Events for Kids & Families
Snowball Adventures: Winter Reading Challenge
For children ages birth-5 years old and in grades K-5.
For Grades 1-5. Visit us after school to create a special craft for someone you love! No registration required.
Disclaimer(s)
Behavior Clause for School-Age Programs
By attending this program, participants agree to conduct themselves in a respectful and appropriate manner. Disruptive, inappropriate, or unsafe behavior toward staff, presenters, or fellow attendees will not be tolerated and may result in removal from the program and/or restriction from future library events. Parents or guardians are responsible for the behavior of their children during all youth and family programs. The library reserves the right to take appropriate action as needed to ensure a welcoming and safe environment for all.
Little Thinkers Lab
For ages 3-5. In this playful storytime series, kids will enjoy a picture book read-aloud followed by a hands-on STEAM activity.
Little Thinkers Lab
For ages 3-5. In this playful storytime series, kids will enjoy a picture book read-aloud followed by a hands-on STEAM activity.
For ages 3-10. Show your love for someone this Valentines Day with this cute craft. No registration required.
Disclaimer(s)
Behavior Clause for School-Age Programs
By attending this program, participants agree to conduct themselves in a respectful and appropriate manner. Disruptive, inappropriate, or unsafe behavior toward staff, presenters, or fellow attendees will not be tolerated and may result in removal from the program and/or restriction from future library events. Parents or guardians are responsible for the behavior of their children during all youth and family programs. The library reserves the right to take appropriate action as needed to ensure a welcoming and safe environment for all.
Sweet Stories, No Candy Required
-
The Little Puppy
From beloved author-illustrator Nicola Killen comes an adorable story about Valentine’s Day and puppy love, tenderly told and illustrated in limited color with lovely red foil and interactive die cut pages.
When Grandma comes for a special Valentine’s visit with her puppy, Milo, Ollie spends a special day playing with her new friend. -
How to Catch a Loveosaurus
From the New York Times and USA Today bestselling How to Catch series comes an exciting picture book about a rare new creature!
Can you catch the magical Loveosaurus? The Catch Club Kids are on the chase again, this time to trap a dinosaur that escaped from the museum and wants to spread love and kindness. Blending exciting traps and STEAM concepts with hilarity and chaos to encourage reading, learning, and imagination, this charming adventure will delight young readers, families, and educators alike-and maybe inspire spreading some kindness too! This funny children's picture book makes the perfect bedtime read-aloud and Valentine's Day gift for kids ages 4-10!
Have you heard of the Loveosaurus? The first ever found-it's true!
He's on the run spreading kindness and joy, but who will trap him... YOU?
Also in the How to Catch Series-
How to Catch a Dinosaur
How to Catch a Unicorn
How to Catch a Class Pet
How to Catch a Gingerbread Man
How to Catch a Mermaid
and more! -
Be My Valenslime
A hilarious and heartwarming picture book about a sweet little monster who really wants to celebrate a not-so-monstery holiday: Valentine’s Day.
“There are powerful messages about the nature of love on almost every page.”—School Library Journal (starred review)
Snoodle is an unusual monster. She loves candy hearts, fun parties, fuzzy kittens, fancy hats, sparkly stickers, and . . . valentines! There's just one problem: Monsters don’t do Valentine’s Day!
And when Snoodle tries to throw a Valentine’s Day party for her monster friends, nothing goes right. Every attempt to show them what love looks like turns into monster mayhem! With each disaster, Snoodle tries to be patient and kind, and to not be rude or get easily angered. But if the party isn’t perfect, how can Snoodle convince the other monsters to be her Valenslime?
Debut author Kris Tarantino and New York Times bestselling illustrator Cori Doerrfeld bring to life a wonderful cast in this laugh-out-loud exploration of the true meaning of love. -
The Goodnight Train Valentine
An ideal valentine for train enthusiasts, bedtime resisters, and Goodnight Train fans! A companion to The Goodnight Train Halloween and The Goodnight Train Easter, this sturdy board book has heart-shaped peekaboo die-cuts on every page.
