Subject Guides

Our library website features 129 eResources and databases with 24/7 access, free with your valid library card - just click on "Research" at the top of the page for a dropdown menu! These include Auto Repair Center, BrainFuse Help Now, Consumer Reports, Encyclopedia of World Biography, lynda.com, NoveList Plus, Pronunciator, and more. These are all great resources for students and lifelong learners. But did you know the website also features subject guides created by the staff of The Public Library ABQ-Bernco? Some of them you might have seen, if you've ever looked for New on DVD or New Music CDs. But the range of staff-created subject guides goes deeper than media - there are guides about New Mexico, Science Project Help, DIY, and more.

You can peruse the 31 subjects covered by our guides very easily! First, click on "Subject Guides" in the dropdown menu.

Then you can select your subject of choice from another dropdown menu.

Unsurprisingly, we have many choices under the subject "Books and Literature"! Some guides are strictly informational, like the Center for the Book; many link to catalog for easy hold placing, such as Monster Mashups; Booklists for Adults and Teens has printables; the Books & Literature guide shows events, book recommendations, and links to NYT Bestseller lists.

Each subject has two views, so you can easily switch back and forth between staff-created Subject Guides...

...and eResources and databases! Just click on the headings to switch back and forth.

We hope this short tutorial will encourage you to explore the library website and check out all of our online resources! Do you already use some guides or eResources? Let us know in the comments!

Our Website's New Look!

We've given the library's website a new look! Don't worry, same address, same great content, only now the site will be the same whether you are accessing it from your computer or your smartphone. We’ve also added a dropdown menu so that you can find what you’re looking for faster.

The beta site has been available for preview for a while now, but here's some features we'd like to mention:

Top Menu

• My Account: View your checked out items, renew them, place holds, view (and pay) fines; access your reading history (if you've opted in), your preferred searches, and your lists. This link now takes you to Encore instead of Classic Catalog, for you to take advantage of the Overdrive & 3M Cloud Library integration (check out digital media directly from the catalog!).


• Books and More: Have questions about Interlibrary Loan?  Want to Suggest a Purchase? Want to see lists of new music, DVDs, and audiobooks? You can also sign up for library emails to get book suggestions by mail and access Classic Catalog, if that's your preferred catalog search.


• Downloads: Use this to search our copious digital media offerings (3M Cloud Library, eBrary, OneClickDigital, Overdrive, and Zinio).  There's also an "About and Help!" page, which includes descriptions of the services, printable instructions, and links to in-person assistance through our Gizmo Garage programs.


• Research: Includes an A-Z list of of eResources and databases, a list of guides for 23 subjects (from Career Resources to Grants to New Mexico Interest and beyond), and links to our Genealogy Center and Special Collections Library.


• Events: Want to just see today's events?  How about just Storytimes or just computer classes?  You can find them here, or search by branch, age group, or subject.


• About Us: Read library news (nice pictures of our new Central & Unser Library!), view our mission statement, learn about special programs, services, and how you can get involved! Includes links to the Library Advisory Board, Friends for the Public Library, and Albuquerque Library Foundation.


• Ask Us: Really, ask us. Type in your question or see if the answer is already in our popular topics!  You can also text us a question.

Click on Mi Biblioteca for information about the library in Spanish.  Click on Hours & Locations for an overview of library locations, hours of operation, and contact information.  Click on the branch of your choice to find out more about their ongoing programs, amenities and services, and meeting and/or study room availability.

Note: If you enter a search term in Find Books, eBooks, DVDs, and more, you will be searching in Encore.

Right Sidebar

Much of the same information you can find in the top menu, but no searching required for those who want to scroll a list of events, visit the Teen Zone or Kids Corner (find events in these age groups, get homework help, see library eResources for youth...and for parents!), or see a list of Gizmo Garages and Computer Classes. How Do I...? has a dropdown menu of FAQ, such as Get a Library Card, Suggest a Purchase, and Pay Fines. Tutor.com links you to our homework help learning suite and the Library Card Mobile App shows you how to put your library card barcode on your phone - one less thing in your wallet! There's also links to a Value Calculator, our digital media info page, and a link to items labeled as "staff picks" in the library catalog.

Bottom Menu

Yay, you made it to the bottom of the page!  This menu contains many of the same links mentioned above, but includes contact information and links to the library's social media accounts - Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and this blog.

Any questions?  Ask Us! Either use the link from the library website or leave us a comment below.
 

Erna & Ernie on Facebook!

