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Virtual Author Talk: Julia Hotz
Be sure to jump start your new year with us as we chat virtually with journalist and author Julia Hotz about her book The Connection Cure: The Prescriptive Power of Movement, Nature, Art, Service, and Belonging. The Connection Cure combines diligent science reporting, moving patient success stories, and surprising self-discovery to help us discover the lasting and life-changing power of social prescribing. Traditionally, when we get sick, health care professionals ask, “What’s the matter with you?” But around the world, teams of doctors, nurses, therapists, and social workers have started to flip the script, asking “What matters to you?” Science shows that social prescribing is effective for treating symptoms of the modern world’s most common ailments—depression, ADHD, addiction, trauma, anxiety, chronic pain, dementia, diabetes, and loneliness. By integrating age-old medicines like art, nature, movement, and volunteer service into patient’s daily lives, social prescriptions are radically changing health and healthcare in more than thirty countries. Julia Hotz travels around the world to survey them —sea-swimming lessons for depression, “culture vitamins” for anxiety, a fishing club for ADHD, a farm-based day-care for dementia, a phone-buddy program for social isolation, and many more.As the first book on social prescribing, The Connection Cure empowers you to find, experience, and implement this revolutionary medicine in your own community. The success stories Julia finds bring a long-known theory to life: if we can change our environment, we can change our health. By reconnecting to what matters to us, we can all start to feel better.Registration required: https://tinyurl.com/3mntcjjp
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Social Canasta
Canasta is a card game of the rummy family, invented in Uruguay in 1939 that quickly took the world by storm and became an American craze through the 50’s, 60’s, and 70’s. If you haven’t played in several years or missed out on the craze entirely, you have another chance to learn the game and make new friends.
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Craft & Chat
Join fellow crafters to work on projects and get tips with other creative people. All crafts are welcome, including sewing, knitting, crocheting, scrapbooking, paper crafts and so on.
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Social Chess
The purpose of this program is to promote the magnificent game of chess in Ankeny by bringing players of all ages and skill levels together at the library for a relaxing and informal evening of chess. Bring your own board or use one of ours.
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Dungeons & Dragons
All adult players are welcome! Games start at 3:30pm. For help with character creation or any questions please arrive between 2:00pm and 3:30pm, walk-ins are also welcome during this time!Questions? Join our Discord at the following URL: https://discord.gg/bTuTqqFBUN
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Social Cribbage
Bring your favorite cribbage board or use one of ours. Come for the fun!
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A-English Conversation Circle
This volunteer-led program offers English language learners the opportunity to practice their conversational English in a relaxed, fun way to:--Improve your ability to use English in conversation and pronunciation.--Practice saying words used for job interviews, renting an apartment, using the phone.--Practice how to say words you need with teachers, health workers and others.--Participate in fun activities and learn about the public library.--Enjoy lively conversation in a casual environment and make new friends.--Share your culture.
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Craft & Chat
Join fellow crafters to work on projects and get tips with other creative people. All crafts are welcome, including sewing, knitting, crocheting, scrapbooking, paper crafts and so on. This program is in partnership with Central Iowa Fiber Arts (C.I.F.A.)
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Family Bingo for Books
Come play BINGO and try to win books! All ages are welcome!
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Virtual Author Talk: Liz Moore
We are thrilled to welcome Liz Moore to discuss her latest work, The God of the Woods, an instant New York Times bestseller and one of NPR’s 2024 “Books We Love” highlights.Early morning, August 1975: a camp counselor discovers an empty bunk. Its occupant, Barbara Van Laar, has gone missing. Barbara isn’t just any thirteen-year-old: she’s the daughter of the family that owns the summer camp and employs most of the region’s residents. And this isn’t the first time a Van Laar child has disappeared. Barbara’s older brother similarly vanished fourteen years ago, never to be found.As a panicked search begins, a thrilling drama unfolds. Chasing down the layered secrets of the Van Laar family and the blue-collar community working in its shadow, Moore’s multi-threaded story invites readers into a rich and gripping dynasty of secrets and second chances. It is Liz Moore’s most ambitious and wide-reaching novel yet.Registration required: https://tinyurl.com/3xnkw785
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Social Chess
The purpose of this program is to promote the magnificent game of chess in Ankeny by bringing players of all ages and skill levels together at the library for a relaxing and informal evening of chess. Bring your own board or use one of ours.
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Young Adult Book Club
Love chatting with fellow bookworms while supporting a local business? Then check out Young Adult Book Club! Open to teens and adults, this book club meets monthly at Smokey Row and reads a variety of young adult and new adult books. Copies of the current book are available at the circulation desk. This month we are reading Strike the Zither by Joan He.
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Seed Swap and Giveaway
You are invited to a Seed Swap and Giveaway! You will be welcome to take up to five packets of vegetable and flower seeds, all chosen to thrive in our Iowa environment.This event is sponsored locally by Nine Square Feet, a local non-profit dedicated to supporting backyard food production.