Festive Fun for ALL: Holiday Market 2026
The library is happy to once again host a Holiday Market this year on Small Business Saturday, the weekend just after Thanksgiving. On Saturday, November 28, from 10am to 3pm, the Bob Kirby Branch Library will become a shopper’s wonderland with 40-50 local vendors selling handcrafted goods, including one-of-kind art pieces, creative crafts, packages of home-baked items, and books by local authors. Shoppers wanting to make a day of it can snag a snack, too, with access to food trucks, another way to support micro-restaurant owners.
The library began hosting an end-of-November market in 2019 as a part of local Small Business Saturday initiatives hosted both locally and nationwide. Since that first event, drawing in the community for a festive shopping experience without having to purchase an access ticket while also providing opportunities for small businesses to sell their wares without having to pay a booth fee have benefited hundreds of vendors and shoppers. Having the Holiday Market at the Bob Kirby Branch Library makes for easy access with ample parking, plus a great opportunity to browse the branch and check out books (and more) before or after visiting the market!
A complete list of confirmed vendors will be listed on social media (Facebook and Instagram), and at the submission time of this article, we have booked Sassy Soda, Only Fries, and The Wurst (featuring American and German faire) as food trucks.
Ben Corley, the library’s new Program Lead, has been working to coordinate the list of vendors and plan the footprint of this year’s event. “I am so excited to connect such talented local makers with local people at our Holiday Market this year! It’s going to be a blast!”
Chill out and READ: Winter Reading 2026-27
In an effort to keep kids and adults reading when the daytime hours grow shorter and the temperatures drop, the library offers its Winter Reading Program to light up the season. This year’s program will begin Monday, November 16, and run through the end of January. There will be a reading incentive program with cool prizes and a chance to win attractive grand prize bundles, as well as a number of free special activities offered during that time. Returning favorites include a Winter Solstice concert, Grinch and Santa events, and character storytimes at the SOKY Ice Rink. More details can be found on our online calendar of events or in our activity brochure, available at any library location, and at warrenpl.org/winter.
The Winter Reading Program’s first big event will be in honor of the SOKY Ice Rink’s 10th season, which we will celebrate at a Frozen-themed party Friday, November 20, between 3:30pm and 5:30pm, at the SOKY Center pavilion. Families are invited to the ribbon cutting at 4pm, there will be a storytime with Olaf at 5pm, plus games and visits with our favorite Ice Princesses AND the one and only Santa Bob! No registration is required. Event activities will be free, but ice skating will require paid admission.
The public library aims to encourage folks of all ages to read and visit the library throughout the year by providing experiences and activities that encourage the imagination and invite exploration. While summer breaks are ideal, especially for school-age kids, we’ve found a niche in providing a similar, but scaled-down program during months that include winter holiday breaks, as well. WCPL’s first Winter Reading Program was hosted in 2009 and has become a fixture in the system’s mid-school-year offerings since that time.
For more information about these or other upcoming events, follow us on social media (Facebook and Instagram), sign up for our online newsletter (https://tinyurl.com/WCPLNews), and bookmark or subscribe to our calendar of events – browse it via the monthly view: warrenpl.org/calendar or the weekly view: warrenpl.org/events-list.
-by Ashley Fowlkes, Digital Content Manager
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