flannel friday is hosted here...

I am excited to be hosting this week's Flannel Friday Round-Up...what a way to come back to my blog after a long, crazy summer! I've missed sharing things with you, so I will share some BIG NEWS with you tomorrow in my post... for now, leave me a link to your Flannel Friday awesomeness and I will round those up for a comeback post tomorrow.

Happy Flanneling!

exciting news for 'flannel friday'!

Introducing the Flannel Friday website!
(with apologies for posting a day late)

As you know, Anne at So Tomorrow has been an amazing manager and archiver of Flannel Friday information for the past year. Anne and her husband are expecting their first baby in June (congratulations Anne!) so we wanted to give her a break from Flannel Friday during her maternity leave. So this spring, Anne and Mel from Mel's Desk and a small group of old and new Flannel Friday-ers worked to create a new web home for Flannel Friday. 

Here's the link! http://flannelfridaystorytime.blogspot.com

The new site will be the home of the Round Up Schedule, the archives, FAQs about Flannel Friday, information about how to get involved with Flannel Friday, and links to help new members get started with social networking and blogging. There will also be a link to the week's Round Up, but the Round Up will continue to be hosted on individual blogs. We'll just point to each Round Up from the site. 


Refining the Round Up Procedure
The Flannel Friday community has grown continuously over the year, with new bloggers, new Round Up Hosts, and new members every week on Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter. We are building an amazing community and are grateful to each and every one of you for your participation and enthusiasm. As the group has grown, you've probably noticed that so have the Round Ups! We've seen an inevitable increase in missed links and general confusion as the Round Ups are compiled. We thought that the launch of the new site was a great opportunity to take a page from other round ups in the blogosphere and establish one single method for building the Round Up each week. 


This information will be in the FAQs on the new site, but here's our new strategy in a nutshell:


Every week the Round Up Host will publish a "placeholder" post for the Round Up on the host blog at 10pm EST on Thursday.


Each blogger who wants to participate in the Round Up will make a comment to the Round Up post with the 
link back to their Flannel Friday post by 10pm EST on Friday. 


This will be the only place to post links for the Round Up! This way the Host won't have to worry 
about checking Facebook or Twitter as well. 


If a blogger can't make the 10pm EST deadline on Friday, we'll ask that the post be held for the next week's Round Up. 


The Round Up Host will gather links from the Round Up post comments throughout the day, and publish the Round Up at the end of the day. 


We hope this will make the Round Ups easier to create and easier to contribute to! We'll look forward to your feedback over the next few weeks. Sharon / @ReadingChick at Rain Makes Applesauce has the Round Up this week, 5/11, so she's going to try out the new procedure with us and see how it goes!


If you have questions or comments, don't hesitate to share them via the new Flannel Friday email: flannelboardfriday [at]gmail.com


------


On a personal note, the ladies who run #flannelfriday are just amazing... I've only hosted ONCE but I have plans for lots more flannel and lots more posting this fall. As a library community, we are *so* lucky to have dedicated, passionate people like this in our midst. Long Live Flannel Friday! 

thinking outside the box...

As I may have mentioned earlier, this session I am flying solo when it comes to storytimes. With the exception of our Books & Babies storytimes, I am the storytime presenter here at the library. I have a drop-in each Tuesday, two storytimes on Wednesdays, two storytimes on Fridays, and a monthly storytime on a Thursday evening.

Flying solo is pretty cool in that I am solely in charge of what we read and what we make... I pick the songs and I make the nametags and I generally call the shots. Now, this is not to say that I was not able to make my own choices in the previous session - it's just different when you are collaborating with other people who bring their own ideas and favorites to the storyroom. I am the whole show these days - with repeat performances.

So I've been struggling to come up with my themes... I find myself falling back on the tried and true animals over and over. I started off with bears, but I knew that I wanted to take my other storytimes in a different direction. But where?

Enter storytimekatie - my go-to blog since I accepted this position and learned about my storytime responsibilities. Using the theme tab Katie so graciously put at the top of her page, I was able to peruse a list of themes she's used since 2010... but it was the BOXES post on the right-hand side of the screen popped right out at me!

Boxes? Katie is brilliant! I tweaked the storytime a little bit - I used shapes for the flannelboard and the craft - but the imagination/box theme was strong through the story selection.

Here's the setlist*:

"Hello Everybody"

Welcome: I didn't have enough "box" books to display around the room, so I asked the children to guess what storytime was about based on the flannel shapes I had up on the board. The most frequent guesses were "shapes" and "colors" - and I told them that they were right... but we'd be reading stories about using our imagination to play with shapes and colors.