One of the reasons the ABC Library exists is that we have always had support from members of our community. The recent reopening of the Special Collections Library was an opportunity for us to reflect on that support and to think about some of the key people in the history of Albuquerque’s public libraries.

Travel writer Erna Fergusson and war correspondent Ernie Pyle come to mind immediately. They were so important we even named libraries after them. Fifty and sixty years after the fact, their lives and their writings are just as compelling as ever. While we have many books by and about Ernie Pyle and Erna Fergusson in our collection, we wanted to do something more.

A recent article in American Libraries about using Facebook pages to connect University of Nevada Reno students with alumni who were important to the school’s history and tradition inspired us. We created our Facebook pages for Erna Fergusson and Ernie Pyle as a way for us to introduce new generations to old friends and benefactors. We’ll be creating a page for Clyde Tingley, the great Albuquerque Mayor who was never actually elected mayor. It’s a long story, and a library is about the only thing in Albuquerque that was never named after him.

So visit Erna and Ernie on Facebook. Keep an eye out for Clyde. There’s a lot to like and a lot to learn. We’ll be happy to help you find out more!

 

Free eBook Sources Roundup

More and more people are reading eBooks these days, on smart phones, tablets, computers, and dedicated eReaders.  Though the library is a great source for eBooks, there are many more available on the internet for free!

In January, I posted a great list of sources for free eBooks that you can still access here.  Here are some other websites to keep on your radar for yet more free Ebooks.

Digitalbooktoday.com has a daily list of free Kindle books available on Amazon.com.  Many of these are publisher promotionals that may only be free for 24 - 48 hours.  You can sign up for a daily email to be notified of the latest additions.

Smashwords.com has over 70,000 eBooks, with approximately 12,000 free in a variety of formats.  These books are from indie authors and small publishers.

Plough.com is a Christian publishing house that has free eBooks in a variety of formats and a variety of languages including English, Chinese, Korean, Russian, and Spanish among others.

Obooko.com is another site with free eBooks from independent authors.  Most books are in PDF format, though EPUB and Kindle formats are being introduced.

Lucky 500 - Winners!

And the (randomly chosen) winners are...


Leeshka
Iller3257
Olivia B
Cassandra S-H
Leah H


Congratulations! Please send us an email to abcreads@gmail.com & let us know at which library you'd like to pick up your prize!  Make sure you bring a photo ID when you go to pick up your prize.

You can visit our "Lucky 500 - with prizes!" post to view the comments by all the those who participated in our Lucky 500th contest.  Thanks to all of you for the kind words.

Lucky 500 - with prizes!

We are celebrating reaching 500 blog posts here at abcreads - yeah!  As part of our celebration, we have prizes for 5 lucky winners. All you have to do is answer, in the comments section of this post, one of these 5 questions!  The lucky winners will be chosen using a random number generator.

1. Which is your favorite ABC Library branch?

2. What is your favorite library memory?

3. What is the last thing you checked out from the library?

4. Have you ever stumped a librarian with a reference question?

5. Have you ever attended a library program - book group, movie, storytime, music event?  If you've attended more than one, which was your favorite?

The fabulous prizes are:

Share your love for the library on the blog to win a prize that will let you keep sharing the love with every swig of coffee you take & every meal you make!

Refresh Your Browsers, The Library Home Page Has Changed!

Hello library customers!  The library website is in the midst of a redesign, so we wanted to check in & make sure that we are all on the same (web)page, so to speak.  This is the library's new home page:

If this is not what you are seeing when you try to access the library's home page, please go to the new web address: http://library.cabq.gov/.  Please note, this is no longer the same address that is on the side of your library card, so if you've bookmarked the old address, you'll want to change that!

As you can see, the new home page looks a little different, although all the content you know & love is still there, we promise.  If you have questions or comments about the new site, please leave them in the comments of this post, or feel free to contact us via any of the methods listed below!  We welcome your feedback.

Call (505)768-5170

SMS (505)819-3563

Email library@cabq.gov

Lost & Found

Working at the library, you find a lot of things forgotten in books - bills, tissues (hopefully unused), Post-It flags, personal photos, scraps of paper ranging from shopping lists to date due slips to children's essays, clothing tags, a thermometer, & an array of bookmarks. The pictures in this post are just some place-holders that have been found by staff of local library branches.