X O! X O! Choo! Choo!
Love is in the air! Cozy up with someone special and take a Valentine's Eve ride on the Goodnight Train in this sturdy board book with heart-shaped peekaboo die-cuts on every page. Little ones who love cars, trucks, and things that go will love all of the Goodnight Train books!
For more bedtime fun with the Goodnight Train look for the companion books:
The Goodnight Train
The Goodnight Train Rolls On!
Santa and the Goodnight Train
The Goodnight Train Halloween
The Goodnight Train Easter
The Goodnight Train Ready for School
-
Bigfoot's Big Heart
A Kids' Indie Next List pick!
When Bigfoot loses the valentines he meant to send to his fellow monsters in hiding, scouts from all over the world come together to deliver the letters.
It's lonely being a monster. But having other mythical pen pals helps. When Bigfoot loses the Valentine's Day cards he so tenderly made for his friends around the world, a troop of scouts offers to help. But they will have to get creative to find every mythical creature in time! Sarah Glenn Marsh and Ishaa Lobo team up again for a sweet Valentine's Day tale about the value of friends, both new and old. -
World of Reading: Super Kitties: Vanishing Valentines
When Valentine's Day cards and treats go missing throughout Kittydale, the SuperKitties must track down the thief to save the holiday. This pawsome foursome of adorable kitties transform into fierce, furry super heroes anytime justice needs to be served. Based on the hit Disney Junior series SuperKitties, this early reader is perfect for fans aged 4 to 6.
This Level 1 reader is Lexile leveled to align the reader and text at an appropriate level of reading difficulty. The use of simple text and word repetitions helps lead emergent readers to reading success.
Annie Auerbach is a New York Times bestselling author. She has written over 300 books for children, from board books to chapter books, and everything in between. Annie lives outside of Portland, Oregon with her husband and son.
Add to your World of Reading collection!
· World of Reading: Meet the Firebuds
· World of Reading: Mickey Friendship Tales
· World of Reading: Meet Alice
· World of Reading: Spidey and His Amazing Friends: Super Hero Hiccups!
· And More!
-
My Sweet Valentine (Disney Princess)
Babies and toddlers will love this adorable Valentine’s Day themed board book starring the Disney princesses!
There is so much to love about the Disney princesses! Celebrate the wonderful qualities of the Disney princesses with your little ones in this sweet book, which encourages them to share love and joy with those around them! Just the right size for little hands and featuring beautiful illustration throughout, this book is perfect for Valentine’s Day, or any day!
Disney Princess celebrates the most magical adventures, each woven around a relatable, empowered heroine who inspires kids to realize their full potential. -
A Stickler Valentine
Stickler, the woodland creature from the mind of award-winning author-illustrator Lane Smith, returns to celebrate Valentine’s Day by giving his friends his favorite gift: sticks. A humorous and witty friendship story that encourages kindness and empathy.
Stickler, a one-of-a-kind creature made of sticks, is giving his friends Valentine’s Day sticks, but none of them are interested in Valentine’s sticks. Crow says he prefers fine, shiny things, Beaver likes receiving funny cards, and Wolf doesn’t care for Valentine’s sticks – they’re too small to chew on! When Stickler tries to offer Cat a Valentine stick, she does not want one. “Hmm…” he wonders, “Maybe Valentine’s Day is not about what Stickler loves, but what others love.”
Stickler has an idea: he will give Cat a gift he knows she wants.
Lane Smith, the award-winning illustrator of Giraffe Problems and The Stinky Cheese Man, presents a story about showing friendship and being thoughtful with humor and wit. Featuring the return of the irresistible Stickler (first seen in A Gift for Nana), this lighthearted picture book celebrates the ways we show kindness and love in gestures big or small. -
Love ABC
Express your love with this colorful, stylish, and sturdy ABC board book for babies and toddlers. A is for adore, B is for balloon (heart-shaped, of course), and C is for cupcake! This sturdy board book introduces Valentine's Day through simple words to get children excited about celebrating love with friends and family. This is the perfect book to teach letter recognition and introduce first letter sounds in speech.
