Happy New Year! Activities for Kids

Red Ted Art's Blog has a bunch of great, easy New Year's crafts for kids to work on today for New Year's parties.

You could blow up a bunch of balloons and hang them up in a stuffed toy netting and release them when the New Year's ball drops (which in our house was usually much earlier than midnight!). Or try this craft to make Christmas crackers, which releases confetti and small toys (just wrap some toys you have at home already): Christmas crackers

And finally, here's a fun song to sing to ring in the New Year with your kids:

Ring The Bells (Sung to Row Row Row Your Boat)(Give each child a set of bells)

Ring ring ring the bells

Ring them loud and clear

Let's tell everyone around

That the New Year is here!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2013 FROM THE CHILDREN'S DEPARTMENT AT MASSILLON PUBLIC LIBRARY!

Merry Christmas from the Massillon Public Library!

This tree was spotted at the library at Saint Mary’s College in Notre Dame, IN.

Need some Holiday reading?

Only one more week until Christmas! For parents that will seem like a short time to get everything done. But for children, it will seem like forever. If you have someone at home that is having trouble waiting for Santa to arrive, you might try reading Llama Llama, Holiday Drama by Anna Dewdney to them. I'll bet you can relate!

"If there's one thing Llama Llama doesn't like, it's waiting. He and Mama Llama rush around, shopping for presents, baking cookies, decorating the tree....but how long is it until Christmas? Will it ever come?"

Wegivebooks.org is offering some Christmas book titles (and other snowy titles) to read online free right now. And if you're looking for another holiday classic, here's Frosty the Snowman. The website says for ages 0-3, but this classic is for all ages, really.

Fair warning though: You will need to have Adobe Flash Player installed on your computer or tablet to read these stories.

And if your children enjoy reading books online, don't forget---The Massillon Public Library website has plenty of books, videos, and puzzles/games on our Tumblebooks page. We received this Tumblebooks subscription thanks to a generous donation from the Mel Herncane family. We hope you'll take advantage of it!

It even lists the Accelerated Reader points that students can earn by reading these books.

Excited for Christmas yet? Here's a great story to get you in the mood: 'Twas the Night Before Christmas.

Merry Reading!