We will have a special Valentine’s Day Craft with Carla this Wednesday at 4:00 pm. Come make pop-up cards for your friends, parents, and (if you have them) your sweeties. This program is intended for children between the ages of 7 and 12, but as most of you know, Carla teaches participants of all ages! See you there.

The Amelia County offices (and this includes the Library) closed at 12:30 today. We are closed on Saturday as well. Also, please check closings listed on Channel 12 for more information.

We are pleased that David Weber, author of nearly 50 science fiction and fantasy novels, will be our guest on January 18 at 5:30. Mr. Weber’s novels have been on many different “best-seller” lists, including Publishers Weekly and the New York Times. He writes for Baen Books and for Tor, and is considered one of the most popular current SF writers. Like most of our programs, this even is free to the public, and we look forward to seeing you there. You may find out more about him and his writing at www.davidweber.net.

Copies of several of his books will be available for purchase in the evening. Proceeds will benefit the Friends of the Library. Mr. Weber is also bringing special hardcopy editions of his new short story collection Worlds of Weber.

The Library Board of Trustees has decided to close the Library this Christmas Eve as well. Happy Christmas everyone!!

Oh, and be sure to check out NORAD to track Santa’s progress!

The Board of Trustees has changed our holiday closing schedule! This Christmas, we will use the following hours:

Monday (12/21):       10-6
Tuesday(12/22):       10-8
Wednesday(12/23): 10-8
Thursday (12/24):    10-2
Friday (12/25):          CLOSED
Saturday (12/26):     CLOSED

Monday (12/28):       10-6
Tuesday(12/29):       10-8
Wednesday(12/30): 10-8
Thursday (12/31):    CLOSED
Friday (1/01):            CLOSED
Saturday (1/02):       CLOSED

Other holiday closings in 2010:
Memorial Day Weekend — May 29 and May 31
Independence Day — July 3 and July 4
Labor Day Weekend — September 4 and September 6
Thanksgiving Weekend — November 24 (open 10-2) and closed November 25, November 26 and November 27
Christmas Weekend — December 24 (open 10-2) and closed December 25
New Year’s Weekend — (December 31 and January 1, 2011)

Our Virtual Library site is live, although we only have a few sites on it so far.We are using social bookmarking for this and tagging with nonlibrary terms as well as broad Dewey Decimal numbers (ie Dewey600s, “cooking” and “recipes” for cookbooks) These are all sites that we have used in the Library or have found in our own personal research. If we are missing a good site — and we know we are! — please consider leaving a message to let us know, or email us, or call us, or, send it via telepathic waves, or whatever. This is a site best built by the community!

Where can you find it, you ask? Right here –> http://delicious.com/hamnerlibrary

Given the demand, we are extending our Christmas Fine Amnesty through December 12. If you have overdue materials, please bring them back to the Library with at least one can of food per item. Until December 9, we are also collecting toys for the Christmas Mother — one medium toy per overdue item.

And here’s a non-Library plug… I have been told that the Amelia Christmas Mother is in desperate need of toy and monetary donations. They will have a booth at TOMORROW’S craft show. Please consider doing a little Christmas shopping there; the craft show will be at the elementary school from 9:30-3:30. We are also collecting new toys for them — just look for the big red bin in the Children’s Room. This has been such a rough year for so many people. If you can help, please do.

Tired of surfing TV channels only to not find anything of interest? Try checking out DVDs at Hamner Library.

Have you missed some of the “old” shows?  We now have all 9 seasons of The Waltons, or maybe you enjoyed Mash.  Do you enjoy some of the new series but missed episodes of Heroes, or CSI?  We have these on DVD now.

Maybe you enjoy cooking!  Come check out Graham Kerr’s healthy cooking series, Lifestyle #9. Or if French cooking is of interest we have Julia Child’s, The French Chef, Volumes 1 and 2.

For our Young Adults we have videos to suit their interests:

     The Dark Knight

      Nancy Drew

     Queen Sized

    7th Heaven

For our children we have added:

     Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium

     Saddle Club: Horse of a Different Color

     Really wild animals: Swinging Safari

     Really wild animals: Dinosaurs and other creature features

Check out these and many other wonderful titles we have added to our collection recently.

I have always been a fan of President Theodore Roosevelt because of his stamina and determination not to give into fear and despair. His life was full of excitement and challenges, most brought about from his own pride and courage.
Currently, I am reading Theodore Rex by Edmund Morris, a biography of President Roosevelt. It reveals TR as a articulate, no nonsense person who wouldn’t take no for an answer. This book follows his journey after President McKinley was assassinated in 1901 through his last year as president in 1909.
“Theodore Rex tells the story of the following seven and a half years–years in which TR entertains, infuriates, amuses, strong-arms, and seduces the body politic into a state of almost subservience to his will. It is not always a pretty story: one of the revelations here is that TR was hated and feared by a substantial minority of his fellow citizens. Wall Street and the white South, Western lumber barons, even his own Republican leadership in Congress strive to harness his steadily increasing power.” (from book jacket)

I just started reading the new James Patterson book Alex Cross’s Trial.  In the story, a young lawyer is sent to his boyhood home in Mississipi on a secretive mission from the President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt, to investigate a number of lynchings. While “home”, he has flashbacks of old friends, his mother, and terrible atrocities he witnessed as a child. 

From his grandmother, Alex Cross has heard the story of his great-unlce Abraham and his struggle for survival in rhew era of the Klu Klux Klan.  Now Alex passes the family tale along to his own children in a novel he’s written–a novel called Trial. 

As a lawyer in Washington, DC, early in the 1900s, Ben Corbett fights against oppression and racism, risking his family and his life in the process.  When President Theodore Roosevelt asks Ben to return to his hometown to investigate rumors of the resurgance of the Klu Klux Klan there, he cannot refuse.  (taken from bookjacket)