Library Memories

This month the Etsy Blogger's Carnival theme is libraries. We are supossed to write of our fond memories of the library. So, I'm taking a break from a crafty post and sharing some of my fond memories of my libraries! Oh, where do I start? I think I will start with our weekly trip! Visiting the library was as regular as going to church for my family. I think it saved my parents sanity! I loved this as a first place to have some independance making my own choices and venturing out of my parents line of vision. Somehow it seemed welcoming from the begining. As a teenager, we loved to spend cooler summer days reading books while listening to albums there. We lived in Arlington Heights IL and the library there was fortunate to have a good tax base from a local race track. We had lot of things to check out others did not: albums, art work, computers and more. We even had a book mobile! I can remember visiting that when it came to the park across the street. I even worked on the book mobile in highschool. The picture above is the Arlington Heights Memorial Library.

College memories of the library include one of the largest libraries in the nation, at the University of Illinois. Of course there are actually libraries all over the campus and they consider them one. The picture above is the Grainger Engineering Library, which I only visited once. The story of the under ground library to save the test fields. The stacks there, stick out in my memory. Getting a pass to go back into the stacks as a graduate student and seeing how large the collection was. The movable bookshelves, to house all the books. And now as a parent myself, I love the library still! We had play groups for toddlers during the winter. Books on tape for family vacations and just every night bedtimes. Books on inter-library loan means we can almost always get what we want! Videos, classes, CD's and more even if you don't read the library is a wonderful place to visit! In this difficult economy, I am even more thankful for my library! Even my scrap booking and paper crafting guild meets at my library! I love that I can paper craft and get books on the same night!