BonnerSprings.com

Doo-wopping frogs helped jump-start the Bonner Springs Library's summer reading programs Saturday morning.

The library's Summer Reading Kick-off starred the Carmen McCrae Puppet Show, featuring a quartet of Kermit's distant cousins singing "Let's Go To the Hop."

The frogs were the favorite act of Abbey Ackerman, 7, Shawnee, and were among several other acts, including marionette poodles dancing the Can-Can and a tap-dancing skeleton.

Alex Wheeler, 8, Bonner Springs, liked best the skit involving a rabbit in a tree opening boxes whose contents surprised him.

After the show, the McCraes came out from the set to tell the audience of about 80 how marionettes work, and called on a boy in the audience to help demonstrate the difference in the way human bodies and marionettes move.

"Most marionettes are made to do a specific trick," said John McCrae, such as the four poodle marionettes dressed in late 19th century dresses associated with the high-kicking Can-Can.

The dramatic difference highlighted by Mary Susan McCrae as John spoke was that some marionettes' limbs can be made to continue moving after separating from the rest of the body, while humans, as shown by the volunteer Ethan from the audience, aren't capable of instantaneous and painless limb detachment.

This trick was part of an act that seemed to be among the favorites of the audience of young children and their parents, featuring a skeleton tap-dancing to 1920s jazz, at one point sitting cross-legged on the toe of Mary Susan McCrae's cocked shoe.

The event served to kick off the library's four summer bug-themed reading programs for children: Bookworms, for children who have completed kindergarten, and those younger; Creepy Crawlers, for children who've completed first or second grade; Library Ant-ics, for children who have completed fifth grade; and finally, Metamorphosis, for teenagers. Each of the programs feature prizes of book bags and books for a certain number of pages or books read, and the teen program features a bingo game with a different kind of book for each space to be checked off.

There's even a horticulture-themed program for adults, Grow Your Reading Garden, in which readers can earn prizes by reading a book from each of four categories.

For more information, stop by the Bonner Springs Library in the Community Center at 200 E. Third St., or call (913) 441-2665.

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