We at abcreads were excited to find a new book in the system by Michael Popek called Forgotten Bookmarks: A Bookseller's Collection of Odd Things Lost Between the Pages.  Popek is a used & rare bookseller. The items catalogued in the book are "the personal, funny, heartbreaking, & weird things" he finds in the books he buys. He also runs a blog of the same name which shows you some of his findings - & "the stuff" ranges from business cards to maps to tickets - & the books in which they were found.  Particular favorites of mine include the square dance instructions for a song called "Honolulu Baby", which was found in a book called Stylists on Style & the "video" found in The Adventures of the U-202 by Baron Spiegel von und Peckelsheim.

If you enjoy sifting through the detritus of humanity without dirtying your hands, you might also consider checking out the two books in the ABC Libraries' catalog by Davy Rothbart, founder of Found Magazine: Found: The Best Lost, Tossed, and Forgotten Items from Around the World & Requiem for a Paper Bag: Celebrities and Civilians Tell Stories of the Best Lost, Tossed, and Found Items from Around the World.  Found Magazine also has a website & they take their show on the road with an annual tour - the "My Heart is an Idiot" tour is scheduled to stop in Albuquerque on October 23rd!

What's something "personal, funny, heartbreaking, & weird" you've found recently?

Like us on Facebook!

It's Library Lovers' Month this month, & it occurred to us that readers of the blog might not know that they can like their favorite ABC Libraries' branch on Facebook to find out more about events & news!  Here are the branches that currently have Facebook pages:

Cherry Hills Library

Promote Your Page Too

Promote Your Page Too


Erna Fergusson Library

Promote Your Page Too


Juan Tabo Branch Library

Promote Your Page Too


Lomas Tramway Library

Promote Your Page Too


Main Library

Promote Your Page Too


San Pedro Library

Promote Your Page Too

South Valley Library

Promote Your Page Too


Taylor Ranch Library

Promote Your Page Too


And there is a central Facebook page for the ABC Libraries as a system:

ABCLibraries

Also, don't forget the Friends for the Public Library's page!

What to Read Next

This year, I did a personal book challenge called Take a Chance.  Sadly, the site that hosts this challenge will not be doing so in 2012, but I wanted to share with you the websites & methods that  they recommended to find new books to read.  I had a lot of fun finding books to read using these methods!

1: Staff Member’s Choice: Go to a bookstore or library that has a “Staff Picks” section. Read one of the picks from that section.

2: Loved One’s Choice: Ask a loved one to pick a book for you to read. (If you can convince them to buy it for you, that is even better!)

3: Blogger’s Choice: Find a “Best Books Read” post from a favorite blogger. Read a book from their list.

4: Critic’s Choice: Find a “Best of the Year” list from a magazine, newspaper or professional critic. Read a book from their Top 10 list.

5: Blurb Book: Find a book that has a blurb on it from another author. Read a book by the author that wrote the blurb.

6: Book Seer Pick: Go to The Book Seer and follow the instructions there. Read a book from the list it generates for you.

7: What Should I Read Next Pick : Go to What Should I Read Next and follow the instructions there. Read a book from the list it generates for you.

8: Which Book Pick: Go to Which Book and use the software to generate a list of books. Read a book from that list.

9: LibraryThing Pick: Go to LibraryThing’s Zeitgeist page. Look at the lists for 25 Most Reviewed Books or Top Books and pick a book you’ve never read. Read the book. (Yes … you can click on MORE if you have to.)

10: Pick A Method: Pick a method for finding a book from the choices listed below.


■Random Book Selection. Go to the library. Position yourself in a section such as Fiction, Non-Fiction, Mystery, Children (whatever section you want). Then write down random directions for yourself (for example, third row, second shelf, fifth book from right). Follow your directions and see what book you find. Check that book out of the library, read it and then write about it. (If you prefer, you can do the same at a bookstore and buy the book!)

■Public Spying. Find someone who is reading a book in public. Find out what book they are reading and then read the same book. Write about it.

■Random Bestseller. Go to Random.org and, using the True Random Number Generator, enter the number 1950 for the min. and 2010 for the max. and then hit generate. Then go to this site and find the year that Random.org generated for you and click on it. Then find the bestseller list for the week that would contain your birthday for that year. Choose one of the bestsellers from the list that comes up, read it and write about it.

Fads & Trends, Curiosities & Wonders

I don't profess to be fashionable.  I am on the cutting edge of nothing.  So, when the Weekly Alibi ran a feature recently on "Planking/Flanking", I was fairly clueless.  Then, yesterday, a co-worker turned me on to Tebowing, & as a corollary, I discovered Owling.  How have I missed all the fun fads?

