Family Fun: November 14-16 Weekend What-To-Dos

Mint Museum Randolph, 2730 Randolph Road, presents a free one-day symposium on the arts in Africa. on Saturday, November 15th, 2014, from 10:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Symposium speakers include Dr. Herbert M. Cole, professor emeritus in the Department of the History of Art and Architecture at the University of California, Santa Barbara; and Drs. Akinwumi Ogundiran, UNC Charlotte; Henry John Drewal, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Cécile Fromont, University of Chicago; Victoria Rovine, UNC Chapel Hill. A masquerade performance by the Oyotunji African Village Yoruba performers will take place at approximately 4:30 p.m., and will be followed by a brief reception. It’s free to attend, but registration is required. Call 704-337-2107 or visit the website to learn how to register online. Box lunches from Panera Bread will be available for $10, cash only.

The Charlotte Symphony Guild’s Musical Petting Zoo offers a chance for children to look at, listen to, and try out orchestra instruments. These FREE events take place at ImaginOn, 300 East 7th Street. The next event:

Saturday, November 15th, 2014, 11:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at ImaginOn, 300 East 7th Street.

Call 704-416-4630 for more information.

Grey Seal Puppets is presenting “The Emperor’s New Clothes” at Sharon Presbyterian Church, 5201 Sharon Road, on Saturday, November 15th, 2014, 3:30 p.m. Admission is FREE but you need to reserve your tickets ahead of time and they are very limited. Reserve them now. The award-winning puppeteer troupe puts a new spin on Hans Christian Andersen’s classic tale, transforming it into a fable. Stay for post-show refreshments afterwards.

Sanctuary at Davidson, an art gallery and shop at 108 South Main Street in Davidson, is presenting the Downtown Davidson Holiday Art Crawl on Saturday, November 15th, 2014, from 6:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. Come enjoy a beautiful fall evening and the kick off of the Holiday season at the Downtown Davidson Holiday Art Crawl. Join 30 artists as they showcase and sell handmade art and gift items up and down the charming Main Street of Downtown Davidson. A multitude of art mediums represented ranging from fine art and textiles to pottery and baked goods. Crawlers will be treated to local musicians playing live in several Main Street venues and wine/beer tastings as well. For the kids: face painting, free crafts and a cup of delicious hot apple cider.

Bass Pro Shops, at Concord Mills, is hosting Santa’s Wonderland 2014, featuring FREE photos with Santa, crafts, games and activities. The festivities take place November 16th (with a preview event November 15th, 5pm to 8pm) through December 24th, 2014. The free Santa picture is a 4×6 print. Other packages are available for purchase. On Mondays through Thursdays the wait will be shorter. Each day a limited number of Bass Passes will be available. They will be for a specific time. You won’t have to stand in line, but will just return when your time comes. See the schedule for full information on when the crafts, games, activities and Santa visits will take place each day.

Preview event, November 15th, 5:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.

•   Magical tree lighting

•   Unveiling of Santa’s Wonderland

•   Carolers

•   Santa will be giving away a $25 Bass Pro Shops gift card to one lucky winner every half-hour! 5:30-7:30pm

•   Picture with Santa 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.

•   FREE craft and backpack clip* November 15, 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.

•   FREE cookies and McSteven’s hot chocolate

Games

•   Laser arcade

•   Slot car racing

•   Remote control trucks

•   Moving trains

•   Soft gun arcade

Crafts

•   Decorate a gingerbread stocking: November 15th

•   Decorate a stuffed reindeer: November 16th to 23rd

•   Color a plaster ornament: November 24th to 30th

•   Decorate a foam bird ornament: December 1st to 7th

•   Decorate a Santa bobber craft: December 8th to 14th

•   Decorate a stick soldier ornament: December 15th to 21st

Cookie decorating: December 22nd to 24th

Rock 'N Read 5K Beneficiary: Little Free Libraries

Still haven't purchased your registration for the Rock 'N Read 5K? Did you know that proceeds benefit the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library Foundation? One of the great community projects that was recently launched by the Library Foundation is the Little Free Library project which was featured in an article in the Charlotte Observer. The Little Free Libraries is a community outreach effort to provide access to books in areas where the population is underserved. LFL's are small containers that house books that are free to the public.  The idea is that people will take books and either put it back when they are finished reading, or will restock the LFL with another book they have previously read. More Little Free Libraries are planned for the Charlotte area, and registrations for the Rock 'N Read 5K will help to continue to fund this great community resource.

