I’m excited to start planning a trip to Tibilisi, Georgia this summer, and I’m wanting to learn a bit of the country’s language before I travel. To study more popular languages, such as Spanish or French, Daniel Boone Regional Library provides materials in various formats to learn, such as books, eBooks and audiobooks. For Georgian, a less common language, I’ve decided to take a look at one of DBRL’s online resources — Bluebird Languages — to get started.
Bluebird Languages offers lessons in over 160 languages (yes, 160!) with a large selection of native language settings so that people can learn in their native tongues. Continue reading “Online Resource: Bluebird Languages”
Sourdough bread is a slightly sour type of bread risen by a fermentation process of yeast, water and flour. It is a very versatile process that produces quite a range of breads and cakes. What I bring to you in this article is a mixture of bread cookbooks, and a lot of them contain recipes and instructions about how to get started baking and enjoying your own sourdough.
My current “mother.” I had baked a loaf of bread and transferred my starter to a clean jar. The liquid to the right is my kombucha carboy.
If you want to read about a baker who fell in love with a 125-year-old starter, read the introduction to “Sourdough Culture: A History of Bread Making From Ancient to Modern Bakers” by Eric Pallent. This is a well-written history following the cultivation of grains, particularly wheat. The Egyptians may have been the first bakers to use sourdough, but archeological evidence doesn’t indicate if there was an established starter or if mixed ground grain and water was allowed to ferment for a time before being kneaded and baked. As of 2021, no Egyptian or earlier bread recipe has been found.
I have always wanted to bake with a generational sourdough but have been too shy to ask my friends if anyone has one to share. So earlier in the year I started my own by mixing 2 tablespoons of flour and 2 tablespoons of un-chlorinated water and 1 teaspoon of commercial dry yeast into a pint jar, and then set it out to pick up wild yeast that might be floating around in my kitchen. Yes, I cheated. Traditionally there is no commercial dry yeast. But I keep feeding it, dividing it and making bread and maybe it has gone wild. It’s certainly doing its own thing over there in the corner of my kitchen.
Posted on Monday, March 17, 2025 by The Biblio-Buckaroo
During a recent day of gorgeous spring-like weather, I had a surge of cleaning energy unlike any I experienced during the winter season. I don’t often have such impulses, truthfully, so it was a welcome change. The warmer weather made it possible to open the windows and let in some fresh air. I was inspired to tidy up my back deck, put in a load of laundry, shake out the rugs and do some vacuuming. Once at my library job, my mind was still occupied with the project(s) on my list, so I naturally decided to do my next blog post on the topic of spring cleaning. Surely, I am not the only person in town stricken with this urge. So I headed to the book collection!
Spring cleaning books fall under different categories. There are books that are strictly about cleaning(disinfecting, stain removal, etc.), books about organizing or downsizing, books about giving your home décor a mini-makeover and books with general life hacks (like putting a lazy Susan in your refrigerator!). I have arranged a sampling for you.
As a fan of the environmental aspect and low cost of sustainable living, I was drawn to the book, “The Modern Organic Home: 100+ DIY Cleaning Products, Organization Tips, and Household Hacks,” by Natalie Wise. It has tips like doing your own dry cleaning using homemade products with a king-size pillowcase and a dryer. It also has hacks like how to remove dents from your hardwood floor and how to clean a mattress. If you like to get your home clean and not just mask odors, this is the book for you. The author does, however, frequently turn to lemons, lavender or peppermint essential oils for natural scent, among other oils. Continue reading “Early Spring Cleaning”
Last year, a roughly a third of Americans took a road trip for their vacation. Of these, I peril to imagine how few had the foresight to stop by their public libraries on the way out of town. What a loss! Adventurous souls can find scores of resources and treats for their upcoming journeys. Find out how the Daniel Boone Regional Library can improve a car trip.
Streaming Audio Books
With a library card, readers can access thousands of books through apps like Libbyand Hoopla. Personally, I love to use a road trip for an audio book marathon. When else do I have eight hours of free time? In particular, heart pounding mysteries and thrillers cures any fatigue that sets in on a long stretch of highway. I recommend “Sorrowland” by Rivers Solomon or “Magic for Liars” by Sarah Gailey for some audiobook thrills. Continue reading “Roadtripper’s Resource Roundup”
Posted on Monday, February 17, 2025 by Skyler Froese
As long as I’ve been driving, I have been locked in a struggle with my car. My beaters have stalled out, erupted coolant, leaked, squealed and haunted my nightmares. I’ll admit, the ceaseless cycle of break downs broke me down to the point I became apathetic to my car. Right now, on the precipice of replacing my ride, I found an invaluable guide for the road ahead.