As I am wont to do when I want to learn about something, I turned to my friendly local library catalog.  A keyword search of "fads" turned up titles such as Panati's Parade of Fads, Follies, and Manias: The Origins of Our Most Cherished Obsessions, Flavor of the Month: Why Smart People Fall for Fads,& Poplorica: A Popular History of the Fads, Mavericks, Inventions, and Lore that Shaped Modern America.  A good background, but none of these books were going to keep me au courant.  We do have the I Can Has Cheezburger?: A LOLcat Collekshun book-wasn't that all the rage not too long ago?  Are people still doing PostSecret? How about Sh*t My Dad Says?  I guess people are still loving The Onion, since you can now pick up a copy locally.  The literary mashup genre still seems to be going strong, though I stopped reading at Queen Victoria: Demon Hunter.

However, what my search for fads did lead me to was a couple of very interesting subject headings (when looking an item record, you can find subject headings under the "Find Similar Items" tab): Popular Culture, seven glorious pages of off-the-wall books from Back to Our Future: How the 1980s Explain the World We Live in Now to Hip, The History; & Curiosities & Wonders, which brings you New Mexico Curiosities: Quirky Characters, Roadside Oddities & Other Offbeat Stuff, The Book of Useless Information, & Charles Fort: The Man who Invented the Supernatural. I'm sure I'll be reading in these subjects for quite some time.

Some other fun things you might enjoy:

Garfield minus Garfield

Simon's Cat on YouTube

Awkward Family Photos

The Bad Fads Museum

Cake Wrecks

Back to School

It's that time of year...the first day of school for Albuquerque Public Schools is August 16th!  (The APS website has a list of school supplies for grades K-5.)  For the University of New Mexico, the fall semester begins on August 22nd; for Central New Mexico Community College, August 29th.

ABC Libraries do not feature textbooks in our catalog, but that doesn't mean we don't have resources for students, parents, & lifelong learners!  The Core Knowledge System is very popular-from What Your Kindergartner Needs to Know: Preparing Your Child for a Lifetime of Learning to What Your Sixth Grader Needs to Know: Fundamentals of a Good Sixth-Grade Education, & other related titles.  You'll find test prep guides in the catalog-SAT, GED, ACT, GRE, ASVAB. NCLEX, TOEFL.  Got a kid who you'd like to see reading more? We have guides to all sorts of recommended reads, from More Books Kids Will Sit Still For: A Read-Aloud Guide to Gotcha For Guys!: Nonfiction Books to Get Boys Excited About Reading. (Adults, consider checking out 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die if you need reading suggestions! I love those "1001" books.)  Does your teen need math help?  Former child star Danica McKellar's books get top marks.

Also available from the ABC Libraries website (you just need to have your library card at the ready to log in) are several LibGuides for you to peruse from the comfort of your own home, 24-7!  Check out the Test Preparation LibGuide & connect to the Learning Express database.  Need to find an award-winning book for your student? Try Book Awards-Books for Kids or Book Awards-Books for Teens. Need a biography in a hurry? Our Biography eResources can be cited like a book.  There are all kinds of LibGuides!  Science Project Help...Learning a Language...Poetry...browse the A-Z guide & check them all out!

Here are some other recommended websites:

Back to School from USA.gov

FAFSA (Federal Student Aid)

Back to School Tips from the American Academy of Pediatrics

Back to School Resources from FamilyEducation.com

Outstanding Books for the College Bound from Young Adult Library Services Association

Plan for College from CollegeBoard.com

College Success from CollegeBoard.com

Free Online Courses

I know the word "free" often makes us all sit up and take notice-after all, who doesn't like being able to get something for nothing? Well, I have discovered that there are a plethora (I have loved that word ever since I first heard it spoken by El Guapo in The Three Amigos) of free online education courses from the article, "How to Go to College for Free", in Reader's Digest. The list in the article was not extensive, but I took the author's advice and searched the web for "Free Online Courses" and was blown away by the number of educational opportunities that are available to anyone willing to take the time to devote to expanding their knowledge.

First, I must mention the library has a huge CD and DVD collection of free courses that can be found by typing in "The Great Courses" as a keyword search in the catalog. At this time there are over 493 items! Some of the selections we have are, "The Origin of Civilization", "The Medieval World" and "Building Great Sentences" to name a few.

There are also databases through the library's Resource Center that customers can access using their library card from their home computer. Some of the great learning tools you can use are:

--The Learning Express Library has hundreds of tests that can be taken to brush up on skills for college or different careers that require tests such as police officers, civil service, or nursing.