Don't forget, we'll be giving away a registration to the Rock 'N Read 5K. Continue reading the Rock 'N Read feature posts to learn about how this event benefits the Charlotte community through the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library Foundation and find out how you could win the registration giveaway.

Service Project Announcement Coming Soon!

At the beginning of 2013 I made the decision that my son and I would do a monthly service project.  Each month this year we gave time, and in some cases, money to help different groups of people/organizations. In 2014 we will be doing the same, but on a larger scale.  Stay tuned for a post within the week about January's service project, of which we are really excited!  This year we are looking to get more people involved and hope that you will join us.  There will be plenty of ways for you and your family to be part of the solution to some of the challenges within the community.

Stay tuned……..

Are you your child's best advocate?

This evening I participated in a town hall meeting regarding North Carolina's new legislative initiative, Read To Achieve. In short it mandates that 3rd graders that are not reading on grade level will be held back.  These students will be given the chance to attend summer reading camps (not mandatory) that will be devoted to getting them on level.  If at the end of the six weeks they are up to par they will be allowed to move to the 4th grade, if not, they will have to repeat the 3rd grade.  The forum was hosted by First Baptist Church West and in attendance from Charlotte Mecklenburg School System were Deputy Superintendent Ann Clark, Community Superintendent (West) Allen Smith and NC Senator Malcolm Graham. The purpose of this forum as well as several planned forums is to make sure that parents are aware of this new legislation, especially parents of 3rd graders, such as myself.

One of the attendees asked the question, "Are you all (school system) prepared to deal with the outpouring of feelings and comments at the end of this year of parents that don't know about this law?" It is something I thought about when I read the letter that is posted on my son's school's website before the school year started.  The same letter was sent home during the first week of school, but I'm sure not all parents received or read that letter.  It brings me to one of the challenges, better yet, responsibilities of being a parent, being your child's best advocate.  Are we waiting to be told and spoon fed everything, or are we taking the initiative in seeking out policies, regulations, responsibilities, expectations, resources, etc.? Often times parents rely on the school to give them all of the information that would be helpful for their children, but why is it solely the responsibility of the school.  Yes, they are aware of many tools that are available, but what about being proactive?  As I mentioned above I found the information about the new legislation on the school's website.  Let me be clear, I don't visit the site as often as I should, I was honestly only there to see when Open House was because I was trying to plan an end of summer vacation.  But on the site there is a host of information about the school as well as links to the system's site. On my recent post about the public library I highlighted a few of the many FREE resources that are made available, just through having a library card, which is free. The public libraries appear to be a underutilized resource, but it is readily available to all.  

We make the time to plan vacations, strategically tackle Black Friday, research the pros and cons of the iPhone versus the Samsung Galaxy, etc, are we doing the same for our children? Not that we are going to uncover every resource and opportunity but are we putting forth the effort that our children deserve?

Weekend Agenda 9/21-9/23

Did you know the World's Fair is coming to Charlotte this Sunday?  The Mint Museum Uptown is hosting Sunday Fun Day (which is one of our favorite hangout spots in town) is debuting their new exhibit 'Inventing the Modern World: Decorative Arts at The World's Fairs 1851-1939':

This groundbreaking international exhibition presents outstanding examples of glass, furniture, jewelry, ceramics, precious metalwork, and textiles displayed at the world’s fairs between The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations in London in 1851 and the New York World’s Fair in 1939. Many of these objects have never before left their respective institutions or countries.

