New Library Program
Max the Reading Dog for Kids!

Wait a minute, dogs can't read! But kids love reading to Max in a relaxed comfortable environment. It's a real confidence booster for early readers to share their new skills with an appreciative and non-judgmental doggy listener.

Max, a bichon-frise, is a certified Therapy Dog owned by Joanne McDonnell (Rochester's Town Clerk). Max will be available for private reading sessions with early readers at the library on two Saturdays during October. For now we only have three slots available and are asking you to commit to attending both Saturdays. Your session will be you, your child, Max and Joanne, for 15 minutes, the library will be closed to other patrons so you will have a private, comfortable space.

Please respond to pittsfieldvtlibrary@gmail.com to sign up.

Saturdays, October 17th and 24th from 10am - 11am.

Friday night Doug and Kelley Lewis (who run Eliteam camps) ran a fun family fitness program at Pittsfield's Roger Clark Memorial Library.  Over 70 children and adults participated.  After a quick talk about Doug's Olympic experiences and setting goals the group (kids and adults together) did a series of fun warm ups including gorilla walks and but kicks.  Following that the group was broken into 4 multi age teams for an adventure race that included frozen clues, dewey decimal number look ups in the library, and traveling across a field while staying attached to all team members. 

As with last year, Doug and Kelley provided this whole program to our library for free. I'm not sure I've ever seen so many smiling faces running in and out of our library.

The fitness program was followed by a community dinner of Picarrello's Pizza and home made desserts.

Thanks you to everyone who helped with deserts, set up and clean up, but especially Susie for manning the desk, Nancy for coming early and setting up, Angelique for photos, Sharon for Pizza pick up and Picarellos for an extremely generous discount on the Pizza dinners.  And of course thank you to the Turrell fund for support of our children's programming.

Below are two slide shows.  One of photos taken by Kelley Lewis, and the other photos by library volunteers.

Doug & Kelley Lewis, who run ELITEAM fitness camps in the Mad River Valley, are coming to Pittsfield to host a fun, fitness event for people of ALL ages. Starting at 5:00, Doug & Kelley will warm up the entire group and then everyone will get a chance to work on their agility with relays and the Obstacle course. Following that, we will pick teams and the Mini Adventure race starts. From melting ice cubes to memorizing famous quotes to carrying a team member – it will be both entertaining and a challenge.

The entire event is for all abilities and ages. Just come to watch and cheer. Following the exercise will be a free Community Pizza Dinner at 6:30. This event is free and open to the public.

See more photos from last year's event HERE.

An enthusiastic crowd of 17 headed up to the Tweed River to identify fish and water creatures with our guides from the Forest Service, Dan McKinley and Mary Beth Payne. We learned how their specialized equipment works, how they count the creatures living in the streams and rivers, and how fortunate we are to have a healthy ecosystem in our backyards.

More new books for adults have been purchased and library volunteers have been working hard to get them on the shelves for your reading pleasure!

We now have the latest from Dean Koontz, Janet Evanovich, Terry McMillan, Anne Tyler and Garrison Keillor.

Also fresh to the shelves: Shanghai Girls, Pride, Prejudice and Zombies, Olive Kitteridge, and Fool.

Many more titles are waiting in the wings. If you have a spare few hours and would like to catalog new books for the library, we'd love to hear from you. Basic typing skills and patience are all that is needed.