December 2019 Volume 1, Issue 10

Haston Free Public Library 161 N. Main St., North Brookfield, MA 01535

Haston Highlights

INSIDE THIS ISSUE

New CWMARS Website ...........2

Summer Reading Wrap-up .....2

LEGO Gingerbread House .......2

Holiday Crafts ..........................3

January Book Group ................3

Long-range Plan Complete ......3

Food Drive Extended ...............4

New Bike Rack .........................4

Volunteer Spotlight .................4

System Issues ...........................4

LIBRARY HOURS

Monday: 1 PM—7 PM

Tuesday: 10 AM—5 PM

Wednesday: 9 AM—7 PM

Thursday: 1 PM—6 PM

Saturday: 9 AM—12 PM

The library will be CLOSED

on December 25 and Decem-

ber 26. Have a wonderful

holiday!

Haston Highlights,

Dawn Thistle, Editor

On November 30 lots of children came to the library with their parents

and grandparents to write their all-important letters to Santa. Orga-

nized by the Friends of the Haston Free Public Library, this event has

been a holiday staple for the past 17 years, and for the last few years has

been scheduled to precede the Christmas Parade and the tree-lighting.

It was a great crowd in the read-

ing room. In one group, par-

ents hovered over the children

as they worked on their letters,

helping with spelling the diffi-

cult words in their Christmas

lists. In another group, some

boys debated which version of

the iPhone was the best for

their list. One of the mothers

reminded them that Santa can’t

bring everything, and that he

leaves some gifts for parents to

purchase, too!

Piano students of Melissa Quilitzsch and the On Q music studio per-

formed a recital of holiday favorites to the delight of parents and chil-

dren alike. On Q has participated in this fun event for the past nine

years. Ms. Quilitzsch is enthusiastic: “It’s the highlight of our year. The

All I Want for Christmas is…

[Letters to Santa, p. 2]

kids like this environment because it’s informal and less

stressful than their June recital. And they enjoy playing

Christmas music!”

Recitalists included Emma Ryan, Harrison and Aubrie Ash-

ton, Adam Lauzon, Ducati Sedlier, Nikos Enetzelis, Layla

Lempke, and Carl and Brianna Quilitzsch.

In total, 100 people attend-

ed the Letters to Santa

event before going out into

the cold for the parade and

tree-lighting. Santa will

have his work cut out for

him—first by answering all

those letters and then by

bringing all the fantastic

gifts that the good girls and

boys asked for!

[Letters to Santa, cont. ]

2

.

It’s Almost Done!

Our LEGO engineers have been hard at work

over the last few weeks building the LEGO Gin-

gerbread House, donated by Carol and Bob

Wheeler.

Children who love LEGOs are encouraged to

come to the library Craft Room on Wednesdays

from 5:00 to 6:30 until construction is complete.

Call the library (508-867-0208) to let us know

you’re coming!

2019 Summer Reading Wrap-Up

“Massachusetts Libraries reached for the stars

during the 2019 statewide Summer Library Pro-

gram, ‘A Universe of Stories’! An out of this

world number of 524,032 people attended over

21,650 programs for all ages at public libraries

across the Commonwealth. This summer also

launched over 132,000 participants from pre-

school to adult to participate in their Summer

Library Program, 38,245 of those registering

online. These numbers represent skyrocketing

increases over 2018 for registration, program-

ming, and attendance!” —Massachusetts Board

of Library Commissioners

New & Improved CWMARS Website

If you like to place holds, check your library account or

download Overdrive books from home, you will have

noticed that the CWMARS website has a new look. The

much simpler and cleaner design went into production

on November 25.

The site is mobile-friendly and will automatically adjust

to the best layout for your device, whether you are using

a computer monitor, phone or tablet. The help docu-

mentation has been updated, and the menus have been

organized to make content easier to find.

We are sure you’ll find the new CWMARS website even

easier to use and navigate!

