Sunday, June 19, 2011

Party Hats, Glowing Endorsements, and Boxes and Boxes of Books!

A special thank you to Mike Nichols of Nichols Photography for capturing this shot of Truman taking a break from working on one of the many Melissa & Doug puzzles we offer at Afterwords Books and to Victoria Nichols for her glowing endorsement of our store!  We are all blushing, even Truman.

This last week seemed to just fly by as we continue to busy ourselves with updating our inventory with the boxes, bags, and tubs of books that our customers steadily bring to us and unpacking the new (and sought after) titles that arrive via Federal Express.  We received some favorite book club titles including A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick, Bridge of Sighs by Richard Russo, and Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese.

Kaleigh just finished reading Jodi Picoult's Sing You Home, which she loved and has passed on to Gabby.  I loved The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho and am a third of the way through The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender.  Jordan says book two of the Series of Unfortunate Events, The Reptile Room, by Lemony Snicket is one of the best books she's ever read.  What are you reading?  Customers are always coming in and asking for recommendations, so don't be shy, please share your favorite reads!  Feel free to leave a comment here on our blog or message us on Facebook.

I was thrilled to read one of my all time favorite books during Saturday's storytime, Go, Dog.  Go! by P.D. Eastman.  We were all inspired to design our own party hats that no dog could resist!  A special thanks to all the parents who braved the sea of craft supplies-colorful pompoms, pipe cleaners, glue sticks, a rainbow of feathers, felt letters, and a fun assortment of stickers- and assisted with the creation and clean up of the fancy chapeaus.  We also read Muddy Paws and the Birthday Party by Deborah Chancellor, about an absolutely adorable puppy discovering the joys of a party for his best friend and Mo Willems' I Am Invited to a Party! where Piggie is schooled by Elephant on all things party related.

The coming week promises freshly baked treats on Tuesday and Thursday, a replenished sidewalk cart full of .25 paperbacks and .50 hardcovers, more titles marked down to 90% off the original list price, and, as always, more free books as we continue to weed out our overstock.  Come on in and say hello and be sure to visit us on Facebook for updates!

Sunday, June 12, 2011

Perfectly Polite & Pirate Puppets

This past Friday, UPS delivered many many boxes to Afterwords courtesy of Melissa & Doug.  It was just like Christmas as we tore open the packaging to reveal our new arrivals, super-fun and awesome hand puppets!  Just in time for Saturday's storytime, all the wee ones had a blast putting on their own mini puppet shows, and, yes, miss lulu might have also tried out Rory the Lion puppet and Smoulder the Dragon.

Storytime was a hit once again as miss lulu donned her goofy cowgirl hat and read Dusty Locks and The Three Bears by Susan Lowell, Interrupting Chicken by David Ezra Stein, and The Three Little Horrid Little Pigs by Liz Pichon. The guests giggled at Dusty Lock's bad manners and the funny way-out-west accent assumed by miss lulu, seemed to identify with Little Red Chicken as she tried really, really hard to be less involved while Papa read her a bedtime story, and were surprised to find a friendly, and really quite lovely, wolf who taught three rude little pigs how to be kind and considerate.

Once again, our customers brought in some awesome titles to stock our shelves.  Authors like Chuck Palahniuk, Barbara Kingsolver, James Patterson, Jodi Picoult, and C.S. Lewis. By request, we also stocked up on some new titles as well, Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen, Committed: A Love Story by Elizabeth Gilbert, The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender, The Fates Will Find Their Way by Hannah Pittard, the Fablehaven series (books 1-5) by Brandon Mull, and some favorites from children's authors Sandra Boynton, David Shannon and Babette Cole.

Looks like we can expect a week of gorgeous weather!  If you're out and about downtown, please stop in and peruse our shelves.  As we sort through inventory, we will continue to offer hundreds of free titles, we have over 100 titles marked at 90% off the original list price, and even marked some of our Melissa & Doug merchandise at half off to make room for the new arrivals.  Oh, and be sure to check our Facebook page for more deals, Saturday's storytime line-up,  and surprises in the week ahead.

Sunday, June 5, 2011

Many Thanks!

    Truman's favorite new addition-his super comfy red leather chair.

Thanks so much for all the oohs and ahhs surrounding our renovation and the warm welcome we received upon our hiatus.  Our first week back was great!!

 Highlights include welcoming our loyal customers back home and meeting some new friends as well.  Saturday's story time proved to be a huge success complete with an acoustic (and probably way too long) version of Old MacDonald and adorable farm animal hand puppets.  We read Old MacDonald Had a Farm (kids loved as they were able to play a game of peek-a-boo and guess which animal would be revealed on each page), Funny Farm by Mark Teague (wonderful illustrations!), Fifteen Animals! by Sandra Boynton (super fun to read and who knew that Bob was such a popular name for pets?), and Duck on a Bike by David Shannon, (the clear favorite with great illustrations and a laugh-out-loud surprise ending).

A special thanks goes out to our customers that brought in LOTS of books this past week, many of which are wonderful and promptly made their way to our shelves and are awaiting good homes while the remaining, (copies we are currently overstocked or are well-loved) were graciously donated which means we have tons of free books!  Though we want to continue to encourage everyone to bring us books (we LOVE books!!), we are running out of room to store the free books we give away each week and so we are unable to accept text books, romance, self-help, parenting, and health at this time.  As always, an appointment is not necessary  to bring in books for consideration but we do ask that you stop by any time after 1:00 to assure we can give you prompt attention.