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Boardman library hosts monthly puzzle swap
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.People looked over the eight tables in the Boardman library's meeting room for the puzzles thbey wanted during the puzzle swap event.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.PLYMC development director Debbie Liptak let the people into the meeting room of the Boardman library to begin the puzzle swap.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.A couple looked at various puzzles to determine which ones they wanted during the puzzle swap event at the Boardman library.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.Development director of the Public Library of Youngstown and Mahoning County Debbie Liptak arranged puzzles on tables before the start of the puzzle swap.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.PLYMC development director Debbie Liptak told the attendees the rules of the puzzle swap before the event started at the Boardman library.
By TIM CLEVELAND
As it has done the second Wednesday of every month for the past three years, the Boardman library hosted a puzzle swap on Oct. 8 that allowed area residents to turn in unwanted puzzles and in turn take home new ones to do.
“We have a lot of seniors who participate, a lot of people from nursing homes,” development director of the Public Library of Youngstown and Mahoning County Debbie Liptak said. “They take them and do them, then they bring them back again. It was friend of the library who said, ‘I think it would be a great idea.’ I said, ‘All right, let’s try it.’ All the leftover puzzles go to the book store in [the] Poland [library] and we sell them for very cheap. On Thursday mornings when I come back from the puzzle swap, there’s always people waiting to buy up the puzzles.”
Liptak said the event is always hosted at the Boardman library because it’s a central location in the library system so that makes it easier for people to travel there.
Each attendee of the event brought up to six puzzles to the event and left them on a table outside the Boardman library’s meeting room. Liptak then took the puzzles and put them on tables in the meeting room while the attendees waited in the children’s room next door.
Liptak said there have been as many as 55 people who attended the puzzle swap in the past, with 20 coming on Oct. 8. Liptak ended up filling eight tables with puzzles.
With that done, she went into the children’s room and explained the rules of the swap, which allowed them to take home as many as six puzzles. She cautioned against any fighting over the same puzzle.
Liptak then allowed them to enter the meeting room and let them loose to grab puzzles they wanted.
The puzzles ranged from 300 pieces, to 500, 550, 600, 750, 1,000, 1,500 and up to 2,000 pieces.
“People who do puzzles may have two or three puzzles going at the same time,” Liptak said. “It’s a favorite pastime. There are people in the summer time who have tables out on their porch and they’re doing puzzles. They like their puzzles. The most popular puzzles are the 500s (pieces) because they can get them done fast.”