A committee comprised of Indiana Youth Services Librarians in public and school libraries, as well as a few booksellers work very hard to read a large amount of picture books each year. The Firefly Committee determines the top five picture books that best explore the aspects of the Every Child Ready to Read program. It [...]
What is National Pollinator Week? National Pollinator Week was established as a way to celebrate pollinators and encourage people to take action to protect them. This year, Pollinator Week is June 19-25. Who is a pollinator? Pollinators are animals who carry pollen from flower to flower. Insects, birds, bats, and even mammals can be pollinators, [...]
What is Juneteenth? The simplified explanation is that it is the celebration of the freedom of the last of the enslaved African Americans in America from Texas in 1865. While most of the States heard freedom ring for all enslaved peoples in 1863, the then still Confederate run state of Texas held out for two [...]
I'm a sucker for an essayist with a strong voice and a way with jokes. Here are three recommended titles in that mode for pride! The 2000s Made Me Gay by Grace Perry is a special favorite of mine. Today's gay youth have dozens of queer peer heroes, both fictional and real, but former gay teenager [...]
Father's Day is Sunday, June 18! Of course your Library has tons of picture books about ALL KINDS of dads and you can find them by searching for "fathers" in our catalog or click here to get a list of picture books. If you're looking for books about African American fathers, it can be a [...]
With today marking the first day of Pride Month, I wanted to share a personal experience I had in recent months. The LGBTQ+ community is a pretty diverse community itself. A diverse community I continue to work toward understanding and make an effort daily to be more mindful of my word choices and how they [...]
I want to tell you about a wonderful book I read recently. I couldn't put it down and I kept reading bits of it out loud to my partner because I had to chare the joy it was bringing me. When The Angels Left the Old County by Sacha Lamb is a queer immigrant fairytale [...]
Over the past couple of months, the Floyd County Library has been hosting the 'This is What Democracy Looks Like' Civic Engagement sessions. These sessions were aimed at young adults and older, and served to educate people on how to get involved with different aspects of their community. With a total of seven sessions, this [...]
Memorial Day is a relatively new holiday in American history, taking on its current name and form in 1966, per President Lyndon B. Johnson. However, Americans have been celebrating a form of it since the Civil War, in honor of soldiers who had given their lives for our country. It also had a different name, [...]
I want to tell you a little bit about this gem of a book called "Unlikely Animals" by Annie Hartnett. This book was devoured by me last weekend, and has become my favorite book of 2023 so far. If you are a fan of contemporary fiction and magical realism, this is the book for you! [...]