Another pandemic year come and gone… another year of starting strong in the beginning and falling off the blogging bandwagon by the end. 😅
Looking Back
Site Traffic
Another record-breaking year with 51,442 views and more than 20,000 visitors! Each year seems to see a 10k so increase in views.
Site traffic remained pretty steady throughout the year, peaking in March when I was posting almost every week. Predictably, traffic dropped in June (summer reading season) and December (presumably, end of year exhaustion). Early Tuesday afternoon remains the most popular day for Storytime in the Stacks readers. Is this the most popular day for every blog? Just library land blogs? 🤔
Total Posts: 35
35 posts totalling 19,766 words. Less content than 2021, but still more than the mere 20 posts I managed to write in 2020. I’ll count that as a win!
Types of Posts
- Storytimes: 43%
- Flannels: 20%
- Books: 17%
- Outreach/Other Library Programs: 17%
- Thoughts: 3%
Blogged more about books this year than ever before! I had lots of thoughts and feelings I wanted to share about being a public library worker with disabilities during an ongoing pandemic… guess they’ll stay screaming inside my head for now.
Posts in Other Places
Like usual, I did some writing in other places. I wrote for the CLEL Blog a bit:
…But What Can I Do About Book Bans?
I was also a live blogger for the 2022 ALSC Institute and captured some of my experiences on the ALSC Blog:
In which I did some first-hand research of happy hour hotspots around the conference hotel. 😁
You Can Take The Librarian Out of the Library…Or Can You?
My tour of the Kansas City Public Library!
A write-up of one of my favorite ALSC 22 sessions led by Marine Band Librarian Staff Sergeant Philip Espe! 🎵
First vs. Last Post
Kicked off the year with a double Top Ten Tuesday post: the 2022 sequels I was squee-ing over and the forthcoming 2022 picture books by my favorite storytime authors. Little did I know when I wrote this post that I would actually get to meet B.B. Alston this year at ALSC and get both my Amari books signed!
Wrapped up 2022 with some recent Bricks and Books Club posts: Spy School and El Deafo.
Shortest vs. Longest Post
Coming in at 157 words, my Kidlit Authors I Haven’t Read Yet (But Want To) list for a Top Ten Tuesday was the shortest post on the blog. Ironically, another Top Ten Tuesday list was the longest post with 1,792 words: Storytime Picture Books with Character Names in the Title!
Most Popular Posts
Five Baby Dragons continues its long reign as the the most popular post on the blog. Some day I hope another post will knock it off its pedestal! Another post actually did come close for once — 2022 Picture Books from Favorite Storytime Authors, which was the most viewed of all the posts written in 2022.
More of My Favorite Posts
Bricks and Books Club is my absolute favorite thing that I do, and The Science of Breakable Things was my absolute favorite book club meeting! Library life does not get better than the LEGO Egg Drop. 🥚🪜
I also loved blogging about my annual Box STEAM Storytime. I’m going to miss this tradition! 📦
Looking Ahead
In 2022 I escaped from what I call the Pandemic Party Library (so named because they started charging patrons for library weddings and sent staff to people’s houses for birthday party storytimes during COVID). I returned to my former library system, but on a different team. While I previously specialized in working with ages 0-5, I now work primarily with ages 5-12. I still plan to share storytime content — I have so much catching up to do, plus I still do some regular outreach storytimes with K-2nd graders! But I expect the blog focus will shift more towards school visits and programming for kids/tweens.
I’ve been looking forward to stepping off from CLEL (Colorado Libraries for Early Literacy) in 2023. I was hoping to catch a professional breath… but, well… more on that later. Suffice it to say, I’m not sure how much time I’ll have for blogging in the next two years. When I can find time to blog, I hope to get around to sharing:
- Early Math Picture Books (and my 2022 CLEL Conference Presentation on said topic)
- STEAM Programs
- Storytime With… Nonfiction, Props, School-Agers, Technology, etc. I think this would be such a fun series to write!
- Thoughts on the (in)Accessibility of Library Conferences
- Thoughts on Summer Reading and School Contests
What was your favorite post from Storytime in the Stacks last year? Any particular content you’re hoping to see more of in 2023? Any advice for getting into and staying in a blogging groove? I’d love to connect in the comments below!
Storytime in the Stacks 
Oh, you’re a Middle Years librarian like me! That’s what my system calls librarians who focus on working with school-aged kids. It’s so much fun, and really quite the interesting challenge, as there’s so much development and change in that broad age range! As for tips on getting into a blogging groove…if you find the secret, fill me in! 😉
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Middle Years makes so much sense as a title as we are dealing with middle childhood! Such an ignored demographic (especially the 5-8 crowd). I feel like there’s so much public library support for getting kids READY to read, but not much for kids as they actually learn HOW to read!
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