The Top Ten New Years Resolutions most people share

•1. Stop smoking
•2. Get Fit
•3. Lose Weight
•4. Enjoy Life More
•5. Quit Drinking
•6. Get Organised
•7. Learn Something New
•8. Get Out of Debt
•9. Spend more time with the Family
•10. Help Others
http://www.squidoo.com/newyears

Nothing to do this weekend? Go see a Movie.

We have movies on DVD and video cassette to check out, but if you can't get in today, go see a movie at Cinema 8 in Hibbing: http://www.manntheatresmn.com/locations.php?lID=5

The movies based on the books: the Stephenie Meyer Twilight Series and Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. We also have The Princess and the Frog paperback.

Pulling Weeds

In order to make room for all the new books that are purchased each year, the children's room collection is weeded every January. Any item (books, music, etc.) that has not been checked out in over four years will be removed. Also, any item that is no longer in acceptable condition will be removed and replaced.

Don't worry about those old books! They get a second chance at life as part of the Friends of the Library book sale in October.

Notice for January 6th and January 7th

During these two days the Arrowhead Library System’s software will be upgraded. We will be using backup software so we want all library users to be aware of the following:

· You will only be able to check out items with a library card. Other types of identification CANNOT be accepted.

· New library cards will not be issued.

· Library cards cannot be renewed.

· Lost library cards cannot be replaced.

· The library catalog will not be available.

· Holds or requests for items cannot be placed.

· No notices of any type (pre-overdue, overdue, holds) will be issued.

· Items cannot be renewed.

· Fines totals will not be available.

· We will not collect fines or fees these two days.

· Items will not be due on January 6th or 7th.

· No fines will be charged for January 6th or 7th.

New Year's Resolutions: Here we are again.

If you are one of "those" people who can't wait to start a New Year's Resolution, the following articles are for you:

Tips For Making Good New Year's Resolutions from http://www.mygoals.com/
http://www.mygoals.com/about/NewYearsTips.html

New Year's Resolutions Guide from University of Maryland Medical Center
http://www.umm.edu/features/resolutions_guide.htm/

How to make a New Year's Resolution from http://www.ehow.com/

http://www.ehow.com/how_12077_new-years-resolutions.html

Christmas Cookies

You still have time to bake Christmas Cookies. The Christmas Cookie website lists 25 cookie recipes including Mexican Wedding Cakes, Fudge, Chocolate Peanut Butter Cup, and Thumbprint cookies.

http://www.christmas-cookies.com/recipes/top25.php

We have holiday magazines and cookbooks available for check out:

Best Ideas for Christmas, Holiday Menus and Christmas Cookies by Lisa B. Zwirn.

Julie and Julia: See the movie and read the books!

In the movie, Julie and Julia, Julia Child is charmingly portrayed by Meryl Streep. Julia’s learning how to cook at the Cordon Bleu Culinary School in France is intertwined with Blogger Julie Powell’s (Amy Adams) challenge to cook her way through “Mastering the Art of French Cooking” in 365 days. Julie later turns the blog into the book, “Julie and Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment”.
Hibbing Public Library has the movie “Julie and Julia” and the book, “Mastering the Art of French Cooking” available for checkout. The book,” Julie and Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment” and “My life in France” are available through interlibrary loan.
Read more about Julie Powell at: http://juliepowellbooks.com/

Library Holiday Schedule

The library will be closed:

Thursday, December 24th (Christmas Eve)

Friday, December 25th (Christmas Day)

Stop in and get your holiday reading before 8:00 p.m. on Wednesday.

The library staff wishes all of our readers a safe and very happy holiday weekend.

Snow Angels by James Thompson

Inspector Vaara investigates the murder of a Somali film star in northern Finland on the edge of the Arctic Circle during winter. Finland, the land of the midnight sun in summer, depresses everyone in December, where daylight is a memory and the temperatures are well below zero.
Sufia Elmi, mutilated and murdered, causes much consternation with Inspector Vaara when he finds out his former wife lives with their main suspect, Seppo Niemi. Gritty and dark, the weather and the lack of sunlight adversely affect the people living there. Heavy drinking, suicide and family violence are frequent. Some Finnish phrases and the description of the Sauna are very familiar to my own background with great – grandparents who came over during the early 1900s.
Snow Angels is the first in a series by James Thompson, an American, who has lived in Finland for the last 10 years. I look forward to reading the next book in the series.

