Sweetest Thing Ever: Selling Cookies and Lemonade For Libraries

Here is something unspeakably amazing to brighten up your Monday morning - little six-year-old Helen Stone spent her Sunday outside her Morningside Heights apartment selling homemade cookies and lemonade to support The New York Public Library. According to her mom Robin Aronson, Helen (who uses the 115th Street, Morningside Heights and St. Agnes libraries with her family) has long wanted to have a lemonade stand, and decided to give her earnings to NYPL so “the library could buy more books for people.” And she did quite well - Aronson happily reported that “many people were very happy to support the library! Our second sale went to a guy who gave us $10 for a cookie and 2 lemonades!” She also said, “I personally can’t quite get over the magic of the library. You can just take books- for free!” How great is that? NYPL Wire just happened to stroll by the stand yesterday and couldn’t resist taking a few pictures. I mean, it’s just SO cute. And the cookies and lemonade were quite delicious, by the way. Check out more pics below, and if you love NYPL, check out ways you can give to the Library!

That would be sad for me if the library closed early. This is like my sanctuary, it gives me thinking time.

— Shabri Cummings, a 13-year-old who visits our City Island branch every day after school to read, game, do homework, use the computer and socialize, discussing potential hour cutbacks as a result of proposed $40 million city budget cut, the largest in our history. If his branch wasn’t open, he said he’d hang out in a local pizzeria. Write a letter now and fight the cuts!