‘I want to try that.’ Cass County libraries offer youth creative ways to have fun

Over the last few months, Cass County young people have been getting creative, courtesy of the county’s libraries. Each library has its own spin on take-home crafts to keep young people entertained.

Down in Drexel, the branch’s Creative Club has found itself perfectly positioned to function in a pandemic. The program has been around for years, meeting in the library on a weekly basis. It transitioned to being virtual last year, when COVID hit.

A typical challenge right now for the Creative Club might be to build something 3 feet tall — but each kit has different materials. When it’s been inside the library, kids might build structures, then see whose can take the most weight.

“(With) a lot of their activities, they are combining common materials we would have around the library as craft materials or people would have around their house. It’s an opportunity to explore and tinker around without worrying what the right use of an object is,” said Heather Emokpae, youth services coordinator for the Cass County Libraries.

Instead of comparing their creations to someone at the next table, the kids now have to go on social media to see how others completed the challenge.

“When they were in person, they would work as a group and look over and see, ‘Oh they did that. I want to try that.’ It’s a lot harder to collaborate from a distance,” Emokpae said.

Right now, the emphasis is less on competition and more just on creation. About 30 kids a month participate in Drexel’s program.

The staff is good at using whatever is available, Emokpae said.

“It might be objects they already have in their craft collection, or they try to use materials that are easy to work with and easy to transport.”

Shannon Julien, a library assistant at the Harrisonville branch, is doing just that with the Teen Take-Out program. She used glass yogurt jars to create a craft with macrame planters and light-up decorative pieces. Her December craft used felt to make hand warmers shaped like characters from the game “Among Us.”

“Every teen I know is playing ‘Among Us,’ and we had a bunch of felt left over in our supply closet,” she said.

One of her most popular crafts has been candy sushi, where teens shaped and combined Rice Krispies Treats, Starbursts and other candies to look like popular types of sushi. She’s got another tasty craft coming up with February’s mini-s’mores that use tea lights for marshmallow roasting.

What makes her crafts different is that they come with a video. Each month, Julien makes an instructional video that goes up on the library’s Facebook page. Sometimes she’s alone, and sometimes a co-worker joins her. She posts each video about a week into the month.

“That way they might have already gotten their crafts (and can watch) if they need help. … Then it’s up forever, if they want to do it again with their own supplies,” Julien said.

She hands out about 100 kits a month. The “Among Us” hand warmers had 120 takers.

It’s a lot to do, but “we had such a demand. I didn’t like the idea of people coming in and asking for one and not having one available,” Julien said.

Alysa Warren, 15, has done five or six of the projects. Her favorite was making a woven bookmark.

“They’re fun, and they give you something to do when you have nothing to do, like in quarantine,” Alysa said. “They give you something to focus on other than the way the world is going.”