simple.green.organic.happy.

Category: Local (DE, PA, NJ, MD)

Local Family Fun This Weekend: 4/29- 5/1
I think this photo accompanied my very first blog post here at simple.green.organic.happy. (April 13, 2008). Look how little Cass is! Where does the time go?!

It’s shaping up to be a bee-yoo-tee-ful weekend here in the Mid-Atlantic! My top picks:

Arbor Day Festivities:
- Arbor Day Adventure Treasure Hunt
  
  Saturday April 30th 1 – 3pm, Morris Arboretum. This interactive family event will begin high in the tree canopy on Out on a Limb, where they’ll experience trees up-close and learn about the many reasons we need trees. The trees of the Arboretum will provide the basis for a tree adventure treasure hunt including four Tree Activity stations. Interactive activities will focus on tree care, tree protection, where trees come from, and what trees give us. Visitors who complete the exploration will receive a seedling to take home.
  
  ** Please note the description for Out on a Limb: “a striking new 450-foot long walkway that soars 50 feet above the ground, and gives visitors a bird’s eye view of the forest. From Out on a Limb, visitors will cross a Suspension Bridge to a giant Bird’s Nest (where they can sit on huge robin’s eggs), scamper onto the Squirrel Scramble’s rope-netting skirting two towering trees, head to the top of the Wissahickon Vista platform for sweeping views, or just wander along the Canopy Walk rising high above the forest floor.” Why have I not gone to see this yet? **
- Celebrating “Roots” at Longwood Gardens
  
  Saturday April 30th 12-4pm. Guided Flower Garden Walk tours, arborist demonstrations and informational sessions. Kids aged 6-12 can put on climbing gear and join Longwood’s arborists climbing into Longwood’s trees. Climb the bird house treehouse to learn about local birds and find out what you can do to take care of birds at home. Make sure to get a voucher for a free tree sapling and pick it up at the Gardens Shop, located in the Visitor Center, on the way to your car. Free trees are limited to the first 350 guests.
Tea Parties
- Teddy Bear Tea
  
  Saturday April 30th 10:30am – 12:00pm. Explore the Brandywine Zoo together and participate in various fun, animal-related activities. Just like zoo animals have a veterinarian to care for them, “Dr. Moose” will be available to perform a check-up & simple medical administrations on your stuffed animal! End the program with a sumptuous treat in celebration of animals! Program begins in the Education Building and concludes in the main zoo. Registration strongly suggested, walk-ins welcome if space available. $8/person; $6/Delaware Zoological Society Members.
- Princess Afternoon Tea
  
  Sunday May 1st – Tuesday May 31st, 3pm – 4:30pm daily. Princesses of the Brandywine Valley are cordially invited to The Green Room & Brandywine Room at the Hotel du Pont for a exquisite and elegant Afternoon Tea Service. Attendance in appropriate princess attire, gown and tiara, is encouraged. $24 per person, not including gratuity. For reservations, call 302.594.3154.
Ag Day

Saturday, April 30, from 10am- 4pm at Townsend Hall (down by the Ice Arena & stadium). Pony rides, hayride farm tours, a petting zoo, YoUDee, face painting, and food; variety of educational workshops and live entertainment. Along with educational presentations and demonstrations about gardening, sheep shearing, stink bugs and bees, there will be two free-flight bird shows presented by experts, including UD CANR alumnus Phung T. Luu of Behavior and Training Solutions, LLC. AND, some of the cheapest annual/ perennial/ veggie starters around! DO NOT skip the plant sale.

Fred Comegys Photographs

Exhibit ends May 1st at the Delaware Art Museum. For more than 50 years, photographer Fred Comegys has captured international celebrities and local kids for the pages of The News Journal. His distinctive images present national news and local interest stories, and perhaps most memorably, the intersection of the two. I used to work at Lincoln Camera and nearly all the photos I own of myself from that time were snapped by Fred Comegys, finishing out a roll of film. He’s a wonderful photographer and a very nice man, as I remember. While at the museum, make sure to take the kids to visit the Crying Giant sculpture and the labyrinth!