Wiggles

I've been having a LOT of trouble with covers messing up my text, so I am borrowing ANOTHER page from Katie's book and doing a book collage at the top of the books section. :)

A Box Can Be Many Things by Dana Meachen RauThis book is pretty small, but it did such a good job of illustrating that all it takes to take a box from blah and boring to superfun is a little imagination - and maybe a well-placed square cut-out.

Not a Box by Antoinette Portis
Oh how I LOVE this book! One page shows our friend the Rabbit standing next to (or on top of, or inside) what looks like an ordinary box. The next page reveals, however, that it is NOT a box. Lots of giggles on this one.
Flannel: Dear Zoo by Rod Campbell OR Flannel Shapes
Katie made an UH-mazing flannel version of this set of printables; I printed the printables in color, laminated them, and added velcro (yup, BIG cheater). The story is so easy to tell without the text and the kids who haven't seen the book (not too many *haven't*!) had a fun time guessing what was in each box.

I did not, however, have this ready to go at the beginning of the week, so I also used our Ellison to make basic shapes in flannel - a circle, square, triangle, rectangle, and (for fun) a trapezoid. C'mon- it's superfun to say 'trapezoid'... it's the 'zoid'. It makes the word. :D I showed the group how we culd rearrange to shapes to make new things - a house, a rocket, a clown, a gumball machine, a tractor, a truck... and that's exactly what we did for our craft!

Song: 'If You're Happy & You Know It'

(4-K group) It Looked Like Spilt Milk by Charles G. Shaw
We own the big book version of this book and it was fun to use with the older kids... they enjoyed shouting out what they saw and learning that, in the end, it was none of those things. :)
(2-3 group) Meeow and the Big Box by Sebastien Braun
This book also encouraged the kids to guess what was being made, but I thought Meow (such a cute illustration) would play better to them than the simple blue and white pages of It Looked Like Spilt Milk.
Magic Box by Katie Cleminson
We finished up with this whimsical story of a girl and her magic box - the illustrations, which use an interplay of black, white, and shocks of color, is what takes this book to the next level. Getting the pet you always wanted isn't bad, either!
Craft: Shape Creations!
I gave the kids construction paper shapes like the felt ones I'd used on the board and a sheet of black construction paper. I also gave them a quarter sheet of paper with ideas for using the shapes to make pictures!
I think that despite a rough start in trying to come up with a theme this week, I ended up in good shape.

Good SHAPE?

Get it?! :D

flannel friday round-up for 12/9/2011...

12/12/11 -
WHEW! This is harder than it looks! :)
I think I FINALLY have all the awesome contributions from last week here on the round-up.
Thanks to everyone for their patience - I appreciate it!!

It's Flannel Friday, y'all! I am so happy to be hosting this week... I've only been blogging for about three months and Flannel Friday was my inspiration to get started. Thank you all so much for sharing your ideas and experiences in addition to your awesome flannel artwork - this newbie YS librarian remains forever in your debt!

Without further ado, here's this week's fantastic round-up (in no particular order - because I'm random like that) ;D :

Andrea at Roving Fiddle Head takes inspiration from Storytiming to create her own version of Ouch! - hedgehogs = super cute, people.

Megan at Busy Crafting Mommy shares her Animals in Winter storytime plan with an awesome flannelization of Time to Sleep. Her bear hibernation craft alone is worth the click. ;)

Melissa at Mel's Desk gets her carpentering skills on with "Five Little Nails". It's a storytime engineering masterpiece, if you ask me.

Allison at Miss Allison is Blogging! takes expandable wallets to a new level with There Was a Cold Lady Who Swallowed Some Snow.

Linda at Notes from the Story Room shares the story of "Crow's Great Gift". If you've had a bad opinion of a crow since you first watched Dumbo, you may have a change of heart after reading this one.

Katie at Story Time Secrets throws the door wide open to welcome all sorts of family visitors in her original tune, "Who Is Knocking At My Door?" - perfect for the season of family gatherings!

Mollie from What Happens In Storytime...  replaces monkeys with snowmen for some (medical emergency) fun in "Four Little Snowmen". I always wondered why that mom didn't encourage the monkeys/snowmen to do something else... :D

Natasha from Natasha the Artsy Librarian brings snowman building indoors with "Let's Build a Snowman" ... and she has a BOATLOAD of awesome stories picked out for a snowy storytime!

Cate from Storytiming gets her kids bibliobopping with a Jellybean Countdown! What's a bibliobop? Only the funniest sounding library program I've heard of in a long time!

