Since You've Been Gone Book Club: Guest Blogger SS Senior Book Club Member

With the book club, I read a book called Since You’ve Been Gone by Morgan Matson where a girl named Emily suddenly loses her best friend, Sloane, without a trace. The only trace left of Sloane is a list that arrives in the mail. Well, with an awesome librarian like Mrs. Hutto I knew we would have an interesting activity coinciding with this book. 

When I received a letter in the mail on the first Saturday of Spring Break I squealed because...well letters are a dying art, but when I noticed it was from school I was pretty sure it was a list like Emily got! When I opened up the letter I saw ten items on a list.

On my first look through I was brainstorming, “Hummus. Hmmm...that means trying a new food. I have to pick ONE favorite outfit??? Huh, my mom’s name is Jamie. I love cooking! Who will I write to? Exactly how far away is far away? Hmmm, so way later than 9...9:15?”

The easiest item on the list seemed like taking a selfie with my best friend, then I asked myself, “Can my dog count as my best friend? Because if not there is no way I can choose between my two human best friends.” I decided that I would go take a selfie with Goose, my dog, because she is definitely my best,best friend. So I completed 2. Take a selfie with your best friend. While she and I took a walk we took the selfie, and Goose had a photo session. 

When I got back to the house I wrote out a game plan and 4. Hug a Jamie was up next. I had to wait to the following day to complete this, because my Momma was in Mountain View with her best friends. The resulting picture is more of a personality picture than a true hugging picture. I say this because the picture is out of focus. A behind the scenes note is that this picture was taken on self timer mode and my Momma and I had to scrunch down so our faces would be in this picture because I just had the camera sat on my dresser. 

Then it was on to the next item on the list. I adore cooking, so the next item was 5. Cook for someone you love. I skipped over Monday and did not do an item on the list, but I cooked tacos for my parents on Taco Tuesday. When I was younger my family and I had tacos every Tuesday, but as I have gotten older and more places to be with my clubs and activities we have stopped having this meal as much so this meal was truly a meal cooked out of memories and love for people I love. 

After cooking I decided to stick to the food items on the list involving food, that meant 1. Try Hummus. When I saw this on the list I was really unsure about it, but when my mom read it she was excited because she thought I would like hummus. She was wrong, I loved it! 

Before I tried hummus on Wednesday I did do something in between cooking and trying the hummus. That item on the list was 10. Stay up way past your bedtime. I am a girl who adores her beauty sleep so this was very painful for me. To stay awake till 1 A.M. I used many different tactics, such as talking to my Mom until she went to bed, texting one of my human best friends, watching I Love Lucy, and doodling. Finally at 1 I felt like I had stayed up way past my bedtime, so I went to bed and let sleep encompass me. 

Then came Thursday, a day that promised to be busy. First on my list that day was 9. Perform a random act of kindness. My random act of kindness was to take do-nuts to the workers at the nursing home in Greenbrier. I suggest everyone make it a weekly habit to do some random act of kindness, for the sole reason of how fulfilling it is. I felt so amazing after taking these in, I could tell some of the workers were having rough days so it made me feel amazing to see them light up when I said I brought those by for them to have that morning. That feeling still hasn't left me almost a week later. 

After I did this, during the kindness too, I finished 3. Wear your favorite outfit. My favorite outfit is a shirt from Cato that is flowy with black horizontal stripes across a gray shirt. In the middle of this shirt there is a Paris scene and at the top it says Paris in black rhinestones. This is worn with jeggings from Maurice's and gold flats from Old Navy. I wore this to the nursing home, Best Buy, Shoe Carnival, and the Conway movie theatre where I saw Zootopia with the ladies from my mom's side of the family. 

After I got home from this I started work on 7. Sew something. I started sewing a cute little bag for my window sill that now holds my favorite perfume and a couple of different lotions. 

But before I finished this on Friday morning first I finished 6. Do yoga. Yoga is an amazing stress reliever for me, I focus more on getting the poses exactly right instead of all the things on my to-do list or my worries. This just gave me more incentive to do yoga over the break. In the picture I am trying a new pose...and you can see it didn’t work out exactly the way I wanted it to. 

Finally! Only one item left, but the most stressful item. I decided to write a letter to each of my two cousins in Texas. Writing letters to them was stressful because I wanted the letters to be perfect. On Saturday I finally finished writing the letters, even though I did not get them sent until Monday morning I count this item finished on Saturday because I finished writing the letters and had them in the envelopes with stamps on them.