Annual Wildflower Celebration

Sunday May 1st from 10am-4pm at the Mt. Cuba Center. Stroll the gardens at your leisure during this fun and festive celebration of Spring! Enjoy live music, learning stations, and activities for the whole family. Take the Wildflower Challenge and win a prize. All parking for this event will be at Red Clay Reservation at 1003 Old Wilmington Road, just east of Brackenville Road.

Newark Co-op Outdoor Farmers Market

Sundays from 10am- 2pm rain or shine, Newark Natural Foods parking lot. Whoop whoop! I’ve spoken about my great love of the Newark Co-op Farmers Market before and I’m so happy that I can start planning local meals around my market hauls again. According to their Facebook page: Opening Day will feature an asparagus recipe demonstration and tasting by Chef Lisa Brisch of Orange Pomegranate!

Wild Mushroom Hike

Sunday May 1st 1pm at White Clay Creek State Park. Intermediate-level hike to learn about the wild mushrooms in the park, accompanied by mushroom enthusiast Glenn Cote. Call the Nature Center (302)368-6560 for meeting location.

And while I’m thinkin’ about it…

National Prescription Drug Take Back Day

Saturday April 30th 10:00am – 2:00pm. Dispose of unused or expired medications safely (so they don’t poison the soil, water, or any people or animals). Locally, the most obvious take back drop-off locations are at Frawley Stadium and the UD Police Department Public Safety building, but you can input your zipcode here for the most convenient location near you. Can’t make it? Find out how to dispose of your meds safely (and why it’s so important).

Flip-Flop Brigade

Until May 21st. Got old flips? Gather up your foot thongs (regardless of condition) and bring them to Old Navy. Each store will have a collection box located near the entrance where you can drop off your flip-flops. TerraCycle will repurpose the flip-flops into playgrounds that Old Navy will give away to a few lucky schools or community organizations. Is that cool or what? (Then, maybe treat yourself to some nice flips that will last a few seasons, huh?)

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That’s all I got! What else is happening this weekend?

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April 29, 2011
Wildwood NJ and Morey’s Pier: Revisiting and Creating Memories

Wildwood Boardwalk, early 80s. Yes, I'm adorb.

Leftovers in their less visible form are called memories.

Stored in the refrigerator of the mind and the cupboard of the heart.

-Thomas Fuller

To take that analogy one step further: memories nourish and sustain the soul (and potentially poison it too, but that’s a different blog post).

When I was young summers were a vast wasteland. I hated summer vacation. The hours and days seemed to last forever. We never really went anywhere or did anything much that I can remember, except for one week in late August, when we rented a room at the Pan-a-Lu in Wildwood NJ.

This week would be marked in red on my calendar, and I would count down the days until I could escape the boring day-to-day of summertime home life, which generally consisted of soap operas, walks to the grocery store (we had no car), rereading Sweet Valley High books, cooking dinner and waiting for the bus bringing my dad home from work.

Wildwood meant the ocean, and shell-collecting, and sand-castle building. It meant feeding french fries to sea gulls and petting rays and sharks. It meant salt-water taffy and cotton candy and Douglass Fudge, trips to the movies and skee-ball at the arcade, early morning bike rides on the boardwalk and “Watch the tram-car, please.”

Summer concerts with Al Alberts singing “On the Way to Cape May,” cheesy souvenir clothing and “things made with shells.” Oh, god, and hermit crabs.

And for one glorious day, it meant a wristband (unlimited rides) at Morey’s Pier.

Last summer, on the last day of the season, the kids and I got to participate in a Blogger’s Day at the Beach, and I took a stroll down memory lane at Morey’s Pier. With my children.

