Read, Baby, Read Storytime & Playgroup

Read Baby Read is back at the Blanche A. Nixon/Cobbs Creek Library on Wednesday, October 28, at 2 PM. It's part of a series run by the Free Library of Philadelphia that focuses on language and literacy development for babies and toddlers and their caregivers, and siblings are welcome to join in too.

Each session mixes stories, songs, rhymes, and bounces, and families are invited to stay afterward for a playgroup. It's a good way to get your little one around books and other kids in a low-pressure setting, and since it's a regular thing, you can make it a weekly habit. The playgroup part is a nice bonus—you get to hang out and chat with other parents while the kids play, which is sometimes the best part of the whole outing.

The library itself has a bit of history. The Cobbs Creek Branch opened on December 30, 1925, funded by an Andrew Carnegie grant, with the community chipping in $10,000 toward a book fund. The building was renovated in 1957 and 1997 as part of the 'Changing Lives' campaign. In 1990, it was renamed the Blanche A. Nixon/Cobbs Creek Branch in honor of Blanche Nixon, a local resident, community activist, and library volunteer who led beautification projects including the garden and an exterior mural. The neighborhood was known to the Lenni Lenape as Karakung and to Swedes as Mill Creek in the late 1600s, and it's been part of the Hoffman family's land since colonial days.

Read Baby Read runs Wednesdays at 2 PM, with the next session on October 28 at the Blanche A. Nixon/Cobbs Creek Library, 5800 Cobbs Creek Parkway, Philadelphia, PA 19143-3036. It's free.