My final thought at the end of the list: major fulfillment. I had such a good time working on this list, and it kept me in touch with my friends even more so than I would have normally been because I would ask their opinion about different list numbers. I would totally be open to getting another list in the mail from Mrs. Hutto...she put some awesome things on here! Since You’ve Been Gone is the best stand alone book I have read in such a long time, and I would totally suggest that everyone read this book.

Written by Jessie

(Many thanks to our guest blogger South Side Senior and Book Club member Jessie. I appreciate your enthusiasm and love of reading more than you'll ever know.  ---Mrs. Hutto)

Going Beyond Borders for Books

Going Beyond Borders for Books

Never in my wildest dreams had I ever imagined that my library degree, along with a little divine intervention, would carry me halfway around the world!  Yet, this summer I found myself in just that situation. There is an urgent shortage of librarians in the Philippines.  My friend Joyce Porcadilla, who is the President of the General Baptist Bible College and K-12 school in Davao City, Philippines, shared this with me when we had visited the summer before at a church convention.  When she found out I was a librarian, she told me that they had not had a librarian in at least three years and that their library was in a bad state.  I could hear the desperation in her voice.  She needed a librarian to the rescue!!! How often does that happen on the mission field? 
Also, she said if my husband, a GB pastor and Occupational Therapist, wanted to come and train teachers in Special Education (which does not exist in Philippine schools) and do some testing, therapy, and intervention strategies, his skills would be very useful for their faculty and students as well.  And then, there are my two beautiful children, bless their hearts, who have become little gypsies following along across the world with pillow pets in tow, wherever the Lord is leading us.

Davao airport

After lots of prayer and discussion, my husband and I, along with our children, said, “Here we are, send us.”  We would be spending a chunk of our summer in Davao. Months and months of logistical planning and gathering of funds and resources began.  The planning process for bringing order out of chaos in a library that I’ve never seen is enough to make you wake up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night…”What am I overlooking?...What am I forgetting?..What if we need xy and z and I don’t have access there?”  I was dealing with a lot of unknowns.  I don’t do well with unknowns.  Time to step out on faith! I was told that there were about 1,000 books that were being checked out with pen and paper.  I also found out that I would have a computer and internet access.  Good news!

As I began raising funds, on the top of my list was being able to provide the school with an online circulation system. Library World gave me a really good price on software and seemed to be the perfect solution for this issue.  Another priority was purchasing a printer and extra cartridges that I could use to print labels with.  Also, I would need a barcode scanner.  Other items that I carried with me were labels and label covers, and various books that I had been able to purchase prior to arrival.  I had to plan well so that my baggage weight would be acceptable.  Still, there is no way that I could totally prepare for this experience.

Library-in-training Jett Esencia

After 36 solid hours of travel from one side of the world to the other, and a good night’s sleep, I began my first day of work at the GBBC Library.  First thing, I met the first year library student, whom I would be mentoring during my month in Davao.  Jett, a bright-eyed 18 year old college student, would be my right-hand-man during this process.  On the first walk through of the library, I found that the books did have Dewey spine labels but were in no way, shape, or form, in any kind of order, AND there was no card catalog.  So I asked Jett what in the world kids did when they were looking for a book. He said, “They just walk around until they find it!” What?!?! They could spend years looking. Needless to say, we spent countless hours in the library moving large piles of books (no book trucks in Davao), cataloging book after book (1,500 at the time of my departure, with at least that many left to be done), putting labels on them, and then moving them back in correct Dewey order on the shelves. 

GBBC Library

Obstacles were plenty.  There were lots and lots of books, however, some were falling apart because they were so old.  The concept of weeding is an interesting one in a culture where nothing is thrown away because it might not be replaced.  The desktop I was supposed to be using, was not cooperating.  Luckily, I had a laptop with me that we could use until Jan Mercado, the most awesome Tech guy in all of the world, could fix it our desktop. My beautiful printer I had carried across the world caught fire when I plugged it in because of the voltage differences. I’m very thankful that Joyce knew a guy who could and would fix it and return it the next day. It was a miracle!!! The library had three window unit air conditioners; however, I compromised with Jett to only turn one on to cool the entire room.  Poor soul, it was 90+ degrees out, and he wore his hoodie while I constantly wiped sweat off my brow. Fun times!