Now, my kids have it way different than I did (glory, in so many ways it’s not even funny). I take them on field trips as often as I can, and my in-laws have a beach house on Long Beach Island that we visit often. But a boardwalk was a new adventure for them, as was an amusement park where 90% of your day is NOT spent waiting in lines.

They had a great time creating new memories, and I spent the day in a weird duality, remembering what it was like to be a child in that space while reveling in my children’s unabashed enjoyment.

Pink elephants

carousel

Kite Flyer

Wave Swinger

Morey’s Pier Rock and Roll- this used to be one of my faves but man, just makes me sick now

Morey’s Pier Moby Dick. I get sick on these too- new appreciation for my dad, going on all these rides with me

Morey’s Piers Convoy

Quick story about the Convoy: once I was waiting for my brother to get off this ride and another (little, maybe 3 or 4yo) kid tripped on the track and busted his face wide open. I know now that face wounds bleed a lot, but at the time I was very severely freaked out and scared and not only did I not go on any more rides for a loooooong time, but I had horrible nightmares about the whole ordeal.

And? I never told anyone about it until I went back to Wildwood and my memory was jogged. It’s a strange relief to put that whole episode in perspective, and to rest.

As a kid I found the FREAKING ENORMOUS Ferris Wheel terrifying. As an adult I still find it somewhat unnerving.

But I felt better seeing that my kids, thrill-seekers that they are, also gripped the sides a bit tightly when the wheel was moving at full steam. It’s REALLY REALLY BIG, ya’ll.

On this trip I also learned that my kids are not natural born drivers. (This was their first time ever manning the bumper car themselves, usually Jeff or I drive. I had to swing past the boys and tell them to hit the gas pedal.)

Bumper Cars

Mini Scooters

Then we had Jumbo’s pizza and Curley’s fries and that brought me back to childhood more than anything. But only because the tram-car wasn’t running.

As the sun set we got some cotton candy for the road (the fried Oreos, alas, had sold out) and Kohr’s Bros. orange-and-vanilla-twist ice cream cones. Not the most nutritious of days, which I don’t mind a few days a year on occasions such as this. That infrequent extravagence helps contribute to the creation of the memory, the nourishment of the soul.

The kids have already asked if they can go back this summer, and I’m happy to comply, since we didn’t get to the second pier’s worth of rides or to the waterparks. There are also some adults-only “extreme” rides I’m wanting to check out.

Best of all— this is relatively new— you can have “Breakfast in the Sky,” a fancy-shmancy chef-created meal on the Ferris Wheel, complete with white linens and china. I’m not exactly sure why this appeals to me so much BUT IT DOES.

It was so much fun, then and now. I know we all have “our” beach; Wildwood will always be “my” beach even though my summers are now spent elsewhere. But if you’re willing to try out a new beach, a new adventure to stand out in your kids’ memories: give Wildwood a whirl. Up until April 29th you can save up to 35% on the purchase of Morey’s Pier admission tickets.

Where did you vacay as a kid? Do you go to the same place now?

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Disclosure time! I attended the Blogger’s Day at the Beach last summer, receiving ride wristbands and snack vouchers for me & the kids, but was under no obligation to blog about it. I obviously really wanted to anyway, but opted to wait until now in the hopes of nudging people to visit this summer.

Because Morey’s Piers are JUST THAT AWESOME.

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April 21, 2011
Local Family Fun This Weekend: 4/15- 4/17
Each new year is a surprise to us.

We find that we had virtually forgotten the note of each bird,
and when we hear it again, it is remembered like a dream,
reminding us of a previous state of existence…

-Henry David Thoreau

Another Saturday, another day at the soccer fields! After a week of being cooped up in the house with feverish kids I’m looking forward to being outdoors so cross your fingers for NO RAIN.

