Participants in the recent public library needle felting workshop display their birds. Jenne Sudia, library program coordinator, is at left.
Programming at the Bloomfield Public Library has changed in the last several months with the addition of reference librarian Jenne Sudia, who now works with long-time program coordinator and reference librarian Lisa Cohn. In the past, Cohn has been responsible for booking the monthly musical acts and, with Sudia, will continue to do so.
Sudia started working part-time at BPL in November and became a full-time reference librarian in May. She worked previously at the Wood-Ridge Memorial Library and the Edison Public Library.
“Lisa did the concert series, which we’ll still be doing,” Sudia said at the library. “But we’re trying to add diverse programming, because of the diversity of Bloomfield.”
In September, the library has scheduled someone who will speak about how a person should convey difficult personal problems with a loved one.
“It’s about how to disagree better when talking with loved ones,” Sudia said. “It’s led by a mediator coach.”
That’s not all.
“We did ‘Mocktails and Masterpiece’ recently,” she said. “It was a painting program. I made three non-alcoholic drinks and people got to sample them. It was a sip-and-paint party, open to anyone. It was a blast.”
She also programmed a pride social.
“It was a meet-and-greet for LGBTQ individuals,” she said. “We partnered with Bloomfield Pride.”
Bloomfield Pride is an LGBTQ social program.
There was also a summer reading kick-off party Wednesday, June 26.
“This year, we included young adults and adults,” she said. “We had ice cream and a band for the kick-off party. The Children’s Library had a magician come out. It was a three-hour party.”
For Hispanic Heritage Month, Sept. 15 to Oct. 15, Sudia and Cohn have booked a mariachi band. It will perform on Saturday, Sept. 21. Complete scheduling can be obtained on the BPL website.
On Saturday, Aug. 3, the library offered a needle felting workshop. Twelve participants arrived to make a felt bird.
They were first given a fist-full of undyed sheep’s wool bunched into an ovoid shape for the bird’s body. But what was surprising was the actual practice of felting. It is done with an instrument called a felting needle.
The needle is pushed partially through the wooley mass and pulled out. The needle has tiny barbs which catch the wool strands and entangle them as the needle is pushed in and pulled out. After repeated needling, the result of the entanglements, the meshing of the strands, is a firm ovoid body, decorations and alterations are achieved in the same manner by “mending together,” as it were, different swatches of wool. When the wooley forms become felted as they firm up. The work is labor intensive.
Everyone managed to produce a little bird suitable for hanging or gift-giving, but it took 90 minutes.
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