Thanks to a grant from the Idaho Commission for Libraries and the Laundry Literacy Coalition, Tumbled Laundromat has recently installed both a children’s book rack and a learning based activity table to keep kids busy while their parents do their laundry.  

According to the Library Cares Foundation and Too Small to Fail, who created the initial project, the average laundromat visit for families is two to two and a half hours, “making laundry time a valuable, if often overlooked, opportunity to engage children and families in language-rich activities like reading.”

Steve Atkinson, owner of the laundromat, and Kathy Kent, director of the Oneida County Library, have worked to secure the funding and install the fixtures, which were placed on June 10.  

“The project was originally started because there are so many underserved people who might use laundromats.  A lot of kids never get into libraries otherwise for different reasons, so now we can bring the library to them.  In our case, it’s so that kids who might not be able to get to the library have access to books and STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Math).  Steve has been very gracious, since we’re taking up so much of his space,” Kathy Kent said.

“No, I think it’s great,” Steve said.  “My wife actually noticed a lot of the brand names on the things you have in here.  This is good quality.”

Library materials are in both Spanish and English, and include a range of notable and well-loved children’s books, such as “Goodnight, Moon,” “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie,” “Clifford” and others.  The books are on loan from the library, which curates the collection and will rotate and replace books as needed throughout the year.  Activities at the learning station include practice with letters and numbers, as well as science and basic engineering concepts.  The displays are likely to rotate throughout the year.

During the first week of the display, Atkinson reported that plenty of kids had taken advantage of the materials.

“I came in just this morning and there were a bunch of kids in here, reading and using the letter magnets.  I just think this is a great thing,” Steve Atkinson said.