Storytelling: it's the best time you'll have in your PJs

All eyes are focused on a woman wearing frog slippers at the front of the room. The anticipation is so intense, most of the 26 children, ages 8 months to 10 years, forget to blink.

This is actually a small group for Sharon Chastain, "The Story Lady," at the Maple Valley Library. She faces the rapt children sitting on the floor in their pajamas, cracks her trademark grin, and with a flourish points to a felt board and begins singing, "Where's the bug, where's the bug, where's the itty bitty bug?"

Hands shoot into the air as the kids vie to see who can find the hidden bug on the felt board.

The evening's pajama story time is off to a rousing start.

Tonight's theme is mischievous mice, and Chastain roars, hoots and has the kids shouting phrases from each book. Madison Hansen, almost 5, got the giggles during the always-popular "Sticky Bubble Gum" song but felt the real highlight of the evening was the mouse story, "Mother, Mother, I Want Another."

Her mom, Heidi Hansen, couldn't agree more.

"All my kids love story time and the story lady," said Hansen, who has six kids. "We do this every Monday night — it's our little treat and a way to be around other kids and moms who enjoy hearing good stories."

Hansen's 10-year-old, Haley, has been coming to story time since she was 2 and says the program helped teach her to love reading.

"The story lady is so good, you just get caught up in it," Haley said. "I feel like I have known her forever."

Chastain knows the name of nearly every kid in Maple Valley under the age of 12, and a good number of their parents. She remembers each kid's book preferences, too, and can always recommend an age-appropriate tale.

After 10 years at the Maple Valley Library, she has become a local celebrity.

"I get recognized wherever I go," Chastain said.

"I actually got recognized in the customs line in Victoria, B.C., where a woman said I read to her son in school. So I'm an internationally known story lady."

Both preschool and pajama story times are attended by a wide range of ages, from crawling babies to second-graders and their siblings, parents and grandparents.

A Wichita, Kan., native, Chastain grew up in Montrose, Colo., and moved to Edmonds after her parents divorced. She loved her first job working with preschoolers in a day care so much that she got an early-childhood-education degree from Shoreline Community College, followed by a bachelor's degree from Seattle University.

"Kids are such a kick," she said. "I enjoyed playing with them so much that it wasn't like work at all."

After a stint teaching middle school, Chastain attended the University of Washington and got her master's degree in library science in 1991.

She worked as a school librarian and with the King County Library System in Snoqualmie, Fall City and on Mercer Island. Then she got a chance to swap jobs with a Shoreline librarian working at the Maple Valley branch.

"I was glad to be able to work two miles from home, in my own community," she said.

When the Maple Valley library opened in 2000, Chastain expanded the storytelling and teen-reading programs and worked with schools to bring storytelling to the classrooms. She also does "Book Talks" in the fall and spring, suggesting books that kids can read throughout the year.

Every children's librarian is a storyteller and an artist with his or her own shtick, said Chastain. Some sing; some work with puppets.

"I sing at least 50 percent of the time," she said. "Each story time is like a live stage performance without the stage."

Susan and Michael Paul credit Chastain's pajama story time with helping their seven children love books.

"We check out a dozen books every time we're here, and that's what they look forward to," Michael Paul said.

For Chastain, reading to thousands of pajama-clad kids is like coming home.

"This is my family," she said. "I live at the library, and the kids I read to are fun, funny and willing to be goofy — and they are so loyal. I follow them right up through school, so I know they're getting prereading skills, building vocabulary, getting group skills and getting excited about books."

The job is a joy, she said:

"I get to have a laugh with people and read stories that teach and feed the soul.

"Plus, I get to wear funky slippers."

DeAnn Rosetti is a Maple Valley freelance writer: archer34@aol.com