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THE BIXBY BULLETIN
June 2025
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After five wonderful years as your Bixby Library Director, I want to share with you that I have tendered my resignation to the Board of Trustees, which they formally accepted at Monday night’s meeting. They have asked me to stay on through the end of September to give them ample time to find a new Director and to help manage the library during the heating system replacement project that is currently underway.
It has been my honor and privilege to serve this community and get to know you since May 2020 (yes, the start of the pandemic). I have loved working alongside the most talented and caring staff team on the planet, our tremendously dedicated volunteer corps and the growing number of you who so generously support our work through financial and in-kind donations. I thank you and am in awe of all the ways that you have made the library as vibrant, welcoming, and bountiful as it has become.
I look forward to making the most of these next few months with you to leave the Bixby in the best possible position for sustained success in the future.
| | What's New at the Library? | | |
Please join us in wishing a fond farewell to Cedar Winslow, Bixby Community Engagement Manager extraordinaire. Over the past two years, we’ve appreciated her engaging communications style and substance, whether through this newsletter as Editor-in-Chief, as our social media manager (remember the video on how to use the ADA lift?), or when introducing the fabulous line-up of programming for adults and families that she curated and produced. Cedar helped craft this newly created position with excellence and infectious enthusiasm, resulting in record numbers of sign-ups, followers, and attendees.
She will be missed, but we know she is off to great adventures. We wish Cedar every success in her future endeavors. If you, or someone you know, is interested becoming the Bixby's next Outreach, Programming, and Marketing Manager, please send a cover letter and resume to catharine.hays@bixbylibrary.org.
| | Booked for Bikes: Pre-K to 8th Grade Summer Reading Challenge | | |
From June 17th through August 16th, kids ages pre-K through Grade 8 can participate in the Summer Reading program, Booked for Bikes! This year's theme, Color Our World, features fun, art-related prizes like a children's pottery wheel and sketchbook.
Pick up your tracking forms from the Bixby to log your reading minutes. After submitting these slips at the library, you will be entered into a drawing to win weekly prizes, along with the grand prize: a new bike! Every entry also earns you a colorful bead to adorn your tracking bracelet or necklace.
Booked for Bikes was launched in 1997 by Scott Gaines, and continues to be a meaningful literary tradition for our five-town community. Many thanks to the Greater Vergennes Rotary for their generous sponsorship of the program.
| | Color Your Shelves: Adult/YA Summer Reading Challenge | | |
Color Your Shelves is a creative reading challenge for adults and young adults! From June 17th through August 16th, pick up a bookshelf-bookmark in the library lobby to track your progress as you read books across six different categories. For each book you finish, color in a book spine on your bookmark and jot down the author's last name.
Bring your completed bookmark to the Circulation Desk to earn prizes! Finish a book on 3 out of 6 category shelves, win an art-kit prize like a Quill & Ink, Origami Kit, Paint by Number, Needle Felting, and more. Conquer all 6 categories to win a gift card to Vermont Cookie Love!
| | Thank You, Friends of the Bixby Library | | The Friends of the Library have once again brought goodness to the Bixby! Their donations have allowed us to keep Hoopla available for our patrons, improve signage, so folks can find their way more easily, and replace our well-worn “Open” banner. They help us care for our art collection with better storage, make our spaces more accessible with a new, ADA accessible computer desk, and add a bit of birdy fun to Bixby Hall with Audubon storage screens. All these donations help make the library even more welcoming, more useful, and more loved. We’re so grateful to the Friends of the Bixby! | | Intergenerational Chess Club | | Do you love chess? Think you might love chess? Want to learn how to improve your game? We’re gauging interest in starting a casual, all-ages chess club for players of all experience levels. If you’d like to join or learn more, send an email to Shelby. If enough people are interested, we’ll be in touch to coordinate the first meetup! | | Last Chance to View Awash in Spring | | |
This week is your last opportunity to view Awash in Spring, the Vermont Watercolor Society's benefit art exhibit. This stunning collection, capturing the tender beauty of the season—petals unfolding, landscapes stirring to life, and the soft light of longer days—will be coming down on Saturday, June 21st.
Don't miss your chance to see each painting, offering a fresh breath of spring rendered in luminous watercolor by talented local artists. You can view Awash in Spring in the Bixby Library's Community Room during open hours. Remember, a portion of the proceeds from artwork sales directly benefits the Bixby Library. If a painting captures your heart, inquire at the Circulation Desk. Congratulations and thank you to those of you who have already purchased your favorite work of art.
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June is National Great Outdoors Month, and the Bixby Library has everything you need to make the most of it.
Ready to play? Borrow from our Library of Things and take home fun, active gear like a cornhole set, croquet set, volleyball/badminton combo, pickleball kit, birdwatching kit, or even a telescope for stargazing under summer skies.
