to get out of the house, we would go to one of the 3 libraries in the area.
When we moved to California, our apartment was less than a mile from the library. We were new to the area and we only had one car. Jared was working a ton and it was 30min away. The parks were all awesome and our little neighborhood was super walkable… but I didn’t know anyone. The library became the social hub for us, and this experience shaped our lives. We realized that wherever we went, the libraries were there to welcome us and help us get our bearings. The library system in San Mateo County is extensive- and we would explore the areas around us by exploring the libraries first. It was like a safety net and we found some GEMS because of this!
RVing around the country found us utilizing the library a LOT- most places have a visitors card, especially if you have a card for your home library. Even when we didn’t check out materials, the library gave us a little home in the areas we were only spending a month or two. My children still have really strong memories of a few libraries that are scattered around the country.
This same story repeated itself when we moved to Michigan- with a different motivating factor. Our RV had broken down and we were totalllllly broke and living in a rental with no furniture while Jared looked for a job and we got our feet under us. The library SAVED THE WHOLE FAMILY!!!! A special shout out for forever to the St Clair Shores Public Library- because they literally were life savers. My sanity and the children happiness were held by their welcoming and accepting librarians. We went there so often and checked out so much- many times I overshared just how much they were helping me keep the family happy and entertained. Yes, I cried to the librarians a couple times…. and yes they were awesome about it.
When we moved to the farm, the local library that was less than 5minutes from us, was truly…. pretty awful. We had to drive to a location 15 minutes away or the county’s main library that was 20-30 minutes away. That became a great difficulty that we really struggled with for 8 years. I have exchanged more than a few emails with the director of that library system and I felt that the resistance from the community to progress the local library was one of the main red flags about living in that community. If a library isn’t welcoming, that MAY be a reflection of the community it serves. Just maybe.
Cut to last year when we moved into our new house. The first visit to the library was within days…. AND WE INSTANTLY FELT AT HOME. Welcoming, inclusive, progressive and diverse- the library here feels like a hub of the community. We are equidistant to two locations, but one was closed for renovations for the first few months. The programming is phenomenal- we are in love.
For the first time in our lives as a family, we became official Friends of the Library. I didn’t really know anything about the Friends of the Library until we moved here. We started going to the monthly bag sales and after talking with a few volunteers- we decided to join. Considering my life long obsession with libraries, you would think that I would have inquired by now… but no.
Now I feel like I can’t shut up about it. I always thought that it was a section of the library- but no. Friends of the Library are a group of volunteers who work to promote the library in the community, raise funds for library programs and services, and promote the use of the Library and its many facilities. (wiki)
If you haven’t considered it before- JOIN YOUR LOCAL FRIENDS Chapter! Make sure to check out their used book sales!
Look at these stacks of books we got at the bag sale on Saturday- we bought THREE $5 bags- and got 79 books. That is 19 CENTS per book. AND SO MANY were on our To Be Read lists on Goodreads already!
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