Flannel Friday: Clifford, Clifford, Where's Your Bone?

This an inspired by Flannel Friday post. I was looking for a flannel board to add to my Clifford storytime back in March and came across Erin's idea for Clifford, Clifford, Where's Your Bone? Erin used laminated pieces for her flannel board and I decided to go with felt.

I edited a coloring page to use as a pattern for the dog houses. I borrowed the following items to hide under the dog houses:

• Carrot, Corn, & Beans from "Gopher in the Garden" by Jack Prelutsky
• Chick from Chook, Chook, Chook, Chook, Chook
• Turnip from Lunch by Denise Fleming
• Bone from Doggy, Doggy, Where's Your Bone?
• Button from Pete the Cat

Like Erin, I asked the kids as we uncovered each item if Clifford could eat it. The first time around I matched the color of the doghouse to the item hidden under it. The kids caught on quick and I had to mix things up!

Kathryn has the round up this week.

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Our July/August Flannel Friday Fairy Godmother is Lisa (@lmulvenna).

DIY T-Shirt Workshop for Teens

This program grew out of the wants of my teens. When we did the Pinterest Crafts event in April, several of them were disappointed not to be doing a t-shirt craft.

I perused Pinterest and came up with four different ideas: tie-dye with paint spray, bleached out, crayon& sandpaper, and textured designs.

The paint spray was made from acrylic craft paint and water. Four parts water to one part paint ended up being the perfect mixture for the spray bottles I picked up at the local dollar store.

Some of the teens saturated their shirts in paint. Ideally, it's supposed to look more airbrushed than tie-dyed. I mentioned that you have to rinse regular tie-dye and some of them then rinsed their saturated shirts out with interesting results.

The bleached out shirts used bleach pens. I looked into making bleach spray, but thought the pens would be easier to control. Good ventilation is needed for this!

Crayon and sandpaper is pretty easy. Draw a picture with crayons on sandpaper and then iron it on to a shirt.

The textured designs were simply dipping textured plastic balls (picked up at the dollar store and Wal-mart) in acrylic craft paint and then stamping them on the shirt.

This was so much fun, I repeated it at 2 other branches for kids. We only did the paint spray and texture designs at these events.

Where Have I Been?

Apologies for the sparse posts during the summer. I have 3 more events to go before my summer events are truly over. This summer has kicked my butt! 161 events over eight weeks and accomplished in 36 days.


Everyone had fun, but both program attendance and reading contest participation were down at my branches. I've been following the discussion of a summer reading revolution on the Storytime Underground Facebook group and various blog posts. I'm really considering making some changes next year.


I've been so busy this summer, I haven't had a chance to post my storytime and school age event plans to my wiki yet. I used these storytime themes this summer: colors, weather/seasons, plants, numbers/math, water, movement/sound, five senses, and animals. For the school age (7-12), here's what I did: Leo the Great/Airplane Science, Cryptozoology, backyard Naturalists, It's Mathematical, Sink or float, Build It (Life size Angry Birds), Candy Science, and Animal Partnerships.


I did 2 events per month for teens this summer. Blog posts will be forthcoming: Chocolate Wars (borrowed from Kelly Jensen) DIY T-Shirt Workshop (ideas from Pinterest & prompting from my teens), Life Size Sorry (inspired by pictures on Pinterest), movie night, Mythbusters (borrowed from the Iowa Summer Reading Program workshops), and Hunger Games Party.


In the midst of this, like a good librarian, I was also planning (selecting would be a better word as the planning comes later) my fall storytime schedule and special events. For storytime, I'm going with an alphabet theme. I've never done this before and am really looking forward to it.


Here are the special events I have lined up for kids this fall: Pete the Cat Party, Life Size Candy Land, Preschool Dance Party, Frozen Party, Little Women event (December 25 this year marks the 20 year anniversary of the release of the film starring Winona Ryder), Adventures in Fairy Tales, Origami & Games, Elephant & Piggie Party, Harry Potter Party, and Kaya: An American Girl Event.


Here are the teen events I'm planning (thanks to input from my teens): Once Upon a Time, Sherlock Party, Minute to Win It, and Movie night (with popcorn, s'mores, and cocoa bars...thank you Pinterest!)


So faithful readers, I'll soon be back to a regular blogging schedule with program plans, book reviews, and Flannel Friday posts. I hope you have survived the summer as well!