Welcome to Library Love!

We miss you and we hope you and your loved ones are doing okay.

Welcome to our blog, which started out as a home for our Library Love podcast, good news and reading suggestions.

Since lockdown started, it’s become another way we can stay connected. It’s also filling up with our ideas for keeping busy, creative and entertained. Stick the kettle on and stay a while. Comments and ideas encouraged!

Reading for kids

Storytime videos, author interviews , book activities…

Reading for adults

Reading ideas, authors and celebs, book groups…

Family Fun

Virtual visits and ideas for creative online – and offline – fun

Crafternoon

Crafty ideas for adults and kids, suggested by library staff

Crafternoon: Plants and gardens

There’s a lot of crafty fun to be had with plants and gardens. From decorating a plant pot with paint to creating a little fairy garden, from growing potatoes in pots, to designing and creating a low waste garden or smallholding (if you’ve got the space and the time)

Indoor Plants

One of the most comprehensive house plant websites that we’ve come across can be found at House Plant Expert . You can spend ages browsing through, finding just the right plant for your home, and checking out how to look after the plants you already have.

picture of spider plant

Royal Horticultural Society

The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) has a fascinatingly informative website about all aspects of gardening. From how to start out when you’re a complete beginner, to ideas for fun family activities, to all sorts of courses for adults.

Grow your own

It’s a lot of fun to grow your own fruit and vegetables. From sprouting cress on a damp kitchen towel, and growing a chilli plant on a sunny windowsill, to cropping blueberries and plums from your garden, there’s a whole yummy adventure just waiting for you.

One of our favourite websites for loads of useful information on growing your own in the UK is Garden Organic

Permaculture

If you want to take your gardening further – to using a design system to plan and create your own productive, waste minimising homestead – then permaculture could be the system for you. Permaculture can give a whole new set of tools for how you interact with nature. There are some fantastic resources at the website of Heather Jo Flores and at Permaculture Scotland

Getting to know you

Vikki cuddling Sunny the ginger cat

Here’s lovely Vikki to tell us a little bit about herself.  Vikki now works downstairs in Falkirk Library as the Community Hub Lead Librarian, but used to work in Denny Library and in Grangemouth Library too. You might have heard Vikki’s voice on our Library Love podcast.

Favourite films – It’s impossible for me to come up with just one, so I’ll narrow this down to 5 in no particular order:

  • When Harry Met Sally
  • Dances with Wolves
  • Fargo
  • Westside story
  • Volcano

Favourite music – again impossible for me to narrow this down, so here are 5 favourites:

  • Billy Bragg
  • Gretchen Peters
  • Dolly Parton
  • Marvin Gaye
  • Nina Simone

Best place to read?  This varies depending on the season Winter tucked up in bed with a cuppa, or summer on a sun lounger with a big hat and a beer

Favourite food? Italian and Chocolate cake

Any pets? Sunny, a quite small ginger tom but with serious attitude

Which is your local library? Falkirk, though I usually and borrow something whenever I visit any others in Falkirk District, I just can’t help myself

What does your library mean to you? The past thirty years of my working life has been spent working in various public libraries both here and in England. Public libraries have always been a big part of my life, as an avid reader I would be lost without them.

What book recommendations would you like to share? I thought I’d share a list of what I’ve read for the past couple of months

  • The Hunting Party, Lucy Foley
  • The Family Upstairs, Lisa Jewell
  • The Giver of Stars Jojo Moyes
  • A Dark Matter, Doug Johnstone
  • The Other Bennet Sister, Janice Hadlow
  • Grown ups, Marion Keyes
  • Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbon
  • Peyton Place, Grace Metalious
  • The Cabin, Jorn Lier Horst

Crafternoon: Give yourself wings

There’s some amazing wing mural street art around the world. How about trying it out at home to create some fun, colourful, family photos?

The idea is simple: Create wing shapes on a wall or a floor and pose in front of them. Stand on a stool and get your camera angle right to make it look like you’re flying!

If you’re feeling very artistic, you could try drawing free hand, but you could also use cardboard, or create a collage effect with scrap paper, newspaper, leaves, or whatever you can get your hands on. You could even just chalk on the wall or pavement.

Your wings could take an form – fairy, bird, aeroplane, dragon. The only limit is your imagination!

This You Tube video has some ideas to help you get started.

You might also find some inspiration from this primary school teacher who had fun creating murals with her class.

Image from http://elementaryartfun.blogspot.com/search/label/wings

We’d love to see how you get on. Share your photos with us on social media or to falkirklibraries@gmail.com