So, since we’ve all lost one hour today, I thought I’d share one of my favorite time-saving tips: the library HOLDS page. Did you know that you can place any book in your county library’s system on hold? Some counties even have agreements with neighboring library systems that allow them to borrow books from each other.
Here’s how it works. First, visit your home library system’s webpage. Login using your library card and pin number, then search the library catalogue. When you find what you’re looking for, you can place it on hold. Your library will notify you by phone or email (depending on how you set up your preferences) when the book is ready for you to pick up at the location that you have selected. You walk up to the counter, hand over your card, and the librarian hands you your stack of reserved books. It’s the perfect time saver!
I use our library holds system all the time. I browse through the “amazon recommends” section of amazon.com and then head over to my library holds page to select the titles that most interest me. It’s great for kid’s books too! When the Scholastic Book Fair order forms come home from school, Kiddo usually circles 70% of the books in the flyer. We use the library’s holds page to check out the titles we don’t purchase.
Lastly- but not least- most library websites offer you the opportunity to renew checked-out items online. Over the years, this feature has saved our family hundreds of dollars. Our family likes to check out DVDs from our library which unfortunately have only a 7-day loan period. I don’t know about you, but for our family it can be tough to get to the library every 7 days.
Okay – that’s it for now. I’m already an hour behind schedule…
Ok, first you inspired me to take Kate to the library for the first time in way too long, and now you've got me placing books on hold for our next trip! Not only that, but I just downloaded the Multnomah County Library app for my phone. I am a little embarrassed to admit how excited I am to be able to monitor my current holdings and list of hold requests right from my phone. This could become addictive...
ReplyDeleteJen- Way to take it to the next level, my friend! I haven't downloaded the app yet... but you've inspired me to do it now! Thanks for your enthusiasm for the blog!
DeleteSomething that our library has here in the kids section is lists of books by topic. Such as princesses, pirates, fairies, etc. It is very helpful when you are there and you want to search for certain categories. There is one problem though... they don't screen the books before they put them on the list. I think they just do a key word search and so you get some random books that don't exactly match what your in for. For example there is a book called "Birthday Princess" on the princess list, but it's really about a girl who gets in to trouble on her birthday trying to look like a princess. So it can be helpful, but you still need a little work. It does save me some time though!
ReplyDeleteHow cool is that!!!! A princess section in our library would make my life so much simpler! I think it's funny that they aren't more selective about their shelving though...
ReplyDelete- Ellie