Harvest Festival: Room for Improvement

I think the Stamford Museum and Nature Center is the best place for kids in Stamford, but I was disappointed in the Harvest Festival.
By the time I got there at 2:30, they were out of cider and cider donuts, which were pretty much the only reason I went. On top of that, I had to pay 5 bucks for the event (for non-members it was $10). The kid and I didn't do anything except look at the animals. I wasn't interested in face-painting, food or story-telling.
I am taking this as a learning experience to get there EARLY next year. It started at 11. I'll be in the parking lot at 10:45 at the LATEST! I was trying to avoid the crowd, and full parking lots, but now I realize that you have to leap into the fray if you expect to get anything good in Fairfield County. Lesson learned.
Still, I hope next year the planners will recognize that at a family event, some people will arrive later because of nap schedules, and perhaps reserve some of the goodies for the later shift!

At least it was a beautiful day, the kid was well-behaved, and I ran into like 6 of my friends (who also missed out on cider and donuts).

They also ran out of popcorn, which I didn't notice, but my friend's kid was not happy about that. Click here to read more.

Last Meal at Bennett's

Wow, just read on Lunch Break Chronicles that Bennett's is closing. The husband and ate there a month ago during Bedford Arts and Crafts. My cosmo was AWESOME. One of our steaks was overdone and one was underdone, but after the cosmo, and because my parents and sister were babysittng the kid, I totally didn't care. My husband and I traded and I ate the overdone one (with delicious sauce). The appetizer and dessert were good.

Anyway, bye, Bennett's, place where the Dalai Lama once ate! Click here to read more.

Funny Article

What a great article from the Stamford Advocate online. (Might not be so funny if you know the guy.) I'll format it later. Here's the headline:

Cops: Naked man tossed $9,271 into river

And the article:
STRATFORD -- A 62-year-old Bridgeport man was committed for psychiatric evaluation after police found him naked throwing thousands of dollars into the marsh near the grounds of the Shakespeare theater.

Police responded to a resident complaint that a nude man with a goatee was throwing rocks at his dog on the theater grounds around 12:28 p.m. Tuesday.

When police arrived on the scene, the man ran along Shore Road and jumped into the marshland of the Housatonic River, according to Police Capt. Kenneth Bakalar. He then began throwing hundreds of bills into the water around him, Bakalar said.

Police fished out $9,271 of what appears to be the man's own money, Bakalar said.

Later, when asked why he was nude, the man stated a tornado had blown off his clothes, police said.

The man was then committed to St. Vincent's Medical Center in Bridgeport for evaluation.

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Harvest Festival Next Month at SMNC

My calendar is already marked for the Stamford Museum and Nature Center's Oct. 17 Harvest Festival. Pumpkin picking, hay ride, face painting, storytelling, apple cider and doughnuts... sounds pretty fantastic. Rain or shine, $5 members, $10 non, 11am-4pm.

I am a huge fan of the nature center. The only thing it's missing is a hose near the exit to wash the duck poop off your shoes and stroller wheels.

Geez, Oct. 17 is in only 3 weeks. Time flies.

PS Know why I am able to actually get a blog post up today? 'Cause I'm taking the day off work for the kid's 18 month well visit, and the little hellion is sleeping in. Nah, he's not a hellion, he's actually an angel, but I can't think of another short word that means "lots of energy, spins in circles for fun, really doesn't sleep as much as I had the impression that kids were supposed to sleep." Click here to read more.

Arts and Crafts on Bedford...

was nice!
Not that crowded as far as shoppers, but people were eating up a storm from 6-8 when we were there. I saw two moms I know from Stamford Hospital Moms Group (cue "It's a Small World After All"). The arts and crafts were pretty typical, but of good quality. There was some nice jewelry. The husband and I had dinner at Bennett's. Excellent service and decent food. My cosmo was EXCELLENT.

This is the first time I've ever made this event. I forget why. The people watching was very good. Lots of kids, lots of small dogs. The end. Click here to read more.

Cans and Cocktails Charity Happy Hour

I love cocktails, and I love blogging, so this is the perfect charity event for me... please join us in two weeks for this wonderful event organized by Stamford blogger Stamford Notes!

Ever wonder who is behind some of your favorite Stamford blogs? Come meet them over drinks and raise a glass to Stamford!

On Wednesday, September 29th starting at 5:30pm, join up for “Cans and Cocktails” at Chinese Mirch, 35 Atlantic Street in Stamford. Each blog will sponsor a cocktail, and each cocktail helps fight hunger in our community. All profits from the event benefit the Food Bank of Lower Fairfield County.

The event is co-sponsored by:
- Stamford Notes
- We Can't Stop

With support from:
- Stamford Talk
- Streets of Stamford
- The Lunch Break Chronicles
- CT Bites
- Blog Stamford
- Always Home and Uncool
- PeculiarBliss

Chinese Mirch is also donating 10% of food sales from Monday, September 27th through Thursday, September 30th to the food bank. There will be specialty Stamford souvenirs created just for this event. For extra good karma, bring a few cans of food to donate.