--Our BYKI language database allows you to practice on 80 different languages.

--The Global Road Warrior allows you to study different countries and cultures

--and, our huge collection of Info-Trac databases have thousands of articles from newspapers, journals, and magazines on everything from pop-culture to physics.

The author of the Reader's Digest article, David Hochman, really pumped up my geek factor and through my own Google search I found so many websites dedicated to providing open courseware that I couldn't wait to try them all. I managed to contain my enthusiasm and whittled my ever-growing list to what I think are some of the best, which are:

--Openculture.com One of the best websites out there! Not only is there access to free educational courses, but there are hundreds of links to audiobooks, podcasts, and over 300 hundred movies that you can watch online. Click the link on the right side of the page under the caption "Videos and Movies", then click "Free Movies Online". You can watch classics such as Bringing Up Baby, Moby Dick or Yellow Submarine. The "Intelligent Videos" link will take you to an A-Z listing of documentary websites, some of which include the "Australian Screen Archive", the "Europa Film Treasures" or "Snagfilms", which has a huge offering of films.

--Khanacademy.org is a wonderful learning site for people of all ages. It has math lessons ranging from developmental math to trigonometry. Science lessons to include, chemistry, biology and cosmology. All done in video no less! Underneath the video it will have links to download or get exercises.



--Academicearth.org This site has courses from art to writing, with many of the them taught by some of the country's top scholars, such as Donald Kagan from Yale, Walter Lewin from MIT and Michael Sandel from Harvard.

--TheProblemsite.com has hundreds of educational puzzles-math games, word games, strategy games and a section on reference and resource, plus daily puzzles and even a section for juniors.

Also, for you Apple enthusiasts out there that may not have yet run across iTunesU, this is another great application that can be used to learn online and can be accessed right from your device or on your computer through the iTunes software.

These are just a small sampling of places on the internet where you can get free courses to help further your education or to help enrich your life, so the next time someone asks if you know what a quasar is or how the Hawaiian islands were formed you will be able to answer without a blank look on your face!

Falling into a Series Relationship

Library Journal had a great article back in November called "Falling into a Series Relationship: Six Top Mysteries". I say great, probably because I agree with their choices: Martha Grimes' Richard Jury series (I love Richard Jury & Melrose Plant as characters, even if the writing can sometimes be uneven); Margaret Maron's Deborah Knott series; the Adam Dalgliesh books by P.D. James; the Two Pines mysteries by Louise Penny, featuring Armand Gamache. I haven't read anything by Elizabeth Peters or Ruth Downie as yet, but now I'm considering them based on the article's other recommendations!

I love to read books in a series, especially mysteries. I am a real stickler for reading them in chronological order, so Fictfact has been a really useful tool for me. Here's a sampling of the many series I'm wading through, as viewed on Fictfact:

Another good source for mysteries is the site Stop, You're Killing Me. This site has many great features, include links to lists of the latest mystery award winners & a great selection of indexes-location, job, historical, diversity, genre. I tend to like mysteries from the British Isles & Police Procedurals. One of my co-workers is a Cozy Mystery fan, with an emphasis on Food & Drink or Crafts & Needlework. What's your poison, so to speak?

If you are a mystery reader, three of the ABC Libraries' branches have book groups that focus on mysteries-Main has The Wide World of Mystery book group, Tony Hillerman has the Who Dunnit? Mystery Book Club & there's also the Mystery Book Group at Cherry Hills Library.

Links of Note

Are you a J.D. Salinger fan? Check out Dead Caulfields, a site dedicated to the life and works of J.D. Salinger. Latest posts include rare Salinger footage & Joyce Maynard on Salinger's death. A Salinger biography by site founder Kenneth Slawenski is due out in 2011.

Prizes:

• Visit the site the National Book Foundation website to see the 2010 National Book Award nominees.
• National Book Award v. the Man Booker Prize: read an article here. Also, an older (but still interesting) history of judgiing for the Booker Prize is available here.

California's Huntington Library-one of the most beautiful sites in the world-has opened an exhibition about Charles Bukowski.

Nelson Mandela's new memoir, Conversations with Myself, has just been released. Put a hold on a copy today! The Omnivoracious blog says the book "delves into his private archive of letters, private recordings, and diaries--including those he kept during 27 years in prison, recording everything from his blood pressure to the content of his dreams".

