Spring into Summer

Family Saturday’s are geared towards the entire family. Our activities are meant to entertain everyone and give the adults an opportunity to work with the children! Family Saturdays consist of two sessions, one at 2 pm, and another at 3 pm. To find out more about our story times at the library check out our website.

Our Family Saturday Program for May 31^st is themed “SPRING INTO SUMMER.” This weeks sessions will be very health and earth oriented. We have lots of fun activities planned for this event. You’ll have an opportunity to win prizes by knowing the right answers for questions in out Fruits and Vegetables Trivia Game. Before you come into the Story Theater, pick up a book near the reference desk on Fruits and Vegetables and find out what the difference between them is so you’ll be ready to win!

After our fun trivia game, we will all be making a terrarium! Once our seeds begin to sprout in a few days, you can replant it and start your very own garden at home! Plants are very beneficial to our health and our environment, to find out how, check out some of our books on plants!

The Library is GREEN!

The Rancho Cucamonga Public Library offers HEALTHY programs just for you! Check out our Calendar to see all of our events.

We want the library to help you do your part in keeping your Mind, Body and the Earth Healthy. Here are just a few ways the library is participating in the citywide effort:

• By using our materials like books, magazines, CD’s, DVD’s, and computers you are reducing your carbon footprint by not having to purchase your own copies or equipment.

• We offer a comfortable atmosphere. In extreme temperature weather, instead of using your air conditioner or Heater at home, you can visit the library and help conserve energy.

• Our collection is very diverse and you can find lots of materials on nutrition, exercise, sports, health, wellness, psychology, reducing stress, how to be green, travel, beauty, parenting, gardening, and cooking.

• There are library transfers made twice a day between the Archibald and the Paul A. Biane Library. These transfers reduce all of our carbon footprints by allowing patrons to transfer materials from one library to the other instead of having to drive there. Patrons may also turn in their materials at either library.

• Patrons can send us an e-mail or give us a call if they have a question instead of having to drive to the library.

• Our library catalog and online databases are accessible from anywhere with an internet connection!
• Our study rooms and copy center have motion sensors for the lights to help conserve energy when they are not in use.

• Our Story Times often include topics that will provide information on health, safety, wellness, and the environment. Here are just a few themes our story times have had: Gardens, Water Safety, America the Beautiful, Caring for our Pets, Sports, Animals, and Veggie Tales.

• Our Adult and Teen Programs have included: Caring for Your Skin, Feng Shui, Dance Dance Revolution, Guitar Hero, and Online Job Searching. These programs are all great ways to take some time out for yourself, learn something new, and make new friends!

We’d love to hear what you are doing to be green, so add a comment to this blog and let us know!!!

Green Computer Tips

There are many ways you can help conserve electricity, some are drastic changes, and others simply take just a few steps. If you use a computer, there are many things you can do to save yourself a few extra dollars on your electric bill and help the earth at the same time. Here are just a few ideas out of the many things you can do

Shut down your computer when not in use!

If you prefer not to shut down your computer, another option is to put it on sleep or hibernate mode. This will save energy. Your computers operating system should have an option to change the power settings. Changing the power settings can include putting the monitor to sleep, spinning down your hard drives or putting your computer to sleep automatically when not in use. If you have the option between hibernating and sleeping, set your computer up for hibernating since it conserves more energy. For anyone who is downloading a file or needs to access their computer remotely, you can set your computer to shut down, sleep or hibernate after a set amount of time or at a certain hour.

If you’re like most people, you have to use an outlet strip to plug in the many accessories that go with the computer. It is a given that your monitor and printer should be shut down when not in use, but even then they often use energy by being in stand by mode. If possible turn the power outlet off when you’re not using your computer.

Curious about how much energy your computer uses? Here are the average watts per hour your computers and monitors use (please note that the amounts will vary from computer to computer):

Desktop computers……………........60-250 Watts

Computer on screen saver…………60-250 Watts

Sleep/Standby………………………....6 watts

Laptop………………………………........15-45 watts

17” CRT Monitor…………………….....80 Watts

17” LCD………………………………........35 Watts

Sleeping Monitor (dark screen)……0-15 watts

Monitor Turned off at Switch………0-10 Watts

If you’d like to now how much it costs to run your computer use this formula:

Watts x Hours Used
________________ x cost per kilowatt-hour= Total Cost

1000

On average, each kilowatt costs about 12¢ to 15¢ per hour.

Healthy Cities

If you read Rancho Cucamonga’s quarterly recreation guide, The Grapevine, then you have probably heard of the Healthy Cities program. For those of you who haven’t heard of the Healthy Cities program, it is something fairly new that the city is taking on to improve the overall well being of everyone in the community. The program is still in the works and will soon have a two-year action plan. For now, the city is including three major components to the program: “Mind, Body and Earth.” The three components go hand in hand. If the mind is under stress, and anxiety it affects the way our body feels in a negative way. The image we have of our body will also affect the way we think and feel about ourselves. With that in mind, we should all make the commitment to take care of our mind and body so we can be happier and more energized. The “earth” aspect to the Healthy Cities program is that we want to try to live in a more sustainable community and be as “green” as we can be. People are realizing that health is not just about medical care anymore; in order to be healthy we need to live in a nurturing environment. We hope that you will join us in this new and exciting lifestyle for a healthier future.