New in the Kid's Room

Dream Stealer

by Sid Fleischman

"The author breathes life into this Mexican-flavored world with a storytelling manner that's teasing and intriguing by turns." (Kirkus Reviews )

"The tale twinkles with Fleischman's signature crisp language and laugh-out-loud wordplay.[a] unique read that's sure to give young chapter-book readers shivers, laughs, and satisfaction." (School Library Journal )

"This fanciful, original tale drawn from Mexican lore.will delight children, as will the narrator's expertly modulated storyteller's cadence. Sis' black and- white illustrations include inventive design elements that reinforce the sense of real and imagined worlds overlapping." (Booklist {starred review} )

"The range of fanciful inventions . . . in this fanciful, original tale . . . will delight children." (Book Links )

Enter the B.J. Rolfzen Creative Writing Contest

Over four decades, B.J. Rolfzen taught high school and community college English in Hibbing, Minnesota. Hundreds of students from all social classes and national origins drew equal and insistent inspiration in Rolfzen’s Iron Range classrooms, but perhaps many have only heard of one student: Bob Dylan. In memory of Rolfzen, who passed in 2009, and his passion for poetry and writing, the Dylan Days Creative Writing contest is calling for short stories, poems and one-act plays from students and emerging writers for 2010. The competition will henceforth be known as the “B.J. Rolfzen Creative Writing Contest” and each year’s winners will be commemorated on a plaque in Bob Dylan’s hometown. The deadline for all entries is March 15, 2010. Poems of less than 1,000 words and short fiction of 1,000 to 4,000 words will be accepted through an online entry system. One act plays will be accepted by mail only. The contest is changing this year. More entries will be considered for publication in the Dylan Days program and literary journal “Talkin’ Blues” and the categories are being renamed and realigned.

For more information see the Dylan Days website.

The 20 Best Gadgets of the Decade (2000-2009)

Paste Magazine selected 20 gadgets that makes our lives more productive and more fun. Inventors created Iphones, Blackberries, USB flash drives, Bose sound blocking headphones, Bluetooth earpieces, Sony playstations, Xboxes, Garmin GPS, The Kindle and Ipods. What gadget would you like for Christmas?

New Library Policies Approved

The Library Board of Trustees approved the following policies at the 12/9/2009 meeting.

Bulletin Board Postings Policy
The bulletin board is for posters or notices of local interest and for announcements by local groups of civic, educational, or recreational activities. Because of space limitations, posted items must be of reasonable size. Nothing is to be posted without the approval of a library staff member, who is to initial and date each item.

The following types of materials will not be posted:

• Political campaign posters
• Materials advocating or promoting one side of a social, moral, political or other controversial issue
• Commercial advertising
• Advertisements for personal profit

Paging Patrons for Telephone Calls

In order to maintain a reasonably quiet library, protect minors using the library, and to comply with Minnesota Statute Data Practices Act, Library staff is unable to accept requests to page patrons in the building.

The library's public address system is to be used for the following:

• Library closing messages
• Library emergency messages such as evacuation, weather warnings, calls for a physician
• Informing staff that they have a service call
• Requests for additional staff assistance in a public area
• Announcement of library programs

All library users are requested to advise people who might call them that the library does not offer a paging/messenger service, except in emergencies.

Holiday fun in the kid's room!

Monday, December 21st, come to the library for a special story time with holiday books, songs and a craft. It all starts at 10:00 a.m. Come in for a special start to your holiday week.

A Geek's Look Back at 2009 from Discover Magazine

DISCOVER charts the best sci/tech movies, books, gadgets and cars of the year. Check out popular movies on DVD and in theaters: Avatar, District 9, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, and The Road. TV shows worth a look: The Big Bang Theory, Eureka and The National Parks: America's Best Idea. Best Books found in our library: The End of Overeating by David Kessler, Nurtureshock by Po Bronson, How We Decide by Jonah Lehrer, and Born to Run by Christopher McDougall.
For the complete article, go to: http://discovermagazine.com/2009/dec/07-geek.s-look-back-at-2009

Downloadable Digital Books 24/7

Titles are being added every month to our digital audio book collection. You can download 24/7 to your computer and transfer the books to a variety of listening devices. All you need is an internet connection and your Arrowhead Library System borrower’s card. Click on the "downloadable books" icon on the library's website.

Titles that have been recently added include:

One Less Thing To Worry About: Uncommon Wisdom For Coping With Anxieties by Jerilyn Ross.

Killer Dreams by Iris Johansen

Bad Place by Dean Koontz

Overlook by Michael Connelly

Tales For A Winter Night by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Keetax Mine Expansion

The Keetac Mine Expansion Draft Environmental Impact Statement (3 volumes) is now available at the library.

