[Event] Life Is Good® Pumpkin Festival

On October 21st, tens of thousands will gather at the nation's oldest public park, the Boston Common, to break a world record (28,952 jack 'o lanterns!) and support a fantastic cause.

While pumpkins pour into the Common throughout the day and the creative carving continues, participants will enjoy good old-fashioned food and family-friendly activities like face-painting, scarecrow stuffing, magic shows, treasure hunts, a pumpkin maze, the Gargantuan Gourds Guessing Game, and four great live bands. Special guest Mayor Thomas M. Menino will be on hand for the costume parade at 3 p.m.

Proceeds to benefit Camp Sunshine.

More info can be obtained at Life Is Good®

As always, check out the "Kidding Around" calendar for more free events in and around Southern New England.

[Book] Art smart in the local library

Did you ever wonder the right way to introduce your little angel to the greatest of masters of all times, Leonardo Da Vinci, Claude Monet, Vincent van Gogh, to name a select few. Or, the right time. Well, how about right here and right now.

A couple of months ago, I was browsing the aisles of one of my favorite places, the local public library, with one of my favorite persons, my four-year old daughter, when we struck the mother lode. We were playing our usual game of her running to a shelf and picking out a book at random, and me reading it to her. A few books later, just when I was about to call it a day, she excitedly ran over to me with a book, the cover of which was as brilliantly hued as the midday sun. The title of the book read Camille and the Sunflowers: a story about Vincent van Gogh by Laurence Anholt.

In this true story, the great painter is described through the eyes of a young boy, Camille, whom he befriends while living for a short while in Camille's village. Although a sad tale, where van Gogh is subjected to taunts and ridicule by the villagers for being different (a constantly recurring theme the world over) and Camille's lack of understanding for this animalistic behavior, at the end the message that comes through is one of tolerance, empathy, compassion. And along the way the reader is exposed to the haunting beauty of some of van Gogh's masterpieces.

A quick search through the library databases and we now had four more Laurence Anholt books about great masters at our fingertips. Leonardo and the Flying Boy, The Magical Garden of Claude Monet, Degas and the Little Dancer, and Picasso and the Girl with a Ponytail. Plus, a host of other extremely interesting books.

Our literary pursuits were very well rewarded last weekend, when at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, both my daughters were excitedly running among the exhibits trying to locate a Monet or a Degas, which, I'm happy to inform, they did. Art, any one?

[Book] Five go capering ...

into my daughter's heart!

Enid Blyton, where art thou! Growing up in India, Enid Blyton was goddess amongst us 8-12 year olds. We could never ever get enough of her. And with seven-hundred plus books to her credit, we really could never ever get enough of her. I wistfully remember hours and hours of summer vacations spent devouring series after magical series of frolics and adventures and mysteries. Many of my role-models during my formative years were Blyton protagonists. Julian (Famous-Five), Barney (Barney series), Philip and Jack (Adventure series), and of course, the inimitable Frederick Algernon Trotteville, aka, Fatty (Mystery series). I would spend many a holiday attempting getting out of locked doors and writing messages in secret ink, not to mention disguising myself with a variety of nasty rags lying around the house. I don't recollect any of that ever working, but that didn't stop me from trying. And, my favorite bedtime wish was for a mystery to hit the neighborhood streets, so that I could at long last emulate my hero, the absolutely fantastic Fatty.

Fast forward - a whole bunch of years. Now, I have an eight-year old of my own, who actually enjoys reading books as much as myself. And, I do enjoy the books that she has been reading (having read every single one of them, of course). Mary Pope Osborne and the lovely Magic Tree House books, Roald Dahl and his marvellous creations, Judy Blume, Beverly Cleary, Johanna Hurwitz, and many many others. But, no Enid Blyton. I searched high and I searched low. Neighborhood libraries, libraries in the county, libraries around the state, libraries out of the state. Nada, zilch, naught - or something very close to it. I would find books from the middle of a series, which (I'm not embarassed to admit) I lapped up eagerly. But, I really wanted her to start reading at the very beginning, where the characters are introduced, story lines are formed, and the magic wand spins its web to pull you into a world that can only be experienced - never explained.

So, now drastic measures had to be invoked. Matters had to be taken into our own little hands. Magic, it seemed, did require a little nudge here and a little shove there. Time was relentlessly attempting to dislodge the beautiful innocence from our daughter's heart and we needed help to postpone the inevitable. And, then occured the event that I had been overtly yearning for, for many a year. Mars and Saturn had finally aligned in the constellation Sagittarius. A family vacation completed the needful and six weeks later, we are the proud possessors of 53 books written by the best children's author of all-time. These include the entire Famous Five series, the entire Mystery series, and the entire Adventure series.

I'm in seventh heaven, and so is my daughter!