2025 Stuffed Animal Sleepover

It was a beautiful summer day at the Elizabeth Taber Library - the perfect day for a sleepover! All afternoon, animals arrived at the library where they shared their favorite foods and activities, so Miss Macy could plan the perfect night out. Soon, there were 23 of us ready for a night of fun!

We got a tour of the newly renovated library, starting with the circulation desk! Some of us were a little nervous about being at the library without our kids - but we met Herman the Bookworm and Willow the Whale who promised us that the library was a great place for stuffies!

There were so many great things to see and learn about the library on our tour! Simba and Figment learned about two great upcoming library programs: Campout Storytime on Tuesday, August 12 and Mini Golf on Friday, August 15!

Bernie, Fruitbat, and Floppy found the library’s new Christmas cactus! It’s the first plant that the library has gotten since the renovation and Miss Macy told them that it just arrived this week!

Froggy and Snowcone were ready to get reading and used the catalog computer to help them find books that they wanted to read. Froggy read Towed by Toad and Snowcone read Bathe the Cat!

A lot of friends were excited to see the Library of Things! Cheetah tried the teeter popper. Pink, Piggy, and Luke worked on building a floor puzzle. Ruth, Dolphina, Yoga, and Lime played the Sneaky Snacky Squirrel game. 

    

Uni, Pantsy, and Crossie were excited to see the library’s 3-D printer in action! It was making a new business card holder for Miss Macy’s Desk. They learned that the library is launching a makerspace on Tuesday, August 19! They hope they get to come back to the library soon to see what they can make!

Ollie wanted to listen to a story on the Yoto Player! They love audio books and were so excited that the library had headphones for them to wear.

Miss Betsy helped Pete the Cat and Rusko check out some books! Luckily, they’d brought their library card with them! They found nonfiction books to read.

Brother Bear and Mr. Wolf found the coffee station and asked Miss Macy if they could have a cup - but Miss Macy said that if they had coffee they wouldn’t be able to fall asleep that night! 

After our tour of the library, we finally made it to the most exciting spot in the library - the children’s room! We all sat on the couch together and listened to Miss Macy tell us the rules of the children’s room - then we got to play! There are so many fun activities in the children's room that it was so hard to decide which one to do. We all had a hard time remembering to be quiet!

Floppy, Froggy, and Yoga decided that they would run the ice cream stand! Froggy took orders, Yoga ran the cash register, and Floppy scooped the cones! Ollie helped read everyone the menu. Mr. Wolf got a popsicle and Luke had an ice cream sandwich with candy cookies! 

    

Fruitbat and Figment decided to fly and explore the highest shelves in the library! Fruitbat was able to show the other animals one of the items on the scavenger hunt!

  

Meanwhile, Dolphina took a swim with all the fish on the children’s room rug.

Pete the Cat, Pink, and Piggy decided to explore the board books! They found so many fun books to read with each other. They all agree that Sandra Boynton is the best. 

Lime decided to be brave and explore Miss Macy’s desk while three of the cats - Cheetah, Simba, and Pantsy took a cat nap together.

  

Rusko and Bernie found the coloring supplies while Snowcone and Uni played with the magnetic gears. Ruth decided the scavenger hunt was too easy and instead tried to see what she could find in the Summer Reading I-Spy! 

    

Crossie and Brother Bear wanted to see what other kids had been reading, so they climbed into the reshelving cart! 

We played for so long that Miss Macy heard our tummies rumbling and decided it was time for us to go eat dinner. For dinner, Miss Macy had a surprise for us - we got to go downstairs to the library staff room! Did you know they have a refrigerator and a microwave down there and everything. Miss Macy had a lot of healthy food for us and some of us even got to eat our favorites like carrots, strawberries, steak, and apples! She didn’t have everyone’s favorite food - but we still had a really yummy dinner.

After dinner, it was time to play outside. The outside of the library is just as fun as the inside! Snowcone, Ruth, and Bernie wanted to climb the library sign while Cheetah, Crossie, and Lime decided that the tree was better for climbing.

  

Dolphina, Simba, Yoga, and Froggy didn’t want to climb at all - none of their species do a lot of climbing. They decided to sit in the shade with the reading kids statue and enjoyed the lovely summer evening weather.

Luke, Pink, Floppy, and Piggy couldn’t figure out what this strange thing with a basket and chains was! Floppy went inside the chains, Piggy sat on top, Luke checked out the basket, while Pink looked at the pile of strange round things in the basket. Fruitbat explained that this was Disc Golf and taught us how to throw the disc! Miss Macy told us that if we wanted to learn more about Disc Golf that the library is having a disc golf clinic on Saturday, August 16.

  

Miss Macy had gotten out the giant legos and Ollie, Brother Bear, Mr. Wolf, and Pete the Cat got started building! They decided to make a tall tower. Then, they had fun knocking them all down! 

On the way back into the building, Pantsy, Figment, Rusko, and Uni asked Miss Macy if we could all stop and look at the Marion Natural History Museum’s meteorite. None of us had ever touched something that came from space before! 

We were so tired after all of our outdoor activities and it was starting to get dark - which meant it was time for bed! Some of us had brought beds, sleeping bags, blankets, and even mini stuffies, to help us fall asleep away from home. But the rest of us didn’t have any problems falling asleep because Miss Macy created a nice comfortable bed for all of us in the children’s room! The blankets kept us cozy and warm.

It wouldn’t be a sleepover at the library without a storytime, and Miss Macy read us The Baby Who Stayed Awake Forever! It was funny and made us laugh, but it also made us even sleepier! Miss Macy tucked us in, gave us each a kiss goodnight, and turned the lights off.

(Shhhh don’t tell Miss Macy- we have a secret - a few of us woke up in the middle of the night and decided to keep exploring the library because we couldn’t fall back asleep! Did you know that one of the meeting rooms has motion sensing lights in it? We were so surprised when they came on as we went into the room! The best thing about the library in the middle of the night is that we could jump on the couch without Miss Macy telling us to stop!)

When Miss Macy woke us up in the morning, we ate breakfast and spent our morning reading until you came to pick us up. Miss Macy made sure to take pictures of us reading the books that we chose. We had a great time spending the night at the Elizabeth Taber Library and we can’t wait until the next Stuffed Animal Sleepover!

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