by Alicia Rudnicki, Library Mix

When my daughter was in preschool, one of her friends asked what the “theme” would be for her birthday party. I was stunned that a four-year-old would be concerned with such matters.

I pondered my answer and told her that the theme would just be “fun,” lots of fun. It wouldn’t be a clown party, or a Barbie party, or a super-hero party. It would just be an old fashioned let’s-play-games and eat-cake-and-ice-cream kind of party.

Although my thinking about preschool birthday get-togethers hasn’t shifted much, my thoughts about how to shape this website have changed considerably since its birth in April. I have decided to create theme issues as much as possible and, when that's not possible, to think of a new issue as being a “grab bag” of surprises.

So today marks a milestone for my toddler website. This is the first theme issue--Inner and Outer Space. The title reflects the fact that all three books reviewed in this issue have something to do with exploring the universe and two of them involve characters who are big on exploring the inner world of their thoughts and beliefs.

It is also sort of a belated Father’s Day issue since two of the authors—Frank Cottrell Boyce and Dom Testa—have spun young characters who acknowledge a web of connectedness to important adults in their lives, particularly fathers and male mentors. Although these adults may not be on-scene for much of either book, their contributions shape the lives of the tween and teen characters in a positive way. What a pleasant surprise.

Hmmm! I've been publishing online for about a year now, so I'm not quite at square one trying to build pages and content. But the word-processing aspect of this site isn't as smooth as I had expected. I guess each day will bring a discovery. Anyway, I lost my first posting (written on April Fool's Day!) on this page. It was a sort of mission statement, which said "Library Mix exists to celebrate and support the bounty that public libraries and reading bring into our lives. It is also is intended to focus on the problems and promise of literacy education. I hope that it will inform and entertain and that it will be useful to readers of many ages as well as to librarians and teachers."

So onward!