Tour my youth department

You've seen my teen department already (which, as we speak, is completely overflowing with materials, and may not look that way much longer). This time, let me give you a tour of my youth department. The entire area is downstairs in a separate room from the teen department.

First, my "office." It's not really an office but rather the hallway between the youth department and the cataloging room. I've got doors but they're pretty ineffective.

It's also purple. And a disaster. Note the book on the left side there: The Zombie Werkbook. I'm pilfering it for zombie puzzles for Saturday night's Teen Masquerade Ball.


Another view. You can see my millions of calendars which I use to plan my programs. My shelves are packed with professional story time books (pop up books we use in story time). I've got to move them from where they are down lower, since my colleague and I aren't able to reach them without using my chair.


That's the back side of my office. You can see tons of my art/craft supplies, a mini fridge (empty), and my flannel board envelopes. Notice how clean it is? My volunteer made it sparkly clean for me. On her own volition.

Now on to the youth department. We'll start at the door for an overall impression.



You can see we have yellow and red walls, and a nasty tree on one of the walls. That thing is going soon. Our department is pretty small and it is packed tight, as you can see. Immediately in front of you is the new set of shelves for new picture books, and behind it are magazines and easy readers.

From the same position, you can also see this:


The blue house thing is our book return, and the big blue this is obviously our children's desk. It's a one-desk, so we do circ and reference right there. The white pvc pipe shelving there is new as of Tuesday after I had a fit of genius. I *hate* things crowding the reference desk, so I moved everything off our desk and onto that.

There's a better shot of the shelving. It houses all our program fliers, as well as our digital picture frame. The frame used to sit on the corner of the desk you can see in this photo, but more people have actually been looking at it here. I'm proud!

So immediately behind us is this:

The shelves on the left house a small (very small) collection of reference materials I would like to make circulating. The other shelves are our Spanish collection; we have board books, picture books, easy readers, and juvenile spanish materials here. On the top of the shelves are some of our lego club creations. We also have a coloring/activity table, and you can see the most popular thing in our department: ALL of the family-friendly movies.


Behind the DVDs is our parenting collection (the magazines on the portable shelf), as well as puzzles, puppets, a couch, and the big mats for kids to move around and play with. Also in this area is my Phineas and Ferb poster and the framed monstrosity I cannot get rid of due to donor reasons. It's a clown poster. My town is the "19th Century Circus Capital of the World," and this is in celebration of that bizarre distinction. It terrifies me.


From the couch, this is the back area. You can see on the right the last of our picture books, and on the right, the board books, the 900 non-fiction ranges, and at the very back by the red wall, our juvenile fiction collection.



There's a bit of a picture of our picture book collection. We keep them in alphabetical order, unless it's a series book like Clifford, Curious George, Arthur, Berenstein Bears, Eric Carle, or Dr. Seuss. Those are on the Clifford spinner. On top of the shelves are more new picture books.


Here's our non-fiction -- well, non-fiction from 000 to about 899. The top showcases some of our new non-fiction books, as well as our lego club creations (those are at the other end). These guys are PACKED. I need to find a better way to organize this collection and to make sure it doesn't jump shelves the way it does. That was arranged before I came but I'm really kind of stumped.


This is our juvenile fiction collection. I'm pretty proud of how much this has improved in my time there. I've really spent a lot of time and energy making this particular area a strength, and I can tell in our kids coming in now. We almost always have what they're looking for!

That's the last set of shelves on the ones pictured earlier that have our board books and our 900s. This is our graphic novel collection, another area I've been working hard on. I've got a Babymouse poster and bookmarks, as well as an Owly poster hanging out there. On the right is also a NERDs poster, courtesy of Simon and Schuster. I love it. On the left's the last part of our juvenile fiction.

Turning around:


You can see my new shelves for new juvenile fiction, as well as the rest of our reference desk. I hate that sun painting. I cannot wait to see it go. I've got permission to paint the department, but we have to wait to get it professionally done next budget year.

To my left of there is this:


We have two public computers and an OPAC here. We let all ages use them, but after school hours, we try to limit it to children. That hallway on the right there is where my office is, and when you step in, before you actually get to my office, there's this:


Here's where we have our Daycare Kits (on top). Anyone can check them out, and they're packed with books, activities, and toys on a theme/topic. There's also all of our materials for baby bags (I'll post about that sometime soon) and our tubs for story time prep. Also, this area is a total mess. I'm hoping secretly my volunteer can't stand it and makes it sparkle for me.


And an obligatory shot from the ref desk. I cannot wait to get rid of that sickly vine thing in the back. From here, you see our easy readers in the middle and the picture books in the "L" shelf set up.

This is our display in the youth area. It's on top of easy readers. This week, I've got "sweet reads." It has a little of everything -- love, food, and friendship. Seems our official Valentine's Day titles are mostly checked out already, so I improvised.

Hope you enjoyed my tour. I cannot believe how packed this place is, and I dream of room, room, room. Also, I am eager to paint this place solid colors.