Libraries are awesome!

I love going to our small local library with my kid.  We have a terrific time looking through potential books that we might bring home,and critiquing the books as we flip through them.  My little one, H, loves to choose books that have colorful covers, and I like to peek at the endings. JG likes to look at the writing and art style. . Discovering new books and new authors is definitely an adventure. So far we have discovered many great authors like Chris van Dusen and Mo Willems. We've also enjoyed interactives like Peek-A- Pet and Pat-A-X Books. Little H learns about sharing, and taking care of things that are not his. And we all enjoy getting great recommendations from our librarians, Yan and Christy, who are the best librarians ever.
The best feature though are the community events held by our librarians. Almost every day of the week, there is something like a toddler sing, lap sit, story hour or language exchange.  Once a month there's a potluck and the neighborhood has really come together to enjoy meeting each other.  The decorations are always festive and bring up lots of conversation. The O'Connell librarians are superb in their curation of books and cultural events.  There are always Mandarin and Portuguese, and Spanish language books and movies around for the local population, and this branch hosts many cultural events to discuss different cultural holidays. My kid loves to see the familiar faces at the desk, and says hi to the librarians everytime.  He enjoys talking to Christy about her colorful sweaters and seeing what books she's holding for us. He loves talking to Yan and getting new updates on recent library events. I think our little local library is just exceptional in its level of engagement with the community and kids of many different ages.
We try to get new books every week, and many of the books we've checked out we've ended up buying. So its done wonders for helping us develop H's interests in science, art, and storytelling.  Best of all, it's free and reduces house clutter because we bring the books back. Go Public Libraries!