Thursday, November 28, 2019

Annual Gratitude Article

“Thanksgiving just gets me all warm and tingly and all kinds of wonderful inside.” - Willard Scott


Every year at this time, we here at 5 Minute Librarian like to take a moment to express our gratitude for the wonderful things we have in our lives, both personal and professional. You can read our past years' gratitude here: 201520162017, and 2018


As always, we are extremely grateful to our readers, without whom we wouldn't have been able to keep writing for so long. It warms our hearts to see people commenting and sharing our articles, so please keep it up! 


Kat L., Children's Librarian:

  1. I am extremely grateful that I have a job that I love. My Director is fabulous and encourages me to think outside the box and push my creativity. My coworkers are awesome, I get to do something different every day, and it's generally a wonderful place to work. Having worked in some not-so-wonderful places, I am very aware of what I have here.
  2. At-A-Glance calendars, colored pens, and fun office supplies. I love being able to flip to a month in my calendar and quickly see what I am doing (green), what my assistant is doing (purple), what days our reading dogs are coming in (blue) and when I have meetings (orange). It probably sounds silly, but it makes things so easy when they're color-coded! I also have stickers all over my calendar, and fun office supplies abound. Sure, everyone has post-it flags, but how many of you have kitten mermaid ones?
  3. Do you know how many flavors of tea there are in the world? LOTS. I am on a mission to drink them all. Tea not only has health and stress-relieving benefits, but it's delicious and has zero calories. 

Allison C., Teen Librarian

  1. I'm super grateful for canva.com. I was able to use our Friends' 501(c)(3) credentials, to get a free upgraded account for our Library. It's super easy to create beautiful social media posts, Facebook headers, graphics for our event calendar and even library signage. You can also have a team so that other library staff can collaborate on designs. And since it's all saved online, I can easily access it from any computer in the library.
  2. Another site I'm loving is hootsuite.com. It's great for scheduling social media posts in advance. The free version allows you to schedule 30 posts in advance (think 30 Facebook posts or 10 posts to Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter). Our library upgraded to the paid version so that I have unlimited scheduled posts. It really comes in handy for the summer when I can schedule out weeks or months worth of posts before I'm too busy to post daily.
  3. Work-wise, the biggest thing I'm grateful for this year is that my library has finally broken ground for our expansion and renovation project. Our library is going from a place with no program space to having a whole teen space and teen program room (among lots of other great additions). I can't wait until our teens can start enjoying it!

Jess B., 5MINLIB FOUNDER AND EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

  1. I am so excited about e-passes! Our library offers one for the local science museum and I was able to request it online (on a Sunday night), it was emailed to me, and I immediately used it Monday morning, before my library even opened. It could not have been any easier! More of these, please!
  2.  I love public library and school collaborations. Our school is in the process of changing their curriculum from reading one book of anthologies to having a variety of books of different age levels. Not only are our teachers getting teacher cards to help add more books for kids to use, but the library director also offered all of the leftover books from the book sale for the teachers to use. It is a win-win for everyone.
  3. Lastly, I am super grateful for my colleagues, Kat and Allison. This has been a rough year for me and they have stepped up and kept 5minlib going. There is no 5minlib without you two. Thank you for all of your hard work, dedication, and passion. 

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