Spring Fair

March 25, 2010

Michael, Jim, Stephanie, Bunny & Bayla





Spring Fair



The annual Key West Preschool Co-op Spring Fair is the major fundraising vehicle for the school. Each year, the fair serves as a harbinger of the new season and kids of all ages show up for the fun. Once again this year the fair was held on location at the school, moving from Bayview Park beginning last year. This year they added some larger rides and a pair of bounce houses to go along with all the other games and activities.









You could not have asked for a more perfect day, bright and sunny with a wonderful breeze, low humidity and temperatures in the low 70s. The wonderful weather brought the crowd out as thousands of kids and parents showed up for the fun.







Kathy once again, reprised her role as the Easter Bunny and I served as the official photographer and took over 700 photos of kids with the Easter Bunny through-out the day. It was so comfortable that in spite of the bright sunshine, Neither the Easter Bunny or I got too hot.







The Spring Fair features all sort of fun activities. Games, face-painting, rides and even the Monroe County Sheriff’s Department Animal Farm were available for attendees to enjoy. It is such a wonderful event and I know that it is creating memories for the kids that will remain with them forever. I can still recall fondly events like the School 70 Carnival and the School 70 Pumpkin Festival from my youth and I get the sense that these kids will recall the Spring Fair in a similar manner.







I was especially happy to see the kids interact with the animals that “Farmer Jeanne” brought from the animal farm. There was a great variety of cool animals, including a sloth, a small pony, a tortoise, a baby alligator, some bunnies, and ferrets. The sloth was really cool and so great with the literally hundreds of kids that interacted with it.







I have no idea how much money was raised for the Preschool, but it certainly looked to be a huge success. Special thanks to Jasmine Kenna, who for the second straight year was in charge of putting on the fair. They were two of the best Spring Fairs that I have attended and I’ve been to more than a few. The parents and staff at the school deserve thanks as well, it is certainly a lot of work, but in the end it all proved worthwhile.

Betsy, Bunny & Jasmine

Blue Skies

March 24, 2009

Stephanie & Bayla

Balloon Boy

Jim, Bayla, Stephanie & Kathy

Blue Skies

Graf

The first day of Spring slipped by me somehow with barely a notice, suddenly the cold winter, which was the coldest on record seems to have past. Oh a cold front or two may still try to sneak in, but they should be short-lived and progressively warmer. For now, we’ll enjoy the two weeks or so of Spring that the Keys get every year before it turns to Summer and we begin to complain about the heat.

Bayla & Stephanie

With Spring of course comes Spring Break and we have had a relatively busy one so far here in the Keys, at least relative to the past few years. It is still nothing like the throngs that descended upon the island back in the 90s when the party lasted a month or more and thousands of students packed the island. Now it is merely annoying and much more manageable.

Stephanie, Michael & Bayla

This year Spring Break has even brought us a number of visitors. Our niece was down for a week along with a classmate Stephanie to celebrate their final Spring Break of High School as they are seniors set to graduate` in June. They stayed with Kathy’s dad Jim, but we spent a good deal of time hanging out with them as they enjoyed the amazing Spring weather, what was actually probably the first week-long stretch of great weather that we have had this year to date.

Mary at Finnegan's Wake

I also had a plethora of visitors in this week for work as all the top brass at RPM Nautical were in town for a series of meetings and to plan for the pending retirement of the wonderful Mary Johnsen. Mary has worked for RPM since its inception and has worked for our founder going back 25 years. Her responsibilities are such that it is going to take three people to replace her, myself among them. She was down for the week as well to participate in the meetings and plan for the transition. We got to spend a lot of time together outside of work as well, which was a true pleasure. Kathy & I both wish Mary the best as she enters a new hopefully relaxed and enjoyable phase of life.

Michael, Kathy & Nadene

Trevor

In addition to the busy schedule for both me and Kathy, who was busy getting ready for the annual Spring Fair fundraising event at the Preschool, all sorts of activities continued to go on around us.

Betsy & Kathy



Trevor & Melissa

Graf, Fiona & Trevor

We had the wonderful opportunity to join our friends at Origami restaurant to help celebrate the 41st birthday of our friend Trevor “Shooter” Orr aka as “Balloon Boy” due to a recent mishap he suffered chasing after a balloon that kept him from continuing on a cruise. It was a great party with mucho sushi consumed that continued on into the evening as the party moved over to Grand Vin wine bar.

Kathy & Eric



Sadly the week ended on sort of a down note as we attended yet another going-away party. Our friends Eric & Mo Holowacz are leaving the Keys and moving to Australia. Eric has been the Director of The Studios of Key West for the past few years, building it into one of the premier artistic communities around. The party was an opportunity to say goodbye to Eric, Mo and their family as they prepare to relocate. Thankfully TSKW has been left in the capable hands of Jay Scott who has taken over as Director, but the Keys owe Eric a big Thank You for what he has accomplished for our community. Kathy & I wish the entire Holowacz family bon voyage and good luck in their new home.

Ashley & her parents.

Literary Landmark

March 23, 2010

Hemingway House





Literary Landmark



It has been so crazy the past week or so that I am suddenly falling behind on Blog postings, not so much on a chronological basis, but because there are so many activities happening that I find myself suddenly behind by a week or more, with no real let-up in sight. So the two events covered in this entry actually took place more than a week ago, and seem to have been even longer ago than that already.
The first was the designation of the Ernest Hemingway House as a Literary Landmark.

Cynthia, Annette, Betsy, Fran, Nancy, Kris & Les



Les Standiford

This is the final year for me as a Board member of the Friends of the Key West Library and it is sort of cool to go out with such a spectacular event. The Friends joined together in support of the Hemingway House and the staff of the Key West Library (notably Kris Neihouse and Nancy Klingener) in the designation ceremony.
The Hemingway House was the home to Ernest Hemingway and his second wife Pauline for nine years during the 1930s. It was easily the most prolific time of his life as he wrote 70 percent of his lifetime works while living in the house, including “For Whom the Bell Tolls”, “The Snows of Kilimanjaro”, and his only novel set in Key West, “To Have and Have Not”.





Jack & Melissa

There are seven other Literary Landmarks in Key West, the most in the state of Florida, including former homes of Poet Elizabeth Bishop and playwright Tennessee Williams, but for some reason Hemingway had been until now overlooked. The ceremony featured a presentation by noted author Les Standiford and the presentation of the Landmark plaque that was affixed to the front of the house under a perfectly beautiful Key West day.

Kris, Les & Nancy







The other event that Kathy & I took in two weekends ago; was the annual Marathon Seafood Festival. We drove the 50 miles up to the Festival to enjoy the wonderful selection of fresh seafood from the Florida Keys at the huge and enjoyable event. There are all sorts of informative and enjoyable vendors as well as a weekend long schedule of live entertainment. While we were there the old Keys stand-bys, Howard Livingston and the MM24 band were on stage. Kathy’s father Jim had not seen them before and he got his first taste of the old Johnson motor Margaritaville maker.

Jim & Kathy

Howard Livingston



The Seafood Festival is definitely worth the drive and we all had a great time. It’s nice to see a different part of the Keys and to run in to our Marathon friends. The food was really good this year as well.