-
Groundhug Day
★ "February holidays collide in this warm and funny story... A showstopper." --Publishers Weekly, starred review
"A great choice for storytime." --School Library Journal
This heartwarming picture book combines two much-loved holidays--Groundhog's Day and Valentine's Day--and shares a message about the importance of friendship and community.
Moose is having a Valentine's Day party, and all his friends are excited! Everyone except Groundhog, that is. If Groundhog sees his shadow outside, he'll hide in his hole for six more weeks and miss the party! Determined to have their friend join them, Moose, Squirrel, Bunny, and Porcupine put their heads together and come up with a clever plan.
With cozy illustrations by Caldecott Honor award-winning creator Christopher Denise, this season-inspired picture book is perfect for readers who are bursting for spring or snuggling up for six more weeks of winter.
"Magical." --Kirkus Reviews -
Cupig
A New York Times bestseller!
A comically mismatched Valentine's Day picture book with a clever and hilarious take on Cupid. Introducing Cupig the Valentine's Day pig!
Cupig absolutely loves Valentine's Day. Every year she enjoys spreading love and cheer to every creature, far and near. But when a storm blows through and sends her arrows off course, Cupig accidentally puts arrows in hearts that don't need to be mended. Peanut Butter has stopped loving Jelly! Salt and Pepper have broken up! Needle and Thread are falling apart at the seams!
Will Cupig ever fix her mistakes and get these classic pairs back together again?
With clever rhyming text and comically expressive art, Cupig is sure to be a Valentine's Day classic for years to come! The perfect Valentine's Day gift and for fans of Little Blue Truck's Valentine, How to Catch a Loveosaurus, and Love from the Crayons!
"Sure to steal readers’ hearts."--Kirkus reviews
"Sure to be a hit with the picture book crowd."-The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books
"Move over, Cupid—a pink piggy competitor takes a shot at creating love matches in this mixed-up Valentine’s Day outing." --Publishers Weekly -
Hap-Pea Valentine's Day
Keith Baker’s New York Times bestselling peas get a Valentine’s Day spin in this picture book filled with lots of loving and giving moments for the peas to share!
It’s Valentine’s Day, and there are lots of hap-pea hearts for the peas to give away. From frilly hearts and silly hearts to growing hearts and glowing hearts, there’s plenty of love to go around. Will you join the peas in giving away some valentines? Any kind will do… Every hap-pea heart says, “I Love You!” -
Happy Valentine's Day, Curious George!
George and his friends celebrate Valentine's Day with decorating, baking, card making, and some unexpected hilarity along the way!
Just how much mischief can a curious little monkey get into when balloons, frosting, and glitter are involved Fun flaps to lift in each scene reveal lively surprises in this humorous celebration of friendship. Curious readers will love the tactile interactive elements of this holiday storybook.
Happy Valentine's Day, Curious George! is the perfect Valentine's Day gift to share with both old and new fans of the famous little mischievous monkey. Now available with a redesigned cover.
-
We Love Valentine's Day (PAW Patrol)
Share the love with Rubble, Skye, Rocky, and the rest of the pups from Nickelodeon's PAW Patrol in this Valentine’s Day storybook featuring over 50 stickers!
It's time for Adventure Bay's big Valentine's Day celebration and the PAW Patrol is ready. That is, until a parade float goes missing! Can the heroic pups solve the mystery and save the day? Children ages 3 to 7 will love this hardcover storybook that includes over 50 stickers.
It’s time for a ruff ruff rescue with Nickelodeon’s PAW Patrol! Chase, Marshall, Rubble, Skye, Rocky, and Zuma are always ready to save their friends and protect the community of Adventure Bay. With their PAWsome vehicles, tools, and teamwork, no job is too big, no pup is too small! -
My Little Pony: a Magical Valentine's Day
An all-new adventure with your favorite ponies from Tell Your Tale! This adorable early reader is perfect for sharing with the pony fan in your life.