Additional information available at www.stamfordnotes.com and www.wecantstop.com. Please email stamfordnotes@gmail.com to RSVP. Hope to see you there!

Click here to read more.

Coalhouse Rocking the Pumpkin Beer

We had a fabulous dinner at Coalhouse Pizza tonight. You may know that I am pretty obsessed with pumpkin-related food, so the fact that Coalhouse had a Pumpkin Ale by Southern Tier Brewing Co only augmented what would have been a very good meal any way. I got the mac and cheese with broccoli rabe and sausage (delish!). The husband got the BBQ Sandwich. He loved it. And when I say he's picky, I'm not exaggerating. I'll be getting that BBQ Sandwich next time.

The kid ate almost all of his meatballs. At 9.75, NOT a great kid's price, but it's Kobe beef and I suppose relatively healthy, so I'll pay ten bucks as opposed to 6 or 7 for something not fried. I asked for a half portion, and the waitress acted like I was speaking Martian, but, well, the kid did eat almost all of it so... touche, waitress, touche!

Coalhouse was full of people who were obviously enjoying their food (and beer and wine). The chopped salad (love it!) towered on the plates of the people at the next table. My toddler passed the time waiting for entrees by drawing with the crayons that Coalhouse provided (thank God). It was a nice easy evening.

Coalhouse doesn't deliver, but that's OK for us since we live pretty close. We do takeout a lot.

Incidentally, I drove almost the ENTIRE LENGTH of the Southern Tier (of New York) last weekend for a friend's wedding. That's route 17/86. It was a gorgeous, gorgeous drive, the most beautiful I've taken in a while, and that made the over 7 hour drive bearable! It's almost to Lake Erie. I'm still somewhat in shock that I drove there Saturday morning and returned Sunday afternoon. Just one of the many reasons I'm finding it hard to keep up with blogging!

PS I had my first pumpkin spice latte of the season at the Stamford Mall yesterday! Click here to read more.

Pet Peeve: Train Station Pickup

Here I am waiting in the road since the south side parking spaces were full, and the measly north waiting area is full too. My sister's train is a couple minutes late. What a mess.

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Faces Around Stamford

I like Advocate reporter Elizabeth Kim's blog post about her "The Way We Live" series. The series looks at housing in Stamford. In the blog post, she gives the background to the article she wrote recently. The article features a security guard at the Tully Center who lives in one of the city's mixed-income housing developments; what's cool is that I totally recognized the guy from a visit I made to Tully last week. (LOVE the Tully Center.)

My world is getting small. At the grocery store yesterday, I ran into THREE different mom-baby pairs I know- two from random playground trips, and one a coworker/friend. At that same grocery store, I ran into Streets of Stamford a few weeks ago, and before that, Mrs. Streets of Stamford and Baby SOS!

This is why I must always brush my teeth before I go out and always be on my best behavior.

Oh- and in the article, you can see photos (including the one above) by Dru Nadler, who did an awesome job photographing my wedding 3 years ago. Did you know Dru does weddings? She's fabulous. Relaxed but no-nonsense. The perfect person to have around on your wedding day. Big Dru Nadler fan here. Click here to read more.

Music: Refugee All-Stars in Fairfield Saturday

This is nice mellow music, made by the Sierra Leonian refugees portrayed in the (devastating) documentary, Refugee All-Stars. These men have been through an awful civil war- imagine the most heinous crimes you can think of, and it happened to them- and still made music to entertain others in the camps. If you are free, it's worth a trip up to Fairfield.
Buy tickets for this Saturday's show here or see a trailer for the documentary on the Refugee All Stars' website. The documentary is great- I recommend it.



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Being "That Parent"

You know how you sometimes see parents do stuff you think YOU'D never do? Like letting a kid play a video game at dinner? Or letting your kid scream at the library? Or, letting a kid run amok, ripping stuff off shelves, while you chat with your friend?
Now, I'm not necessarily saying I've done those things, but I did have a moment last weekend when I saw a couple looking at my family as if we were "those horrifying people." It does involve letting my baby play an iPhone app at dinner, but let me give you some background.

In early August the toddler and I flew to California to visit my sister, just me and him, with- horrors- a layover. With the thought of seven hours in a plane, and an hour layover, I armed myself with all the things I could to keep him busy: food, drink, books, stuffed animal, and iPhone apps. Most parents do videos, but I didn't want to deal with bringing a laptop for that, since I didn't want to have to put it in and out of the backpack at security. I already had to deal with kid and carseat, so I figured I could make the iPhone work.

One of the apps I got for him is Talking Tom- a cat that repeats what you say. You can also knock him out if you poke him in the face repeatedly. Well, since my kid only says like 15 words, he preferred to mostly knock the cat out. Oh- and shriek at it. The app was a moderate success on the plane- I had to limit his time with it because of the shrieking, plus I was a little freaked out by how addicted to it he (and my sister's older 3 kids- yes she now has 5 kids age 7 and under) became.

