An Open Book: Meet New Waukee Children's Librarian Keri Weston-Stoll

As Keri Weston-Stoll read a story about animals -- complete with mooing sounds for the cow -- toddler Ryan Taylor of Clive hopped up to help with the sound effects.

Other toddlers in the March 12 story time were content to hang back and sit on mom's lap. Or just wander around the room.

With an audience of 2-year-olds, anything can happen.

Which is one of the facets of being a children's librarian at the Waukee Public Library that appeals to Weston-Stoll. She was the director of the Carlisle library before making the move to Waukee to focus on young readers.

"It's more immediately rewarding," Weston-Stoll said of her work with kids. "They get excited and you can feed off that right away. It's never dull."

Her work will include guiding the teen programming, which they largely do themselves. Last weekend the Waukee teens cleaned out a craft/supply closet for library staff.

"They're a great group of young people," Weston-Stoll said.

Her goal is simple: get children, young people and their parents interested in reading, and learning in general.

She encourages residents to check out the busy library, which just celebrated its 10th anniversary at the 950 Warrior Lane location. "It's a fun building, everyone should come in."

And Weston-Stoll, who lives in Grimes with her husband, John, looks forward to exploring Waukee in the weeks to come.

"Everyone I've met here in the library has been nice and I hear great things about the schools," she said.

Weston-Stoll earned her bachelor's degree from Cornell College in Mount Vernon, and received a graduate degree in library science from the University of South Carolina.

In her free time -- and there isn't much of it right now -- Weston-Stoll enjoys reading kids' and teen books. She's a fan of the "Elephant and Piggie" series by Mo Willems for its humor, which draws in young kids. For teen readers she is "a giant Harry Potter fan" and also recommends the "Hunger Games" books.