It's Valentine's Day in Equestria and every pony is celebrating! Take a tour of the Mane 5's world and discover how every pony shows their love for one another.
My Little Pony: Tell Your Tale is an animated series of shorts that follow the pony besties as they embark on wild adventures across Maretime Bay! The fast-paced episodes offer hilarious stories that will have everypony in stitches. Be sure to catch My Little Pony: Tell Your Tale now available on YouTube and Netflix!
This book is a level 1 I Can Read, which means it's perfect for children learning to sound out words and sentences.
Celebrating Black History Through Stories
-
Mae Among the Stars
Mae wanted to be an astronaut. She dreamed of dancing in space. She imagined herself surrounded by billions of stars, floating, gliding, and discovering. Her parents encouraged her, saying, "If you believe it, and work hard for it, anything is possible."This encouragement, along with Mae's own curiosity, intelligence, and determination, paved the way for her to become the first African American woman to travel in space.
-
The ABCs of Black History
A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
B is for Beautiful, Brave, and Bright! And for a Book that takes a Bold journey through the alphabet of Black history and culture.
Letter by letter, The ABCs of Black History celebrates a story that spans continents and centuries, triumph and heartbreak, creativity and joy.
It’s a story of big ideas––P is for Power, S is for Science and Soul. Of significant moments––G is for Great Migration. Of iconic figures––H is for Zora Neale Hurston, X is for Malcom X. It’s an ABC book like no other, and a story of hope and love.
In addition to rhyming text, the book includes back matter with information on the events, places, and people mentioned in the poem, from Mae Jemison to W. E. B. Du Bois, Fannie Lou Hamer to Sam Cooke, and the Little Rock Nine to DJ Kool Herc.
-
A Big Day for Baseball
Meet Jackie Robinson and solve a mystery in the #1 bestselling Magic Tree House chapter book series!
PLAY BALL! Jack and Annie aren’t great baseball players . . . yet! Then Morgan the librarian gives them magical baseball caps that will make them experts. They just need to wear the caps to a special ballgame in Brooklyn, New York. The magic tree house whisks them back to 1947!
When they arrive, Jack and Annie find out that they will be batboys in the game—not ballplayers. What exactly does Morgan want them to learn? And what’s so special about this game? They only have nine innings to find out!
Discover history, mystery, humor, and baseball in this one-of-a-kind adventure in Mary Pope Osborne’s New York Times bestselling Magic Tree House series lauded by parents and teachers as books that encourage reading.
Magic Tree House books, with fiction and nonfiction titles, are perfect for parents and teachers using the Core Curriculum. With a blend of magic, adventure, history, science, danger, and cuteness, the topics range from kid pleasers (pirates, the Titanic, pandas) to curriculum perfect (rain forest, American Revolution, Abraham Lincoln) to seasonal shoo-ins (Halloween, Christmas, Thanksgiving). There is truly something for everyone here! -
Before the Ever After
WINNER OF THE NAACP IMAGE AWARD
WINNER OF THE CORETTA SCOTT KING AUTHOR AWARD
National Book Award winner Jacqueline Woodson's stirring novel-in-verse explores how a family moves forward when their glory days have passed and the cost of professional sports on Black bodies.
For as long as ZJ can remember, his dad has been everyone's hero. As a charming, talented pro football star, he's as beloved to the neighborhood kids he plays with as he is to his millions of adoring sports fans. But lately life at ZJ's house is anything but charming. His dad is having trouble remembering things and seems to be angry all the time. ZJ's mom explains it's because of all the head injuries his dad sustained during his career. ZJ can understand that--but it doesn't make the sting any less real when his own father forgets his name. As ZJ contemplates his new reality, he has to figure out how to hold on tight to family traditions and recollections of the glory days, all the while wondering what their past amounts to if his father can't remember it. And most importantly, can those happy feelings ever be reclaimed when they are all so busy aching for the past? -
As Brave As You
Kirkus Award Finalist
Schneider Family Book Award Winner
Coretta Scott King Author Honor Book
In this “pitch-perfect contemporary novel” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review), Coretta Scott King – John Steptoe Award-winning author Jason Reynolds explores multigenerational ideas about family love and bravery in the story of two brothers, their blind grandfather, and a dangerous rite of passage.