Katie from Recipe for Reading has cooked up her own penguin tale (that I believe I will be using this coming storytime!!) in "A New Color for Mr. Penguin". If you've been dying to try out a box story, this may be the one for you!

Mary from Miss Mary Liberry brings a classic to flannel - The Mitten by Jan Brett. She even tells us how to get all Brett's animals illustrations in one fell swoop. ;)

And finally, I - Liz/Mrs. D, here at Putting Smiles on Faces - am sharing my flannel version of a NickJr. online/animated story, Rumble, Grumble, Gurgle, Roar! by Jonny Belt.

*******************

Next week's host is Linda at Notes from the Story Room! 

Don't forget!

We are taking a winter break and there will be 

NO Flannel Friday round-ups

on the 12/23 or 12/30!

The round-up archives and host schedule is at So Tomorrow.

For our visual learners, we also have Flannel Friday posts at Pinterest - grouped by theme!

You can talk storytime/flannelboards shop on the Flannel Friday Facebook page.

And don't forget to follow Flannel Friday on Twitter with the #flannelfriday hashtag. (You don’t even have to be on Twitter to check this out!)

Last but not least, if you’re a contributer, grab the blog button in the right hand menu at Mel’s Desk!

flannel friday: rumble, grumble, gurgle, roar!

Woo-hoo! It's my turn to host Flannel Friday!

In anticipation of this ocassion, I got my butt in gear and finished my flannel and picture taking tonight so that I can dedicate myself to my round-up post tomorrow. Here goes:


This coming week is the last week of our second session of storytime. The theme is penguins and I want to try to tell a story with the flannel board - so far, it's been all rhymes and games for me. I found this story while searching "penguin stories" and flannelized it - which was pretty easy to do given how adorable the animation was. (NOTE: I did NOT hear Whoopie Goldberg read the story since my work computer does not have speakers; I am glad because I am afraid it would have influenced how *I* told the story.) The story is abbreviated here in the captions:


Little Penguin was swimming in the icy blue sea when she heard a funny sound - rumble, grumble, gurgle, ROAR! It was her tummy and it meant she was hungry!

So she hopped out of the water looking for something good to eat... and she spotted something white and fluffy!

It was a polar bear!

Little Penguin couldn't eat a polar bear... and the polar bear went back to sleep. But Little Penguin was STILL hungry!

And she saw something plump and brown...

But it was a walrus! 

But Little Penguins can't eat walruses - and the walrus went back to basking in the sun. Little Penguin was still hungry!

Ah-ha! Something shiny and orange - looks so yummy!

Daddy Penguin! If she can't eat a polar bear, or walrus, or a Daddy Penguin, what can she eat? Little Penguin was still SO HUNGRY! 

How about those silver, shiny fish! 

First, I think I am going to need to work on the whole "iceberg" environment - I think I need to add a sheet of white felt to the sheet with the hole so that it goes across the board. Second, I need to pick up some brown felt so I can redo the walrus. The polar bear is in white felt and his head is double-sided so that he can change his expression... which is super fun. :) The walrus is made out of construction paper so I had to use velcro on him. 

NickJr. suggested having kids guess what Little Penguin is trying to eat before advancing through the story - I think I will add a layer of felt to the "snow covers" for the characters so we can do that in storytime, too. 

You can find the rest of this week's round up... oh, wait! Right here! With me! :) You can also view past round-ups with Anne at So Tomorrow, or click the Flannel Friday button to the right to view the flannel board on Pinterest.

Happy Flannel Friday! 

flannel friday: aww, turkey feathers...

I seriously need help. I read the post on the FF Facebook group that said that we could list all our postings there... and I was like, "Wow - people are getting their posts done early!"

And then I realized it was Friday morning.

I missed last week because I was out of the building at a meeting - I didn't want to miss this week because I am a creature of habit and I was afraid of slipping into that one (not posting). :)

So, without further ado...

Turkey Feathers!

Here's the star of the Thanksgiving show (though I doubt that was a role he sought for himself)! This turkey - hereafter referred to as 'Tom' - was inspired by the work of Anne, Andrea, and Allison. I loved the idea of having the turkey bend over to show off his feathers and the songs that you could use to count or identify colors.

Tom's nekkid!

Now, I have to tell you - Tom's a bit of a miracle. When I went to start putting him together this morning, I discovered that I only had scraps of brown felt left. SCRAPS, people. Tom is made of nearly ALL the brown I had - and his little body is about the size of the average woman's (I think I'm pretty average) hand spread out. I guess he was just meant to be!

