Do you check crochet books out of your local library?

[The_Virginia_Hooker]

For years I helped subsidize the local libraries with overdue fees! One year, I lost the crochet book I had borrowed and had to pay for it. It was old enough they took pity and only charged me $5 for it. Several years later I found it! By then I was living in another state, so it became part of my pattern stash.

 

I still enjoy checking our crochet books for the beauty of reading patterns. But these days, I get renewal notices by email and can renew on the web. My overdue fees have dropped to nothing, so now I help subsidize the libraries by donating old paperbacks for them to re-sell.

 

More seriously, find out how your library makes the decision to acquire new books. Frequently a component is people asking for the book. Participate in the process (I'm now on a committee) to help increase the number of crochet books your library purchases.

 

 

 

I used to do this all the time, i'd make a "plea" for a book

[happy stitcher]

Actually, my old library didn't have but one or two, and they were OLD. Not good old, either!

 

But we've moved and I haven't made it over to the new one yet.

 

Thanks for the reminder!

[knit knackack]

I love our public library. My boys and I both are big users! We all go to our own sections and pull and browse all sorts of books. I have checked out and ordered dozens of crochet and knit books. My boys get book, cd's, and DVD's. My neighbors are always surprised that my boys ask to go to the library for a treat. What could be better?

[boksie]

A few years ago I checked with our library system and all the crochet books were stolen! I'm bad about returning books on time (shame on me) so what I do for my reading pleasure is buy used books at goodwill and then donate them to the library when I'm finished. You may be able to use this as a donation write off when it comes tax time.

[kookykatlady]

i will check out crochet books from time to time, and have checked out scrapbooking and crochet dvds

[beth_in_indy]

Yarnluver, they seemed to think that the library would have no books on this subject. I don't know if they had had no luck with their own library or if they were simply assuming that they would have no luck. Before reading all the great responses on this post, I was thinking maybe the Indianapolis Public Library was a solitary bright spot in the crochet universe!

 

I'm glad you posed the question to all of us :-)

 

Beth

[Knit Happens]

Our library is cooperative in my county and we can borrow from any library in our county. Its a great service. Like yarnluver wrote, she can borrow from other libraries as well. What a fabulous FREE resource.

[Yarnluver]

Some libraries probably don't update their supply of books because of low demand. A lot of people don't bother telling their librarians what they'd like to see there thinking they have no say in it (I used to be one of them...) so now I think we have to be pretty vocal about what we do want.

 

I've also been a 'great' contributor to my library via late fees thanks to my forgetfulness. At one point I used to go to the city library practically every week and a couple of employees would reduce or forgive some of the fines because they already knew me. I have resented looking for something there and finding out somebody stole it but maybe most missing books have been unintentionally lost like it happened to MaryPat. Many years ago I too was moving and forgot to return some books so at the last minute I gave them to my ex-b/f, who was then my friend, so he'd drop them off for me. A couple of months later I received a forwarded notice from the library about the missing books, the bonehead forgot to return the books! I ended up moving back after just 3 months and got the books from him and returned them but was too broke to pay the fines; instead I worked out an agreement with them to help out on a couple of Saturdays in exchange to have my privileges reinstated (and I must say I enjoyed doing that!).

 

As for right now, I'm really happy with what I brought home last Thur. Other than shawls and a pair of slippers I've never made any wearables and there's a cute and easy "cropped cardigan" in the DVD "Crochet Fashions in Motion" (click on it if you want to see it, the picture's on the cover) that I want to make. The hostess shows how to make it step-by-step so no struggling to decipher the instructions for me! I thought of one of my nieces for this and I have some of the Patons Glittalic from my stash in mind for this.

 

And let me tell you something funny about how jealous even grown children can be: when I excitedly showed the picture to my daughter and said I'd be making it for her cousin she immediately piped up "I want one!!", so she'll be next - well, tonight she said she wanted "one in every color", yeah... right! What tickles me is that a few months ago she didn't think crochet was cool but the other night she came home telling me a male friend thought the hat she wore (1 of 4 I've made her) was "so cool".

[mc1mommy]

I do. I certainly don't need any more books or magazines, but the compulsion is there to look. You never know when you're going to come across a gem of a pattern. Or a variation of a stitch...or an interesting color combo...