Genie’s summer is full of surprises. The first is that he and his big brother, Ernie, are leaving Brooklyn for the very first time to spend the summer with their grandparents all the way in Virginia—in the COUNTRY! The second surprise comes when Genie figures out that their grandfather is blind. Thunderstruck, Genie peppers Grandpop with questions about how he hides it so well (besides wearing way cool Ray-Bans).
How does he match his clothes? Know where to walk? Cook with a gas stove? Pour a glass of sweet tea without spilling it? Genie thinks Grandpop must be the bravest guy he’s ever known, but he starts to notice that his grandfather never leaves the house—as in NEVER. And when he finds the secret room that Grandpop is always disappearing into—a room so full of songbirds and plants that it’s almost as if it’s been pulled inside-out—he begins to wonder if his grandfather is really so brave after all.
Then Ernie lets him down in the bravery department. It’s his fourteenth birthday, and, Grandpop says to become a man, you have to learn how to shoot a gun. Genie thinks that is AWESOME until he realizes Ernie has no interest in learning how to shoot. None. Nada. Dumbfounded by Ernie’s reluctance, Genie is left to wonder—is bravery and becoming a man only about proving something, or is it just as important to own up to what you won’t do? -
Almost to Freedom
A rag doll narrates a family's Underground Railroad journey.
-
All Are Welcome (An All Are Welcome Book)
Join the call for a better world with this New York Times bestselling picture book about a school where diversity and inclusion are celebrated. The perfect back-to-school read for every kid, family and classroom!
In our classroom safe and sound.
Fears are lost and hope is found.
Discover a school where all young children have a place, have a space, and are loved and appreciated.
Readers will follow a group of children through a day in their school, where everyone is welcomed with open arms. A school where students from all backgrounds learn from and celebrate each other's traditions. A school that shows the world as we will make it to be.
“An important book that celebrates diversity and inclusion in a beautiful, age-appropriate way.” – Trudy Ludwig, author of The Invisible Boy -
I Have a Dream
A Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor Book
From Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s daughter, Dr. Bernice A. King: “My father's dream continues to live on from generation to generation, and this beautiful and powerful illustrated edition of his world-changing "I Have a Dream" speech brings his inspiring message of freedom, equality, and peace to the youngest among us—those who will one day carry his dream forward for everyone.”
On August 28, 1963, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington, Martin Luther King gave one of the most powerful and memorable speeches in our nation's history. His words, paired with Caldecott Honor winner Kadir Nelson's magnificent paintings, make for a picture book certain to be treasured by children and adults alike. The themes of equality and freedom for all are not only relevant today, 50 years later, but also provide young readers with an important introduction to our nation's past. Included with the book is an audio CD of the speech.
Comics Plus for Children
Flipster
Hoopla
Library cardholders can access eBooks, eAudiobooks, Movies, TV shows, Comics, and Music all in one place.
Kanopy Kids
Libby for Kids
Riverhead Free Library cardholders can access a wide range of free eBooks and audiobooks for children via Libby.
Tumblebooks
Tumblebooks provides animated, talking picture books which teach kids the joy of reading in a format they’ll love.
Online Learning for Kids
ABC Mouse
ABCmouse is educational and fun and has more than 10,000 learning activities for ages 2-8+ (books, puzzles, educational games, science videos, art activities, songs) that encompass reading, math, science, social studies, art, and music—including more than 2,000 STEM and over 1,000 Spanish-language learning activities.
Adventure Academy
Adventure Academy immerses elementary- and middle-school-age students in a safe virtual world where every activity is designed to build critical knowledge in academic subjects, including language arts, math, science, social studies, and more.