These documents have been prepared to disclose potential environmental, social and economic effects of the proposed Keetac mine Expansion project near Keewatin. They will be available for public review during the public comment period beginning December 11, 2009 and ending January 26, 2010 at 4:30 p.m.

The public meeting concerning this issue will be on Monday, January 11, 2010 beginning at 6:30 p.m. at the Hibbing memorial building in the dining room.

Reference copies (in library use only) are available at the front desk. A second set can be checked out with a valid library card.

Celebration of Lights

Hanukkah begins at sundown on Friday, December 11th. If you want to learn more about this Jewish festival of rededication the library has a number of books such as:

"Lights of Hanukkah" by Barbara Rush

"Happening Hanukkah: creative ways to celebrate" by Debra Mostow Zakarin.

These websites also relate the stories, traditions, and music of Hanukkah Judaism 101 and The Jewish Outreach Institute.

Local Restaurant Owners Featured

Did you know that Mr. and Mrs. Lo, owners of the Hong Kong Super Buffet in Hibbing, were recently featured as a success story in the "Asian Restaurant News"?

A copy of the magazine is currently available for viewing at the library.

New in the Kid's Room

Some books are absolute magic, and this is one of them. The main character, an unnamed angel, is a plucky creature with a bumbling vocabulary that is laugh-out-loud funny as well as a sassy running commentary about the "peoples" who reside in a small village in the Swiss Alps. Kids will giggle at the mischievous side of Angel, who throws pinecones at irritating mortals and smashes figs for fun. Angel can only be seen or sensed by the book's children—first and foremost, by spunky Zola. She is a free-spirited young girl who wears a trio of rainbow-colored dresses at any one time and teams up with the angel to bring the tiny town out of a time-worn gloom with good deeds, namely rescuing a motley crew of orphans with touching and humorous results. Creech's protagonist is hugely likable. Angel has moments of self-doubt and impatience that are appealingly human, while there is a sweet exchange with Zola about the potential of people to already be angel-like in this existence by using their lives for good. Thanks to the author's signature eloquence in detail, readers will wish that they, too, could live in the village among the quirky cast of characters. Creech's offering deserves to be read out loud and more than once to truly enjoy the angel's hilarious malapropisms and outright invented words, and to appreciate the book's tender, comical celebration of the human spirit.—School Library Journal

Give if You Can

If you are able to help out the Hibbing Area Chamber's Range Young Professionals and the Salvation Army need help making the holiday season a little brighter for Hibbing families in need. As you may know, Hibbing has had the highest unemployment statistics of any city or town in the state of Minnesota.

Please consider donating new, unwrapped gifts for children, teens, and adults. Donations may be dropped off at the following centers:

BARR ENGINEERING
CUSTOM LETTERING
DETROIT DIESEL-DMR ELECTRONICS
HIBBING AREA CHAMBER OF COMMERCE
HOWARD COURT
PIZZA RANCH
SECURITY STATE BANK
US BANK
W.P. & R.S. MARS COMPANY
WALMART

Donations are being accepted until December 11th.

Seasonal Schedule for Story Time and Toddle Time

Spring: Story Time every Tuesday at 10:00am, Toddle Time every Thursday at 10:00am.
Last week in January through first week of May.

Summer: Story Time every Tuesday at 10:00am, Toddle Time every Thursday at 10:00am.
First week in June through last week of July.

Fall: Story Time every Tuesday at 10:00am, Toddle Time every Thursday at 10:00am.
First week after Labor Day through first week of December.

Look for other kid’s programs in the regular seasonal schedule.

Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day

On this day in 1941, the Japanese raided Pearl Harbor and changed the course of history. This attacked brought an unprepared U.S. fully into World War II. Today is a day to remember the brave men and their families that served in the past and continue to serve and protect all of us today.

The Naval History and Heritage Command site features a historical overview of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Also included are a number of images which capture the horror of the day.

Yuletide Festival Fun!

5 Tips for Safe Web Shopping from CNET News.

63% of online shoppers abandon a purchase due to sites that ask too much information, are uncertain how their personal data will be used and lack of faith in the site's security.
Look at the following tips to avoid unpleasant surprises.
1. Know who you are dealing with.
2. Know exactly what you are getting and when and how your are getting it.
3. Watch for prechecked or disguised offers.
4. Maintain a complete paper trail.
5. Watch for unexpected charges after the fact.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13880_3-10404891-68.html?tag=TOCmoreStories.0

Yuletide Festival Tonight

The annual Yuletide Festival starts at 6:00 p.m. tonight.

Stories will be told.

Music will be enjoyed.

Treats will be eaten.

Holiday decorations will be crafted.

Books will be given away.

Santa will listen.

Bring everyone!