Resolution Update

So at New Year's I made the resolution to read all the books in my house that I've bought and just haven't got around to reading yet. I thought the number was 31, but then I went around my house and gathered them all up. The final count was 55!

By January 18 I was down to 47. Mostly I was catching up on souvenir books I had bought on recent trips, but also finishing the multiple books I was trying to read at once. Then I started hitting some mysteries.

Is there anything better than a good mystery? My love of mysteries started with the late, great Rex Stout, author of the beloved Nero Wolfe mysteries. Then my mother-in-law got me hooked on Janet Evanovich. I love her Stephanie Plum books the best. Then there were the Bed & Breakfast Mysteries of Mary Deheim. Then a friend got me hooked on the Heather Wells mysteries by Meg Cabot. Most recently my mother-in-law introduced me to the Callie Parrish mysteries by Fran Rizer. I'm not sure what I would do without a retired librarian as a mother-in-law.

I was a little "bad" at the end of January when I actually bought a few books on my trip to Jekyll Island. I couldn't help it, they told the history of the island and had fabulous historic photos. To my credit I read them on the plane on the way back.

It's now toward the end of February. I'm down to 43 books. I've decided to take a break from the mysteries and in honor of St. Patrick's day I'm concentrating on the books about the Celtics and Ireland. The first is Celtic Inspirations and the second is Cultural Traditions in Northern Ireland. I have no doubt that reading these will put me right in the mood to show my green on March 17.

Guided Access - Can It Aid in Device Management? – Part 2

In my last post I covered how Guided Access is being used to help us manage the iPads in our Reflection Areas. This time I want to share how Guided Access has worked on our iPod touches. The museum has 80 4th generation iPod Touches with our iOS app installed available for guests to check out. These are free thanks to the generous sponsorship of Cox Communications. After talking to colleagues at other institutions about their experiences, and trying out several alternatives, the decision was made to use iPod cases that do not cover the Home button. Even though covering the Home button could have helped control the devices, the benefits of allowing staff and knowledgeable users to easily service devices when needed seemed to outweigh the potential costs of leaving the Home button accessible. To conserve battery life and prevent new content from being installed on the iPods, we decided to use Apple's iPhone Configuration Utility to create a configuration profile to block access to ce...

Things that Endanger Your Treasures

When people find out my degree is in Museum Studies and I work at a museum, I’m constantly being asked questions like: “What things do I need to look out for in order to protect my keepsakes?” “What’s the worst thing that could happen to my great-grandmother’s wedding dress?” “So my photos are just thrown into a cardboard box, that’s probably not the best thing, right” “I could never afford to properly store my grandfather’s Bible, could I?” The majority of my answers revolve around four things that can endanger your treasures so, I’ve created a little guide on those things and solutions you can start implementing today to help mitigate them. I’ve made it in a worksheet form to really help you think through changes you might need to make. But I also wanted to share a fifth thing for you to be aware of just in this blog post and that’s how materials can interact with each other. The more complex an object is as far as the materials that it is made up of the more complex it c...

It’s Ok to Use It

I’m often asked, “But what should I DO with my family heirloom?” My response is always, “What do you want to do with it?” At this point people are often taken aback. I think they assume I’m going to tell them to lock it away in storage and never use it again for fear of breaking or damaging it. In some cases, that may be what might be best for the object. You have to consider the condition its in and what your goals are for it. If it is a book in poor condition, but you are hoping your great-grandchildren will get to see it. Then, yes, probably the best thing to do is stabilize it and store it, taking it out occasionally to check on the condition, but to try to manipulate it as little as possible. Other objects don’t necessarily need to be treated so delicately. For instance, something I chose that belonged to my maternal grandmother was soup bowls. There were only two of them and they aren’t valuable. They're Anchor Hocking from the 1970s. They were her everyday dish...

Heather Marie Wells

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