September Draw Winners

Well, congratulations to the September prize winners! And a huge thank you to everyone who is reading and turning in their reading logs. These three lucky winners can drop by the Library at any time to claim their prize.

First place with a $10.00 gift card for Shellbrook Flowers 'N' More is Jovee D.

Second place is Evan B.. and his prize of Vouageur by Eric Walters.

Third place winner is Emma K. with her Library pen.

Gearing up for the September Draw we have a first place gift certificate valued at $10.00, second place is the book Silverwing by Kenneth Oppel, and third place is a Library pen.

So read lots of pages and hand in your Reading Logs every Friday to have your name entered in the October Draw! I wish the best of luck to everyone!

Dzień dobry Everyone!

Well week sixteen saw 3,671 pages added to last weeks 45,307 for a new total distanced travelled of 48,978 kilometers. Great job everyone!

But, the all important question: where am I now? Well, I breezed through Ireland, Britain, Netherlands, Germany and am camping in Poland at 53 N 17 E. (Don't forget to check my location out with the satellite view on Google Maps.)

Now about the subject line! "Dzień dobry" which you pronounce as "jane dough-bray" means "good day" and is a Polish way of saying "hello." So dzień dobry everyone!

Do you think you readers could try and find a book in the library that is set in Poland? Or set in Poland part of the time? Good luck and hope to hear about your discovery from Ms Carswell!

Keep on and continue having fun reading.

Off the Coast of Ireland

Week fifteen saw 2,120 pages added to last weeks 43,187 for a total distanced travelled of 45,307 kilometers.

So currently I am in the Atlantic Ocean (the water is quite cold here!) 570 km off the coast of Ireland. My exact location is 53 N 19 w for those of you who are interested.

Well, though I say I'm off the coast of Ireland I've still got a few novels to read before touching Irish soil. Maybe three Nancy Drew should get me there at 180 pages each? Well the first two novels are 180 pages, The Secret of the Old Clock and The Hidden Staircase but Ms Carswell has misplaced her personal copy of the The Bungalow Mystery so she can't check the page number for us right now!

Read on!

Swim Time Again

Week fourteen saw 3,873 pages added to last weeks 39,314 for a total distanced travelled of 43,187 kilometers. Which means I'm back swimming in the Atlantic Ocean! Currently floating at "53 N 40 W" until I learn how many more leagues I can swim next week.

So, what can we learn about the Atlantic Ocean from Wikipedia today?

The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's oceanic divisions; with a total area of about 106.4 million square kilometres (41.1 million square miles). It covers approximately one-fifth of the Earth's surface.

The Atlantic Ocean occupies an elongated, S-shaped basin extending longitudinally between the Americas to the west, and Eurasia and Africa to the east.

On average, the Atlantic is the saltiest of the world's major oceans. Hope I don't end up a pickled centipede if I have to tread water here to long!

The Atlantic Ocean appears to be the second youngest of all five oceans. Evidence indicates that it did not exist prior to 130 million years ago, when the continents that formed from the breakup of the ancestral super continent, Pangaea, were being rifted apart by the process of seafloor spreading.

Which means we centipedes are older then the Atlantic Ocean as we showed up 420 million years in the late Silurian period. That means us centipedes are much older than dinosaurs and we're still around as ourselves too! (No turning into birds for us!)

Quebec and Paper from Trees

Week thirteen saw 1,834 pages added to last weeks 37,480 which means the total distanced travelled is now 39,314 kilometers.

So I'm back visiting in Quebec , which means I'm still in the northern forests of the Taiga Shield but this time I'm south-west of the the Robert-Bourassa Reservoir. Once again, if you want to find exactly where I am, visit Goggle Maps and enter "53 N 78 W" to see my new location.

It's very pretty visiting here in the fall because the leaves of the sugar maple and oak trees turn red as well as the yellow and orange of the birch. How many of you have heard of birch-bark-biting? Well here's a bit of information about it from Wikipedia:

Mazinibaganjigan (plural: mazinibaganjiganan) is an ancient folk art made by the Ojibwa (Anishinaabe) by biting down on small pieces of Birch bark to form intricate designs. In some areas, it is also known as ozhibaganjigan(-an).

Using the eye teeth to bite, the bite pressures can either pierce the bark pieces into a lace or just make certain areas thinner to allow for light to pass through. If the bark piece is carefully folded, symmetrical designs can also be made onto it.

Birch bark bitings can be used in storytelling, as patterns for quillwork and beadwork, as well as finished pieces of art.

What other method is there of storytelling? On paper of course! And birch bark has a history of being used as paper in two very different places.

In India the thin bark coming off in winter was used as writing paper and is known as bhoorj patra. Bhoorj is the Sanskrit name of tree and patra means paper.

This bark also has been used widely in ancient Russia as note paper which is called beresta.

Hope you enjoyed learning about birch bark, I know I did. Have a great weekend and keep up the reading during the week!