Prefer a slower pace? Stretch out lakeside or in your backyard with a great summer read—browse new titles by Emily Henry, Carl Hiaasen, Stephen King, Clare Leslie Hall, and many more. Don’t forget to stop by our Seed Library and grab free vegetable and herb seeds to start or refresh your garden.
Get outside, get inspired, and let the Bixby be your guide to summer fun!
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Amber Lay, Assistant Director/Adult Services Librarian
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Kick off your summer vacation in a fun way by signing up to Read to Elia the Therapy Dog! On June 21st at 11AM, Elia will visit us in the Children’s Room. Send me an email to sign up for a 10-minute time slot to read to our furry friend. This is a great tool to practice reading out loud, work on confidence, and spend time with a cute dog. If you are unable to secure a slot, you are invited to come hang out and silently read in the Children’s Room while Elia is there. We are so thankful for Elia and her owner Samara Anderson for coming to the Bixby to meet everyone.
This summer you can catch the Bixby at the Vergennes Farmers Market. On June 19th, we will have a booth with Pollinator Pathway. We will be discussing how you can work to help pollinators and have all sorts of pollinator books to browse. Stop by and say hi!
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Next time you visit the library, take a look at the Tiny Art Show in the lobby! A wonderful variety of over 30 tiny canvases are on display throughout June. And, if you have your tiny art ready to bring in, there is still space for you.
This month, the Bixby Book Club read and discussed The Lost Bookshop by Evie Woods. Next month’s book will discuss The Rent Collector by Camron Wright on July 8th. This year’s list has been full of such interesting reads!
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I learned to read here at the Bixby Library, at Storytimes, and with stacks of picture books, balanced high on my walk home. I learned the meaning of community here, alongside my fellow readers-in-training and encouraging guardians. When I returned to the Bixby, two years ago, I had to learn where the adult books were kept. I walked behind the circulation desk for the first time, entranced by the walls of words surrounding me like the comforting arms of an old friend.
Since then, it has been my privilege to give back to the place that inspired me to be a lifelong learner. From crafting community at Fiber Arts Circle, to inspiring folks to read outside their comfort zones with Summer Reading Challenges, it has been my great joy to bring people together within the walls of this beautiful building.
On June 27th, I bid farewell to this chapter at the Bixby Library. I am overcome by appreciation for the magnificent, intelligent, and caring staff team, our ever-generous library volunteers, and every person who dedicates their time to this five-town community that I am so lucky to call home.
Farewell, until our next story unfolds.
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My Friends delivers a tender and deeply resonant story that explores the enduring threads of friendship, art, and memory with Fredrik Backman's signature wit and compassion.
Through the eyes of Louisa, an aspiring young artist on a journey to uncover the story behind a mysterious painting, Backman gently unspools the bittersweet history of a group of teenagers who once found solace and strength in each other on a forgotten pier. With warmth, humor, and emotional depth, Backman weaves a tale that celebrates the quiet beauty of human connection and the ways in which art can carry our stories long after we’re gone. It’s a moving tribute to found families and the messy, miraculous act of finding where we belong.
Amber Lay, Assistant Director/Adult Services Librarian
| | | | Mishka by Edward van de Vendel and Anoush Elman, illustrated by Annet Schaap | |
What makes a home feel like a home? Mishka follows Roya and her family who have obtained citizenship after a long journey from Afghanistan to the Netherlands. Escaping imprisonment and more, Roya is too young to remember the events her family experienced, but still feels the effect of the journey in her soul. What makes their new house become a home is Mishka, a small white bunny who completes their family, and becomes a vessel to remember their past.
With unique sketch illustrations from Annet Schaap, you'll come to love Mishka along with the rest of the family. A sweet story on the bond of family, the struggles of immigrants, and the comfort of a pet, Mishka is both heartwarming and wistful, making any reader reflect on their first pet.
Shelby Gagne, Children & Youth Librarian
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Are you searching for a summer beach read, a literary romance, a scorching saga that will leave your pondering the nature of fate? Holiday Country is the book for you! İnci Atrek's debut novel presents a lovably flawed protagonist and her dynamic friends, the complex love of mothers and daughters, alongside delectable descriptions of Turkish food and dreamy ocean side landscapes.
Holiday Country offers a perfect bite of awkward, complex, unexpected, real emotion, in the package of a beachside read. Atrek's novel left me comforted by the messiness of the choices we make, and inspired to keep on making them.
Cedar Winslow, Community Engagement Manager
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Questions or comments on this month's newsletter?
Contact Bixby Bulletin Editor-in-Chief, Cedar Winslow.
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Library Hours:
Tuesday–Thursday: 10 AM–7 PM
Friday–Saturday: 10 AM–3 PM
(802) 877-2211
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