Chaya Milchtein’s “Mechanic Shop Femme’s Guide to Car Ownership” helped me reset a decade of bad habits with the education and empowerment to do better. The quick read left me with more insight on my vehicle than I had generated in the past decade. Milchtein, an automotive educator, combines expertise, personal perspectives and plain language into an approachable overview of a car’s life. For those like me, ignorant and almost afraid of their car, and those who have been intentionally dispossessed from car ownership, the book offers friendly guidance. Continue reading “Staff Review: Mechanic Shop Femme’s Guide to Car Ownership by Chaya Milchtein”
While there are many social media platforms available to us, today, I would like to sing praises of Substack, a company that believes “the internet’s powers for good could be realized if they were tied to a business model that produces better incentives…” than other platforms. For me, those incentives include conversations from bestselling authors as well as gardeners, new writers and artists sharing their work, and gleeful hobbyists sharing quilts and chicken coops.
Substack allows you to bypass traditional print and media gatekeepers. Write directly to your readers and develop a relationship. In addition to a traditional newsletter you can work in audio, video or chat formats. You are also given a web presence for people who prefer reading on an app or browser window. Branding and other customization options allow you to present a consistent newsletter and web page. Subscriptions are free to your readers, with an option for you to charge a small fee for select material.
“How to Build a World Class Substack” by Russell Nohelty and Claire Venus is a great resource. Using personal experiences, Nohelty shares a step-by-step process of creating your presence on Substack. Learn about newsletter management, book launching, scheduling, interacting and more. In all fairness, this book and I didn’t click. The information is good, though, and it’s on Hoopla so you won’t have to wait to check it out. Continue reading “Substack! The Social Media App for Writers and Creatives”
The 2025 Black History Month theme is exciting and wide-sweeping! This theme “focuses on the various and profound ways that work and working of all kinds — free and unfree, skilled, and unskilled, vocational and voluntary — intersect with the collective experiences of Black people.” The theme is particularly appropriate, since 2025 celebrates the centennial anniversary of the founding of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters and Maids by labor organizer and civil rights activist A. Philip Randolph. This organization was the first Black union to receive an American Federation of Labor charter. Continue reading “Black History Month 2025: African Americans and Labor”
I’m in my Medicare Era. Dealing with signing up for the programs, researching what I need and how it affects my current group coverages. Open season. Social security. What if I get it wrong? Will I screw up the rest of my life? Then there is the inner voice that was cracking jokes at my age and my creaking knees. Dismissing that there is a future for me, repeating “too late, too late.” That’s internal ageism. I know what it is; I’m battling my inner cranky person by turning to some trusted resources, one of those being my library.
What is ageism? It is a type of discrimination based on a person’s age and usually based on stereotypes, misinformation, prejudices and lack of knowledge. It presents as elder abuse and as discrimination including in health care, the work place, language, the media and in emergency services. The term was first used in 1968 by Dr. Robert Butler, a gerontologist and the first director of the National Institute of Aging, equating ageism to racism and sexism. Although over half a century has passed, ageism remains a barrier that denies equal access to older folk, putting unfair limitations on older adults’ abilities to live to their fullest potential and devalues them as individuals.
I wrote about new sewing machines in my last post. Now I want to discuss how my social media is also active with people learning thrifting and flipping skills. Many people plan to make cautious choices about clothing purchases in 2025 and hope to move away from fast fashion to more sustainable practices.
This is completely different from the movement 10 years ago when crafters were buying all the wool sweaters, washing them in hot water to felt them and turning them into mittens and scarves. No, this is in line with patching the holes in those sweaters or recrafting a maxi dress’ generous fabrics into something else. Exploring what is still good in your closet even if you are tired of it, and updating it by rebuilding it. Maybe also melding in the coordinating piece that is also left in the closet because it’s boring, if sturdy. Continue reading “Altering Thrifted Clothing”
From my readings on social media, I’ve learned that a number of us are acquiring sewing machines in December. People are excited about the opportunities and asking advice, talking about first projects and worrying about machine settings.
There is also a bit of worry about running your thumb under the needle (ouch!). Sorry to say that none of these books will protect you from what is a very rare accident, but the books in this article absolutely will give you more information than your manual provides. For those of us who adopt used machines, the manual will possibly be long-gone. Continue reading “You and Your New Sewing Machine”
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While there are many social media platforms available to us, today, I would like to sing praises of 
