All of us here wish you a very Happy New Year!

Last year was amazing for Kitsap Regional Library with our new brand launch, new website, new Strategic Plan, new Inspire publication, new Institute of Museum and Library Services Grant to develop programs for small and rural libraries on science, technology, engineering and math, and new-building groundbreaking in Kingston.

We are looking forward to this year with excitement because spring 2016 is when we will move into the new Kingston Village Green Community Center. We hope you will visit us during our last few months in the old Community Center.

Our January programs include:

Family Storytime: 10:30-11 a.m. Jan. 4, 11 and 25. Join us for early literacy learning fun where you and your child can experience movement, songs, stories, and rhymes designed to build letter knowledge, vocabulary, and narrative skills.

Book Group: 10-11 a.m. Jan. 6. Discussion will be on a variety of European authors.

Kingston Writers Group: 6:30-8 p.m. Jan. 12. Enjoy a friendly, supportive atmosphere to encourage writing. We want to read what you want to write. Beginners welcome.

“The Herb Lover’s Spa” by Sue Goetz: 10 a.m. to noon Jan. 13. Grow healing and aromatic herbs to create hand-blended spa products. Join author Sue Goetz for a fun informative talk about growing healing, aromatic herbs and using them in hand-blended spa treatments.

Make fresh herbal potions from the garden, including bathing blends, sensual sugar scrubs, powders, fragrant mists and more. Get to know the nurturing attributes of herbs, how to grow them, and information on other ingredients used in herbal care recipes, based on Goetz’s book.

Lego Lab: 3:30 p.m. Jan. 20. Lego fun for the whole family. Join us for an afternoon of building with lots of blocks, either individually or on a team to complete a special challenge.

Classics Book Group: 6:30 p.m. Jan. 25. Discussion will about Katherine Mansfield’s short story, “The Garden Party.”

Adult Crafternoon — Paper Quilling: 3 p.m. Jan. 28. Create paper filigree designs by tightly rolling fine strips of paper. Design your own art, greeting cards, or other dimensional displays.

Little Boston events:

Family Storytime: 10:30-11 a.m. Jan. 5, 12, 19 and 26.

Little Boston Book Group: Noon to 1 p.m. Jan. 6. “We Die Alone: A WWII Epic of Escape and Endurance” by David Howarth.

Crafternoon: 2:30-3:30 p.m. Jan. 6, 13, 20 and 27.

Seattle Opera Preview Lecture, “The Marriage of Figaro”: 1-2:30 p.m. Jan. 2. Join opera aficionado Norm Hollingshead for a preview of the plot and music of this Mozart/Lorenzo DaPonte collaboration, which has never been out of the repertory. Paid for by anonymous Kingston donors.

Seattle Opera Preview Lecture with Mary Stuart: 1-2:30 p.m. Jan. 23. This, the greatest of Donizetti’s three “Tudor Queen” operas, is a not-very-accurate retelling of the political and romantic rivalry between Queen Elizabeth I of England and Mary Queen of Scots.

Some of the most exciting music Donizetti ever wrote was given to Mary/Maria as she battles for her life against the more powerful Elizabeth/Elisabetta.

Hollingshead’s lecture about this true struggle for power includes music and a different perspective of a famous event. Paid for by anonymous Kingston donors.

Lego Lab: 3:30-5 p.m. Jan. 27.

The library will be closed Jan. 18 for Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

See you at the library!

— Tomi Whalen is manager of the Kingston and Little Boston library branches. Contact her at twhalen@krl.org