This is my serious cataloging face

Internet usage was hit or miss.  And the days when it was a miss were discouraging.  I only had a limited amount of time to complete my goals for the GBBC library, and I quickly became frustrated with any downtime.  I just had to remind myself that I was training Jett as best I could to carry on the work after I left..it was the old teach a boy to fish mentality.  The downtime was a blessing in disguise. Those moments of nothing to do gave me a chance to interact with the small children who became curious about the visiting librarian and to get to know my fellow teachers and co-workers.  I quickly discovered how magical these people were.  Their resources were limited, but their hearts were huge and their creativity mind-blowing.

Oh, but the blessings were plenty!  The funds we had received back home were used to increase the amount of children’s literature and young adult literature in the GBBC Library.  The collection was heavy on theology, as would be appropriate for a Bible College, but Joyce really had a vision for increasing the collection of literature for the 700 elementary and high school students who shared the library with the college. I am proud to say that the GBBC Library is now the proud owner of the Harry Potter series, as well as, many other iconic books that have hooked kids on reading all around the world.  Also, one of the main academic concerns was that their students were struggling with reading comprehension.  It has always been my philosophy that exposure to printed material is the key to begin this process. They have to have something available to read in order to increase reading comprehension.  I was able to train the faculty on reading comprehension strategies, but the best thing is that now they have more books than ever to expose their students to and to get them excited about reading.

Pint-sized library patrons

My husband, Marcus, was able to evaluate and test several of their more severe students and do some therapy while he was there.  The lack of special education classes and guidelines, leaves their teachers at a loss many times on how to best help their kids with learning disabilities. He was able to work with teachers on strategies for students with ADD and other learning disabilities.  He also conducted inservice trainings on Autism, and various other diagnoses that needed to be addressed in the classroom.  In addition to that, he preached during chapel and taught seminars on stress management, pastoral counseling and discipleship.  I think a lot of the time, he was busier than I was.  He made many special friends while he worked on campus who will be forever in his heart.  
Together, we visited schools deep in the mountains and spoke to and encouraged teachers there. We were able as a family to travel to areas affected by Typhoon Pablo that came through and devastated part of the island.  We shared some bananas at lunch on that trip that were the first fruits of the banana crop destroyed during the typhoon.  That was the best banana I ever had.  I’ll never forget it. My friend Joyce says that Filipinos are waterproof, and I believe her.  They are such a resilient and joyful people in spite of great poverty and unthinkable tragedy.

Rubble in Compostella Valley after Typhoon Pablo

Since my return, I have remained in close contact with Jett, who recently, along with some of the staff,  hosted a Read-a-thon. That made my heart so happy! I left him with a library plan and he updates me with funny pictures of him “drowning” in a pile of books to catalog.  He has such a sense of humor! My heart wishes I could be there, but I know that I have work to do in my South Side Bee Branch  library here.  I came back with so much gratitude for the many resources we have at my school which I had taken for granted for so long.  I may not miss the “bucket baths” or the rice for breakfast, lunch, and dinner (daily life was very different there), but I miss my passionate Filipino colleagues who inspire me every day to make much of the little things.  The church my husband pastors keeps me on mission here at home, but I will forever be an advocate for my friends and colleagues on the other side of the world.  I hope that in some small way, I have contributed to the education of these beautiful children and young adults.  May they become future preachers, teachers, and world-changers.

Students Help Move New VBCL

Last week, several students had the opportunity to spend the day helping the Van Buren County Library move to it's new location.

I can't even imagine the logistics of moving thousands of books from one location to another.  My hat is off to the Van Buren County Library staff for planning and executing the whole move.  It could not have been easy.

The new facility is state of the art with an incredible children's area that rivals the Faulkner County Library's.  The library is now has a meeting room equipped with a Smart Board that can be opened after hours to the public.  Laptops are available to check out in lieu of desktop stations, and on a pretty day, wifi can reach to the beautiful stone patio overlooking the golf course.

Upon arrival, students were given a tour of the facility.    After sorting hundreds of boxes, we were then able to begin unpacking them and  shelving books in both the fiction and non-fiction areas.

We are very grateful for the VCL for feeding us lunch.  I expected the kids to drag their feet as we headed back to work after lunch.  We had, after all, been hauling and moving heavy boxes all morning long.  However, many of the kids finished eating quickly and asked if they could go ahead and get back to work.

The group of kids I had asked to go were very knowledgeable about the Dewey system and were very helpful in making sure the books were going in the right spots.

But, library nerds are not all work and no play.

We did take a few minutes to stop in at a local park on the way back to school.

All in all, we were all very excited about the upcoming Grand Opening of the new library facility which is tentatively set for April 1st.

Until Next Time,

Amy Hutto, LMS
South Side High School