You Hear Everything But "Shush" At This Library!

Nora is a bookworm.

And I'm not bragging like "I turn the TV off and make her read" because I don't.

She watches Sesame Street and is pathological about Elmo, so I won't pretend she isn't a little kid who loves her tube either, despite all the dire warnings of letting kids watch TV.

But this is about her thing with the library.

When I lived in Seattle, I always went to neighborhood libraries, often some small branch library with a few books in it.

But when we moved to Denver, they had a brand new, state-of-the-art Central Library that won national architecture awards, and had such an amazing set-up that I would often walk there from work to spend my lunches napping in their Adirondack chairs in the children's department long before I had children.

So here we are in a smallish (150,000 population) town with a 1970s library, and a baby who loves to read.

I take her to the library now, not just because of the wide choice of books that we can take out, but because they have a BUNCH of places for kids to play, and not ONE of them will EVER tell a child to "Shhhhhhhh".

The children's area has "horse" seats where Nora now points and says "pbbbbb" (her sound for horses), a stage area where she can practice her stairs, and puppets to play with.

There's a "discovery room" where she can learn about Oregon past and present, including a teepee for learning about the native culture, and a stuffed, nearly life-size cow for learning about its dairy industry.

They even have children's hours with story telling, dancing, singing and as Nora grows, she participates more and more.

This isn't your mommy's library!