Happy World Book Day!

Firstly, yes, I know I'm a day late... but there is a reason for this.

22 days ago, I signed up for something called "100 Happy Days". This involves posting a photo everyday, on Facebook, or Twitter, or your blog, or similar, to show what has made you happy today. You do this for 100 days (bear with me, this is going somewhere book-related, I promise).

Well, I've been uploading my photos to Facebook. This week, firstly by chance (and later in the week, I admit, by design) all my photos have been book-related.

Mondays photo was of a picture that I coloured in (look, I was helping an 18-month old, OK?), from a book that was read to us at Tiny Tots, the mum and baby group I go to with my son.



Tuesdays photo was of my friend reading a book to our sons. They were both so happy to be read to they went and sat on her lap to listen to the story and look at the book.



Wednesdays photo was of the (very good) book I am currently reading.



Thursdays photo was of my son dressed as Peter Pan, ready for going to nursery dressed as a book character.



Fridays photo was of the recipe book I used to bake my husbands birthday cake.



The books in question:

Mon: Big Sister, Little Sister by Gillian Shields and Georgie Birkett
Tues: In the Night Garden... Igglepiggle Lost Blanket: A lift-the-flap book by BBC
Weds: The World's Strongest Librarian by Josh Hanagarne
Thurs: Peter Pan by J.M Barrie
Fri: Halleujah! Chocolate byWendy Dyor, Honor Harris and Judith Merrell

All this got me to thinking... what are all the different ways I use books in my life? There's barely a day goes by that I don't use a book in one form or another. So here are some of the ways I've used books recently:

• Recipe books to bake cakes, pies and meals 
• Story books to teach my son words and chill him out at bedtime
• Books on research data to learn more about advances in my professional field
• Fiction books (usually to get away from it all at lunch at work!)
• Books to learn about child development (I wouldn't really recommend these normally, but the ones I used during, and about, pregnancy were helpful...)
• Books with advice on weaning and baby recipes (way more helpful than the ones on child development)
• Books to learn more about the world (such as ones about history and astronomy)

I'm sure there are many, many more uses but these are the ones that instantly occurred to me. And all that from somebody who, whilst a librarian, has a job that basically never requires her to pick up a book.

Happy World Book Day!

23 Things for Professional Development: Thing #6

So, online networking then. Firstly, just to say I have no problem at all with online networks. If you've read my previous post, you'll know that I've finally "got" Twitter and am perfectly happy to use it for networking. I can see the benefits, especially in the way these networks enable you to gain a lot of additional knowledge and information with others, and share the knowledge you have too.

My problem with this Thing, I guess, is that I feel like I have enough networks that I'm a part of right now! I can certainly see the potential of LinkedIn, but I just don't really feel like I have the time for it. Maybe when I've got to grips with Twitter (I'm still new to it, after all) I'll want to to explore some of the other options out there. But for now I think I wouldn't get much out of anything new I signed up to it, because I wouldn't feel like I had the time to use it properly.

Having said all that, I am a part of some online networks. Like many people, I signed up to Facebook some years ago. I tend to keep this mostly for my personal life, and have my friends on it. Some of the colleagues I'm friendlier with do end up becoming Facebook friends as well though. It's also a good way to keep in touch with people who you'd otherwise possibly not see again (I'm thinking of those folk who stayed in Aberdeen when I moved down to Bristol here), but don't want to lose contact with. I do tend to reserve Facebook for people I've met in real life though, and gotten to know that way.

Coming back to the library world, I'm also a member of LISNPN. I have to admit, I've used this a lot less than I could have. You could even use the word neglected. I haven't even added anything to my profile space, so that's my job for this evening..