TED: Riveting talks by remarkable people, free to the world

I have seen a lot of talks from TED online, & been interested in the variety of subjects covered. The other day I actually checked out their website, subtitled "Ideas worth spreading". Hear talks on joint replacement, fractals, global population, & more! On-site ratings include jaw-dropping, informative, funny, & beautiful. Here are a couple examples of what you'll find there:

J.K. Rowling: The Fringe Benefits of Failure (2008 Harvard Commencement speech)
At her Harvard commencement speech, "Harry Potter" author JK Rowling offers some powerful, heartening advice to dreamers and overachievers, including one hard-won lesson that she deems "worth more than any qualification I ever earned."

Elizabeth Gilbert on nurturing creativity



Isabel Allende tells tales of passion



Doris Kearns Goodwin on learning from past presidents

I Write Like

We found a link to the I Write Like website on Facebook. All you need is a sample of your writing-a couple paragraphs of a story, some poems, a blog post-& this statistical analysis tool will analyze your word choice and writing style and compare them with those of famous writers. We write like George Orwell. Have you noticed?

This is just for fun-obviously it's not completely accurate, as Margaret Atwood used it with a sample of her own writing & found she writes like Stephen King. Rogert Ebert has also given it a try (he writes like Margaret Atwood); Yann Martel writes like Kurt Vonnegut; a writer for the New Yorker's Book Bench says, "According to the machine, an invitation to a birthday party was worthy of a comparison to James Joyce; an excerpt from a term paper on Renaissance literature, though, more closely resembled Dan Brown’s fiction." (The program, written by a Russian software programmer whose second language is English, only pulls from a list of 50 authors right now, but we gather more are being added.)

Serial Readers Unite!

We had a customer come in today & recommend a site caled Fictfact.

From their website:

"You read books in series. You want to keep track of what to read next. You want recommendations on what to read next. You want to know when new books are coming out.

"That's why you need FictFact!FictFact is a tracking site focused on book series. Let us know what books/series you've read and we'll let you know what you need to read next and what's coming out soon. Registration is free, so let us know how you like it, and what series, books & authors we might be missing."

We like to read the books in a series in order, so we think this will be a great tool for us!

What if Everyone on Twitter Read One Book?

If you are on Twitter, consider joining the One World, One Twitter Book Club! They started reading on May 5th. The idea is similar to The Big Read program that Albuquerque participates in during October.

'Last year Edinburgh residents tackled Arthur Conan Doyle's dinosaur adventure The Lost World, last month Dubliners were taking a collective look at The Picture of Dorian Gray, and Brighton's readers are currently engrossed in Ian Fleming's James Bond novel From Russia with Love. Now a new project is hoping to take the "one book, one city" initiative a step further, and get the whole world reading the same novel.' -from The Guardian article

The book that the book club is reading is American Gods by Neil Gaiman. Read about it on Gaiman's blog.

For instructions & a discussion scheduule, be sure to check out Wired magazine's article.

Social Knitworking (& Crochetworking!)

"Ravelry is a place for knitters, crocheters, designers, spinners, weavers and dyers to keep track of their yarn, tools, project and pattern information, and look to others for ideas and inspiration. The content here is all user- driven; we as a community make the site what it is. Ravelry is a great place for you to keep notes about your projects, see what other people are making, find the perfect pattern and connect with people who love to play with yarn from all over the world in our forums."-from Ravelry.com

If you are a knitter or crocheter, you must check out Ravelry, a free site made especially for knitters and crocheters. Create an account & you'll be reading the newsletter "where my stitches at? This Week in Ravelry" in no time. You'll have a notebook where you can: list yarns in your stash; projects you're working on; queue up projects you soon hope to be working on; search patterns on the site & save in a favorites folder; blog; meet friends & join groups; get your questions answered in the forums; & more!

For instance, my groups on Ravelry include Anglophiles, Learn Crochet, & New Mexico Knitters. Recently I posted on the forums, looking for a pattern for an Elsa Schiaparelli hat, & had quite useful responses by the next day. & my Ravelry use has been intermittent at best-one of my co-workers has used it to keep track of needle sizes & see the finished projects of a pattern to see if it'll look good or not, as well.

If you prefer to socialize in person, the library system has several drop-in stitch groups, including Cherry Hills Library's own An Itch to Stitch, which meets Tuesdays from 10 AM to noon. If you want to work on your stitching projects together with like-minded folks, asking questions and sharing experiences, this group is for you! All ages & skill levels are welcome! This month our display case will feature handmade crafts by members of the group.