Stories he reads and those he makes up. . .

As residents of the county seat we are blessed with a kick-ass library. It's under renovation, at least the old side is. The new side opened recently and gives indication that the entire place is going to be even better than before once the work is finally completed. Logan LOVES going to the library. He could spend forever and a day there. He likes picking out books. He also likes riding the glass elevator up and down and staring up at the mimicked stars on the ceiling of the elevator bay. He likes cuddling into the bean bag chairs to sample one of his story selections. And he really likes taking time to play the games on the computers in the children's department.

Each summer our library offers a reading program. Its designed to encourage school aged children to continue reading over summer hiatus. Pre-readers get to participate also by having 20 books read to them throughout the course of the summer. Logan signed up on Saturday. We've got 5 books already filled in - his five favorite selections from our nightly reads. Every five books he gets a sticker from the library.

Tonight was PJ storytime. He and I headed over a bit early to show the librarian his summer program card. I handed it to him as we entered the children's department.

"I get a sticker?" he asked excitedly. And I told him that yes he would get one tonight. He ran to the desk. He saw a mom there with her kids. "Is it my turn?!" he said anxiously.

"Not yet honey." I told him, resting my hand on his shoulder to keep him from charging ahead.

The woman and the kids left. "Is it my turn now?" he pleaded. Yes it was. He handed the staffer his program paper. She took that deep golden sheet from him and opened it to see what it contained.

"I get a sticker," he told her. She stopped to praise him for his five stories already accounted for. She pulled out the stack of stickers and asked him to pick one from a sheet she showed him. He picked a shimmering pink basketball and asked her to affix it to his paper for him because, as he informed her, he couldn't go behind the table since he didn't work there.

She gave him back his book and said something about seeing him again when he got to 10, but he didn't hear. He was too busy admiring his prize. Then he was off to the stacks of books, happily pulling one book from each aisle - something he felt destined to do tonight.

The bell rang and we followed the other librarian to the meeting room, joining a slew of PJ clad 2-7 year olds for a special time of stories in the early summer evening. First she played a song on CD. Logan stood - no one else did. He said, loudly I might add, "What's wrong with them? Don't they know its music?" He danced. He bopped. He clapped a little.

The woman read. He made it through two books, but her method of holding a book so only she and half the room could see it left him uninterested. He asked if we could leave for story time.

"This *is* storytime," I told him. And he told me no, he wanted to go back out to the beanbags and have our own story time. So we did.

On our way out we passed another regular summer occurrence - a concert in the courtyard outside the main entrance to the old section of the library. I asked Logan if he wanted to stay and listen some - "No," he said, "They're too loud." Instead we danced our way to the car, enjoying the cool evening and the 'loud' music.

We stopped for ice cream on our way home. As we were pulling out another car attempted to leave the lot down an aisle with no exit. He instead ended up just feet from us, front fender facing front fender. The man backed out and nearly clipped a car pulling in the lot at fast speed, desperate for a space at the popular local ice cream shop.

"What's that man doing?" Logan asked. "Crashing into cars?"

"Apparently," I said. "Or at least he will if he's not more careful."

Logan giggled as he sat securely in his car seat. "Come in, come in! This is Rocky Canyon," he said, pretending once again to be his favorite Rescue Hero. "We have a code 57298. We've got crashing into cars."

I laughed. "You're a real pip, you know that!" I told him.

"Why, yes I am!" he agreed, and dissolved into a fit of laughter.

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A Caterpillar Update:
I am very proud to say that I managed to keep that thing alive long enough to cocoon! Logan named his wiggly, hungry pet "Newchur." I have no idea why. Regardless, on July 3 I noticed that Newchur was no longer chowing down on my parsley and carrot-top sampler. The little green thing was instead partly suspended in a pseudo "J" shape on the frame of the cage. Bruce thought it might have met the same fate as our 36-hour gold fish experiment. I thought it might be preparing to morph.

I was right. On July 5th we woke to find Newchur fully in cocoon. Now if I can only manage not to kill a morphing butterfly. My favorite caterpillar info web site says it should take about 10 days from the time our little friend hid away. Keep your fingers crossed!