Apple Pies at the Library!

On Saturday, November 7th, the Baking Coach came to the Montauk Library to help families make apple pies together.  She showed everyone how to make apple pie from scratch, having them first peel and cut the apples.  Next, everyone worked together to mix the ingredients for the dough and roll it out in order to make the pie crust.  After filling the pie crust with the cut apples, cinnamon and sugar, families rolled out the dough one more time to put the finishing touches on the top pie crust and got creative with the pie's design.  Everyone got to take home their apple pie to bake and enjoy and also got to take home the recipe!

This program was so much fun and came just in time for Thanksgiving and apple season! A big thanks to the Baking Coach for all of her instruction and assistance and to the Friends of the Montauk Library for helping us offer the program!

Check out the pictures and pies below!

Zombies at the Montauk Library!

There were zombies at the Montauk Library yesterday! Artist and author Joyce Raimondo visited the library again and taught children how to make zombie and mummy hands and fingers! Children learned how to work with plaster gauze and used their own hands as the basis for the mummy or zombie hand that they created. 

After slathering their hands in goop (Vaseline) to ensure the plaster wouldn't stick, the children worked in pairs to turn their normal hands into zombie hands!  They wet plaster strips one at a time and placed them on their hands, overlapping them slightly, covering the top and sides of their hands.  After the plaster hardened, children were able to remove the completed hand and take it home with them as a spooky Halloween decoration.  Check out the spooktacular pictures below!

 Missed this program? Don't worry, we have two more fun Halloween programs coming up! On Saturday, October 24th we will be decorating pumpkins (please sign up with Miss Jackie!) and on Friday, October 30th there will be a "Monster Mash" at the library where children can come in their costumes and do crafts, play games and trick or treat around the library.  Check out our upcoming events page here for more details.

Wild Witches & Playful Pumpkins

Halloween season is here! This week we had the first of many Halloween-themed programs at the library.  Artist and author, Joyce Raimondo, came to the library and hosted her Wild Witches & Playful Pumpkins program for the children's department.  Children used their imaginations to make witches, pumpkins, zombies and more! Everyone was very creative and got into the Halloween spirit!

After finishing their creations, everyone told us a little bit about their projects and showed off what they made! The kids did a spooktacular job!

If you missed out on the Wild Witches & Playful Pumpkins program, Joyce Raimondo will be back next Tuesday at 4:00 pm to make mummy hands with everyone! Come dressed to make a mess!

September Programs Wrap Up: Pirates, Apples & Snoopy!

This past month we held some really fun programs and as a bonus, it was library card sign up month nationwide!  Here's a look back on all the fun we had...

September 19th was International Talk Like A Pirate Day and we held a pirate party for all the little pirates in Montauk! Children who attended received a bandana and eye patch and created their own telescopes to search for buried treasure.  After decorating their telescopes, listening to pirate tunes and using some pirate phrases, kids went on a treasure hunt for gold and buried treasure in the children's room, armed with their very own treasure maps! Children came away with (chocolate) gold coins and a prize and a swashbuckling good time was had by all!

On the first official day of fall, we had a program called Autumn Apples where we read stories about the fall season and about apples, learned about the fruit, enjoyed apple snacks and did an apple stamping craft.  Children used apples that were cut in two to create a picture of an autumn tree.  First, children colored in the trunk of the tree and then they dipped the apple halves in paint and stamped the paper and created "leaves" for the trees.  Everyone did a great job with their projects and exercised their creativity on the first day of Fall!

Finally, September was National Library Card Sign Up Month and Snoopy was this year's library ambassador! All month long children and teens could enter to win a Snoopy stuffed animal and prize bundle.  Snoopy was in residence, sitting at the circulation desk, just waiting for his new home.  The winner was drawn on October 1st! Congratulations to our lucky winner Alex K!

Montauk Library's Banned Books Social Media Contest!

Announcing Montauk Library's Banned Books Social Media Contest!   

To celebrate Banned Books Week, the Montauk Library is holding a social media contest for a chance to win banned book author Harper Lee's books To Kill A Mockingbird and Go Set a Watchman!  Lee's classic work To Kill a Mockingbird is one of the top 100 banned books of all time and her highly anticipated second novel debuted this summer.

Throughout the week we will be featuring different banned books-themed posts on the Montauk Library's Facebook and Twitter pages. Anyone who “likes” (Facebook) or "retweets" (Twitter) one of the banned books posts will be entered into a random drawing for a chance to win Harper Lee's two novels.

How It Works:

• Facebook: “Like” or comment on one of Montauk Library's banned books facebook posts, and you will be entered into a random drawing for a chance to win Harper Lee's two novels at the end of the week
• Twitter: “Retweet” one of the banned books twitter posts, and you will be entered into a random drawing for a chance to win Harper Lee's two novels.

At the end of Banned Books Week, we will randomly pick a winner whom we will contact via the social media site that the entry came from.

Contest will run from September 27, 2015 to October 3, 2015. The winning entry will be chosen  and announced on October 4th.

We love that you shared one of our posts, but contest winners must have a Montauk Library cardn or be a resident of Montauk, NY.

For any questions regarding this contest, please contact the Montauk Library.

Sidewalk Chalk & Summer Wrap Up!

We had our last program of the summer last weekend. Children and parents had fun with sidewalk chalk and kept cool with ice pops!  We held the program in our lower parking lot on the side of our building where everyone got creative and made art with chalk.  It was a really hot day, but the ice pops and juice boxes kept everyone cool enough to have some fun!

We were really impressed by all of the chalk drawings everyone made. It was the perfect summer day for an outdoor program as well.  Which chalk drawing is your favorite? Check out the pictures below!