The museum is debuting this exhibit in a big way, there will be a Ferris Wheel in uptown Charlotte as part of the opening events his Sunday! If you come out look for us between 1-3pm, we'll be there volunteering.

If you're in the Kannapolis area Saturday evening you should check out Stories Under the Stars, for an interactive program that brings words to life.  

What better way to kick of autumn than with a corn maze?!  Rural Hill's seven acre Amazing Maize Maze is now open through November 3.

Big shout out to all of the ladies that will be participating in the Ramblin' Rose Tri this Sunday! I did it last year and crossing that finish line is such an incredible feeling.

What is on your weekend agenda? Don't forget to check out the calendar for upcoming activities and events. 

Justin Timberlake, Math Whizzes, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and World Travelers all in one spot?!?!?

Do you know where you can go to learn new languages, receive free tutoring services and stream tv shows and movies all for free?  Give up?  It's your public library!  And those are just three of MANY services they provide and offer to the community and card holders.  The saying 'Membership has its privileges' definitely rings true in this case.

Most people think of the library as just a place to check out books, or if you are my age, it was where you spent your weekends in high school before a major project was due. Well there are so many services available it has taken me a week to decide which to highlight because there are just too many to highlight without this qualifying for a PhD thesis.

I would have had no idea about all the library offers and probably wouldn't have taken my son as young as I did had it not been for my father.  My parents are really great about doing activities just with him as a bonding opportunity and getting a library card was one of them.  My father was the one that introduced him to the library and got him his first library card. I lived in Hickory, NC when I was a pharmaceutical sales rep and I had a library card there upon learning that you could check out movies.  Clearly this was before Netflix and I don't remember them having a Blockbuster Video. But that was four years before he was born so I hadn't been inside a library for a while before taking him in to check out books.

One day I decided to go onto the library's website to see if downloading books to mobile devices was a possibility (which it is) and that is where I discovered a whole new world of services offered by the library.  One of the first was the ability to download new music. Imagine my delight to be able to download some of Justin Timberlake's '20/20 Experience' the week it came out!  That is where I found out about Hoopla, it is a service that allows you to stream movies and tv shows to mobile devices, for free. A sorority sister of mine recently posted about Hoopla on her Facebook page and how she enjoys it with her twins. Frankly I was surprised that someone else knew about it but am glad that people are taking advantage of this resource.  There are lots of kid friendly movies and tv shows available, especially shows that were popular when I was a child.  I always love sharing things with my son that my brother and I use to love or were popular when we were his age. Or as Tyler says, 'back in the old days'.

You can also take advantage of a great program called Mango Languages through the public library.  My son is in a spanish immersion school and since I did a horrible job of paying attention in high school, my spanish is sub par and I have got to learn so that I can better help him learn as well as communicate with him to make sure he isn't cursing me out to my face unbeknownst to me.  Mango Languages is a program that offers 60, yes, 60, foreign languages and yep, it's free! You can even choose if you just want to learn for conversation or if you want more in depth learning for grammar and reading comprehension. So guess who has it downloaded onto their mobile devices?

The other really huge service offered to the community through the public library is free tutoring services.  That's right, I said free! Tutor.com provides free tutoring services daily from 4:00pm EST to 12:00am EST. You can select from math, science, english and a few other subject areas and it is broken down by elementary, middle, high school and adult levels.  Seriously, how often are you able to find free tutoring services?

As I said earlier, membership has its privileges and you don't get these free services without having a library card. There are so many other services and programs I didn't mention: help with starting a business, digital magazine subscriptions, movie screenings, story time, audiobooks, book clubs for all age levels and the list goes on.  You can find out for yourself better than I can tell you.  What's the Daily Show with Jon Stewart reference?  I got to go to a taping of the show when it was in Charlotte for the DNC and guess where it was filmed?!?!  Yep, at ImaginOn, part of our library system! You can't tell me that isn't pretty awesome! The library is for kids of ALL ages. Do you and your kids have one of the the coolest membership cards in town?  What are some of your favorite things about the library?