So, cut to last weekend. We were out for what we thought would be a quick dinner. The kid, as usual, was doing great, snacking and being pretty quiet. Something weird happened to our order, though, and our entrees took 45 minutes to arrive. The kid had been in the stroller for a while, then in his dinner seat for an hour, and was getting restless and fussy. I didn't want to get him out of his seat because he's way too active and crazy to let walk around a non-baby safe area, so to calm him down, I gave him the drug- I mean, iPhone. He immediately became deliriously happy and started punching Talking Tom in the face. I noticed the lady across from me turning to look at my kid, then turning back toward her date, and then they both looked back at us. It was an "Oh my god" look, rather than a "Oh how cute and funny" look. I could totally see that she saw us as "those awful people that let their kids play video games." And even worse, a very young kid.

I feel a little bad about that, but then I think, "Whatever." I don't see how you can expect kids (and active boy toddlers) to do ridiculous things like ride in a plane for 7 plus hours, or sit in a in a seat or stroller for almost two hours, without doing something equally ridiculous like letting them play with your iPhone. It's hard to live a balanced life as a parent without doing a little crappy parenting here and there.

By the way, the flights turned out well. On the way out he slept a lot since he'd woken up at 3am to make a 6:45 flight- and on the way back, not only did we have new iPhone videos of him and his cousins to watch, he'd also learned from his cousins how to jump off stuff, so he spent several minutes jumping off the armrest into his seat. Our flight home landed at- ugh- 11pm, and although he was crabby, he spent, no joke, 30 of the last minutes quietly buckling and unbuckling our ERGObaby carrier. The kid's a champ. Click here to read more.

Sports in Small Spaces

See this worn patch of grass in front of this apartment building?

It’s worn because the dudes who live there use it for sport.

The building is on the busy corner of Forest and Strawberry Hill, and the patch of grass is on Forest.

Once, I passed by and two of them had out a football. I wanted to take a photo but my husband for some reason wouldn’t let me.
He said that one time, he passed by and they were playing beer pong.
Beer pong, I can see, but I was curious what type of football they were going to be able to do in such a small area.

In any case, I think it’s great they are making the most of their outdoor space.
Be sure to be on the lookout for these guys, and let me know what sport you see them try next!
Bowling maybe? Bocce? Click here to read more.

Breastfed in the Park

The Breastfeeding in the Park event went great. We gathered at 11, sat around and ate and chatted, latched on the babes at noon, talked to the news crew and reporters, chased the toddlers around and oohed and aahed at the littler babies, then cleaned up. I saw some old, good friends and made some new ones, which is always awesome. We had 25 babies/children nursing, and many more people came to show their support.

Mad props to my fave store Giggle, and to my beloved Stamford Hospital lactation consultants, for showing up to support.

Something one of the reporters said made me realize that some people think La Leche League is about pressuring moms to breastfeed. It's not. It's about supporting moms who want to breastfeed- because believe me, we need support (my husband asked me to elaborate: many things can challenge the breastfeeding relationship- painful latches that need to be corrected, decreased supply after an illness of baby or mom, preemie having trouble nursing, the stress of pumping at work, being given a really crappy place to pump at work, bad advice from others). The mission statement says it all: "Our Mission is to help mothers worldwide to breastfeed through mother-to-mother support, encouragement, information, and education, and to promote a better understanding of breastfeeding as an important element in the healthy development of the baby and mother."

Speaking for myself, I do not feel it is my business how any other individual mother feeds her kid; rather, I want to be able to feed mine how I want, and the support and advocacy of La Leche League makes that possible. LLL is how I knew exactly what my pumping rights at work were, and how I know that I don't have to automatically believe my pediatrician when he tells me that age one is a good time to wean, or that after age one, you can't count breastmilk toward their nutrition or calorie needs. (How is that even logical?)

LLL, as far as I can see, is not about guilt-tripping parents who use formula (as the News 12 reporter Gillian Neff seemed to be trying really hard to make it seem in her 5pm segment- more on that later), but about educating society in general about breastfeeding, and thereby making it easier for women who want to breastfeed to do so. Nursing in public is one easy way to show that breastfeeding is a normal, natural, non-freaky act. I know that for me, seeing my sister nurse gave me the idea that it was a good thing to do- other than that, I'd never seen another person nurse a kid. I do not care if individual people breastfeed or use formula- plenty of my best mom friends do both. I do want people to know though, that nursing can be a very cool thing, and to try it if you're interested, and to get help if you need it from LLL or Stamford Hospital lactation (not your pediatrician, for goodness' sake, not your coworker or sister- get real help, and it's free!!!).

I probably used to have a stereotype of LLL as a bunch of hippies who are sticking their nose in people's business, pressuring them to breastfeed and trash-talking parents who formula-feed. I am sure there are some people in the organization like that, but not in this chapter. And anyone who acts like that is not following the philosophy of LLL in a positive way. LLL is about helping moms and babies, and that's why I am so pleased to be a part of it.

Plus I've just met some really cool people through it.
Click here to read more.