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National Honey Month

A couple weeks ago, I had the opportunity to visit the Minnesota State Fair for the first time in over a decade. It’s as crowded as I remember. There are plenty of distractions of food and fun, but there are also a lot of great exhibits about science, agriculture, conservation, and more. The hard work that many young people put into raising a diverse array of animals is on full display. The Agriculture Horticulture building sits on a hill overlooking the surrounding avenues and vendors on the state fairgrounds. Built like a many-spoked wheel, it has a variety of entrances and wings ...

An old fashioned app: Farm calculators

“But when are we going to use this in real life?” That question comes up in math classes, much to the chagrin of many teachers. It’s not just a classroom cliche to say that math is everywhere, from planning a budget to decorating a room. Even careers that aren’t directly connected to math require plenty of it. Take agriculture. Today, an online search can bring up farm calculator apps designed to help determine, for example, how much fertilizer a field requires, fuel efficiency of farm equipment, or predictions for product yields. Farm calculators have existed long before apps, ...

Best Nonfiction Books of 2025 (so Far)

There are many “Best Books of 2025 So Far” lists out right now, so I chose some of the top picks to share with you. Mark Twain by Ron Chernow (921 Twain) • Amazon’s Best Books of 2025 So Far Raising Hare by Chloe Dalton (599.324 Dalton) • New York Times Best of the Year (So Far) • Spotify’s Best Biography & Memoir of the Year So Far There is No Place For Us: Working and Homeless in America by Brian Goldstone (362.592 Goldsto) • New York Times Best Books of the Year (So Far) Fate of the Day: The War for America, Fort Ticonderoga to Charleston 1777-1780 by ...

Vlaminck brings new styles to vases, canvases

Maurice de Vlaminck (1876-1958), born in Paris, was one of the painters who exhibited at the 1905 Salon d’Automne, considered the beginning of the Fauvism art movement. The name “Fauvism” came from a critic’s negative reaction to the exhibition, insulting the paintings on display as the work of “wild beasts” (“fauves” in French). Fauvism was characterized by the use of highly saturated color, abstracted shapes, and loose brushwork, a marked departure from the naturalistic, representational styles that dominated the art world at the time. Although de Vlaminck’s fame ...

Penny rugs provide a historic example of repurposing

The environmentalist movement popularized the saying “Reduce, reuse, recycle” in the 1970s, but the sentiment goes back much farther than that. Historically, people avoided buying new items to save money, or simply because said new items were not as readily available to purchase as they are today. Reusing and recycling materials was done out of necessity, too, but the effect of saving resources remains the same. Rug making is one of the best examples. Throughout the 19th century, American families had many ways of transforming fabric scraps into useful rugs. The earliest were ...

Summer reading and beyond

This year’s summer reading program theme was Color Our World. I want to take a moment to thank all the parents, caregivers, children, and teens who participated this year. I would also like to thank the library staff. They did an excellent job helping to make the program happen throughout a very busy summer. We recorded 1,115 people in attendance at the 48 programs scheduled for this summer. Visitors completed 1,130 in-house scavenger hunts, and 374 crafts during the eight weeks of the program. At the end of the program, finishers received a free book, a grand prize ticket, temporary ...