Lookin' good, buddy!

I added little tiny pieces of velcro to the feathers I picked out for his tail. I am not sure that this part of the flannel will survive until next year, but MAN are these feathers pretty! You'll notice two shades of green and two shades of blue. Not ideal for talking about colors with the littlest patrons, but I needed them to get to ten  feathers total in Tom's tail - ten being a great number for counting and all. 

You can find the rest of this week's round up with Cate at Storytiming and view past round-ups with Anne at So Tomorrow, or click the Flannel Friday button to the right to view the flannel boards on Pinterest.

Happy Flannel Friday! 

flannel friday... five little dinos!

Hey, all! Today's Flannel Friday post is not original, but is super cute nonetheless. I am in the process of planning the second session of fall storytimes and next week's theme is "Diggin' Dinosaurs". As I trolled my favorite storytime blogs for inspiration, I came across "Five Little Dinosaurs" on Mel's Desk - and when I realized she had provided a link to the adorable dinos she'd used, there was no stopping me.

Srsly?!? How cute are these little dinosaurs??

I also loved how Melissa described singing the song:

Five Little Dinosaurs Went Out to Play
(Tune: Five Little Ducks Went Out to Play)

One little dinosaur went out to play
on a giant fern one day.
She had such enormous fun
that she called for another dinosaur to come.


(Cup hand around mouth: "Oh diiiiiiiinnnooosauurrrr!" / slap hands on thighs to make running sounds)


Two little dinosaurs...
Three little dinosaurs...
Four little dinosaurs...


Five little dinosaurs went out to play
on a giant fern one day.
They had such enormous fun
That they played until the day was done! 

Who *wouldn't* come running to play with these dinosaurs?

I printed out the images at the size they were and they are pretty small... you could enlarge them on a copy machine or something like that. But I liked the size they were because they are "little dinosaurs" and they are supposed to be playing on a giant fern (which I just drew on green construction paper myself; put one small teardrop shape at the top and then pairs of teardrops until they are as big as you like, leaving room for the 'stem' to connect them all). The image is black and white, so you get to color them yourself - and I added some extra lines and circles to give the dinos some pizzazz. :D

I came up with a pretty cute craft to go with it, but you'll have to wait until I post about that storytime. Don't worry, though -  Melissa's post reminded me how fun it is to share. :) 

You can find the rest of this week's round up and view past round ups with Anne at So Tomorrow, or click the Flannel Friday button to the right to view the page on Pinterest.

Happy Flannel Friday! 

my first flannel friday!!

Seriously? Participating in #flannelfriday is a major reason I started this blog. The *first* flannel I made was inspired by the "5 Little Owls" that so many awesome librarians had already put together. These owls are ridiculous cute and so. easy. to make. The kids loved them.

I was so happy with my experience with the owls (both making them and sharing them with the kids) that I decided to make my own flannel for our Halloween-themed storytimes this week. So fun!

There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat (Scholastic, 2002)

I made flies like these when I shared There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly during a Bugs storytime. We used a sorta creepy looking old lady puppet and the kids stuffed what she was swallowing right down into her gullet. It was a hoot.

I didn't know about the old lady who swallowed a bat (or the cold one who swallowed some snow for that matter) until I went looking for songs for our Halloween storytime. I figured that if I created a pretty generic looking old lady, I could use her in the future for swallowing flies, bats, AND snow (with the addition of some layers for the "cold lady" angle). Yay, multitasking flannels, amiright? :D

I am super proud of the finished project:

(Over the course of the story, she swallows a bat, an owl, a cat, a ghost, a goblin, some bones, AND a wizard. Sheesh, sister... take it easy!)

I thought the eyebrows added to the agony that would no doubt be associated with swallowing that amount of things.

This wizard cracked me up because he pretty much came together from scraps. His gesture there is because he eventually casts a spell on the old lady.

Am I the only person who is not quite sure what a goblin looks like? I went with a green guy with yellow teeth and ragged clothes. (Patch added to emphasize raggy-ness.)

This little owl is my homage to Leah's adorable owls who kicked off my flannel journey. :)

I had so much fun making this - which I did when I had some free time away from the desk on Tuesday. I am already considering putting together my own flannel kit and hope to add many more fun multitasking flannels to my meager collection!


You can find the rest of this week's round up with Tracey at 1234 More Storytimes, view past round ups with Anne at So Tomorrow, or click the Flannel Friday button to the right to view the page on Pinterest.

Thanks for checking this out and Happy Friday!