For local peeps, this is what I’d be doing if not cheering from sidelines:

Kids’ Greenfest

Saturday April 16th 10:00am- 3:00pm at the Newark Center for Creative Learning. “This fun-filled event will offer kids’ hands-on activities to learn about green technology, wildlife, energy, food and conservation. Kid-led exhibits and sustainability experts will share easy ways for changes everyone can make. Come enjoy storytelling, live music, local food, art, and environmental displays and activities. Free admission, free parking… Browse your bookshelves for books you and your children are finished with, bring them to Greenfest, and swap them for new-to-you books!”

Kite Day

Saturday April 16th 1:00- 3:00pm at Brandywine Creek State Park. April is “Let’s G.O.! (Get Outside!) Month” over at the Children & Nature Network. Kite Day at Brandywine Creek is a registered event! (You can read about why I think kite-flying is a monumentally important childhood experience here, but I think just causing an expression on your kid’s face like Cass has above is reason enough on its own.) Celebrate Earth Day early by making and flying your own kite! $3 per kite.

National Park Week

April 16th- 24th. Free admittance to over 100 parks… less exciting for those of us in the DE area, unless you’re willing to do some traveling (but we’re on spring break! So maybe not totally out of the question…) “This year’s focus, Healthy Parks, Healthy People, highlights the connection between human and environmental health and the vital role America’s national parks play in both.”

Here Comes Peter Cottontail…

The Easter Bunny will be out and about… laying eggs? Hiding eggs? Why does he have eggs, anyway? I’m going to have to hunt him down at some point Sunday because I have photos I need to take 🙂
- White Clay Creek State Park Egg Hunt: Saturday April 16th 10:00- 11:00am at the Carpenter Recreation Area (off 896). 10:00 is walking- 4yo, 10:30 5-9yo. Rain date 4/17 starting at 2:00pm, call the Weather Hotline 302-366-7147 if weather is iffy. BYOB (Bring your own basket) to collect goodies and see the Easter Bunny. Park fees in effect.
- Milburn Orchard Egg Hunts: April 16th & 17th; 21st, 22nd & 23rd plus Bonus Day Monday, April 25th (closed Easter Sunday), 11:00am- 3:00pm. Up to 1800 eggs for the finding every half hour, with prizes to choose from for every hunter. Hayrides through the apple orchards, games & activities, Gigantic Sand Dig, Barnyard Buddies, & the Easter Bunny on the playground. APPLE CIDER DOUGHNUTS. Weather permitting; dress accordingly and call if weather is iffy. $5 per child (containers provided/prizes awarded), $3 per non-prize collecting adults.
- Hayrides to Bunnyland: Saturday April 16th thru April 23rd, 11:00am– 4:00pm at Linvilla Orchards. Take a hayride thru the woods to visit the Easter Bunnies house, the Easter Bunny visits with everyone on the ride and gives them each a treat. Pony Rides (Sat & Sun only), face painting & train rides; baby chick display & baby animals. $8 per person.
Feel like heading up to Philly?
- Philadelphia Book Festival Street Fair: Saturday April 16th 10:00am- 5:00pm at Parkway Central Library. Meet three authors of The 39 Clues series and Chris Van Allsburg (!). Storybook Parade, juggling, face painting, and a heckuva lot more, including my favorite, a Zine workshop for kids 10 and up.
- Science Carnival: Saturday April 16th 10:00am- 5:00pm on the Ben Franklin Parkway. More than 80 exhibitors offering “non-stop family-friendly experiments, interactive activities, games, and a packed line-up of live entertainment. Enjoy liquid nitrogen ice cream, make gak, meet live zoo animals, check out the inner-workings of robots, take a tour of a helicopter, extract DNA from a strawberry, test a “crime scene” for forensic evidence, and so much more!” Rain or shine, dress accordingly.
AND, last Winter Farmer’s Market Sunday April 17th from 10:00am- 2:00pm at the Newark Natural Foods Co-op… the outdoor market begins May 1st! Whoop whoop!

What are you up to this weekend? What do you wish you were doing?

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April 15, 2011