Aubrie Ashton

3

BOOK GROUP:

JANUARY SELECTION

The Book Group will be reading At the

Water’s Edge by Sara Gruen for its Janu-

ary 28 meeting at 7:00 in the Library.

“In this thrilling new novel from the au-

thor of Water for Elephants, Sara Gruen

again demonstrates her talent for creating

spellbinding period pieces. At the Water’s

Edge is a gripping and poignant love story

about a privileged young woman’s awaken-

ing as she experi-

ences the devasta-

tion of World War

II in a tiny village

in the Scottish

Highlands.”

—New York Times

Copies are availa-

ble in the library.

Please join us!

HOLIDAY CRAFTS

Monday, December 16 (New Date) at 6:00 p.m.

Beeswax Ornaments with Lou Meyerdierks.

Thursday, December 12 at 6:00 p.m.

Paper Window Star with Elisabeth Hyder of

Brookfield Paperworks.

CHILDREN’S CRAFTS

Thursdays at 4:00

Dec. 5: Penguin pencil holder

Dec. 12: Snowman ornament

Dec. 19: Holiday wreath

LONG-RANGE PLAN

COMPLETE

The Library’s Long-Range Plan, 2020-2024,

has been accepted by the Massachusetts

Board of Library Commissioners. The Li-

brary Planning Committee would like to

thank everyone who participated in our fo-

cus groups, filled out surveys or made sug-

gestions for improving our already-

wonderful library. We couldn’t have done it

without you!

To view the plan, go to the Library’s website:

https://northbrookfieldlibrary.org/

Now that our plan is approved, we are eligi-

ble to apply for state and federal library

grants which will help us to move forward

with special projects.

4

Deb Hill has been a volunteer at the Haston Library for

a year and a half. In her volunteer work she shelves

books, empties dehumidifiers, organizes the new fic-

tion, helps with displays , and “anything I’m asked to

do.” She works hard and quickly accomplishes all her

library tasks.

Deb is a wonderful artist and often uses her talents to

help us design displays for the library entryway. It’s

her favorite part of the job. She is known for her crea-

tivity, which extends to drawing, creative writing and

even baking cakes and

cupcakes.

A high school senior,

Deb is hoping to go into

some aspect of environ-

mentalism as a career.

She is still considering

her college options.

When she is not study-

ing or volunteering at

the library, Deb some-

times works with her

mom. One of these jobs

involves cleaning and

organizing—another of

Deb’s talents!

We are pleased to have

Deb on our team and

know she’ll do great

things in the future!

Food Drive Extended

Through Christmas

Many Haston Library patrons took advantage

of the Thanksgiving opportunity to cancel

overdue fines by bringing non-perishable food

goods to donate to the North Brookfield / St.

Joseph’s Church food pantry. Thank you!

If you missed that opportunity, no worries!

We will forgive fines through December 31 for

anyone who brings non-perishable items for

the food pantry. If you don’t have any fines

on your library account, bring some food in

anyway! We thank you for your generosity.

Volunteer Deb Hill

VOLUNTEER SPOTLIGHT

Deb Hill

4

NEW BIKE RACK

Just in time for kids to put their bikes in the gar-

age for the winter, the library has acquired a new

bike rack. Over the past few months our young

adult patrons have been riding to the library every

day. They had nowhere to put their bikes except

on the library porch. As this is a safety issue, the

Friends of the Library donated the funds to pur-

chase this bike rack.

It may not get much use un-

til spring, but we are very

grateful to have it. Thanks,

Friends!!

CWMARS / Evergreen System Issues

On Saturday, November 30 and Monday, December 2,

the library experienced CWMARS/Evergreen down-

time, due to a bad Spectrum modem. On those days,

we entered borrowing and return data offline. The

modem was replaced on Tuesday, December 3, and we

uploaded all the data we had. If you notice that there

are problems with your library account, please let us

know, and we’ll correct any errors that may have re-

sulted from working offline. Thank you for your pa-

tience.