Archive for May, 2009

Want to make sure the kids get off the couch this summer? Take them to tomorrow’s performance of Circus Bella, a people-only circus featuring incredible things some folks can do with their bodies. Aerialists bend like a bow while swinging from a strap, acrobats run and flip merrily along a slack wire, jugglers fling all manner of things into the air and catch them with breathtaking skill. It’s enough inspiration to have them juggling outside on the front lawn until September.

Circus Bella
Circus Bella, an outdoor, one-ring circus features high-level acts set to the sounds of the Bella All-Stars. The show combines contemporary performance with the rich tradition of the American circus and includes acrobatics, juggling, slackwire, beatboxing, eccentric performance, aerial artistry, and musical mastery.
http://www.ybgf.org
5/30/09

Ages: Unknown
Time: 12n; 2:15pm
Cost: Free

Yerba Buena Gardens

760 Howard Street
San Francisco, CA94105

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Want to make sure the kids get off the couch this summer? Take them to tomorrow’s performance of Circus Bella, a people-only circus featuring incredible things some folks can do with their bodies. Aerialists bend like a bow while swinging from a strap, acrobats run and flip merrily along a slack wire, jugglers fling all manner of things into the air and catch them with breathtaking skill. It’s enough inspiration to have them juggling outside on the front lawn until September.

Catch Circus Bella at 12:00 noon and 2:15 p.m. as part of the free Yerba Buena Gardens Festival, 760 Howard Street (between Third and Fourth streets), ybgf.org.

If you’re not out at the Maker Faire (why aren’t you out at the Maker Faire?), you can sleep on a ship, help build a barge out of bottles,

Maker Faire

Make magazine’s Maker Faire is ground zero for the Bay Area’s crafters, robotics nerds, furniture makers, and other creatives, who get together each year for a two-day expo and party. Don’t miss the kid-friendly activities, and watch out for the cupcake cars (pictured.

When: Sat., 5/29, 10am-8pm; Sun., 5/30, 10am-6pm; All ages; Free-$25 daily.

Where: San Mateo Event Center & Expo Address, 2495 South Delaware Street (at Concar), San Mateo, makerfaire.com.

Family Overnight on the USS Hornet

Spend the night on this retired aircraft carrier, which houses vintage airplanes. Eat, sleep, and float around like a WWII Navy guy.

When: Fri., 5/29 5pm-10am; Age 5+; $100 per person.

Where: USS Hornet, 707 West Hornet Avenue, Pier 3, Alameda, 510-521-8448; uss-hornet.org.

Our Plastic Oceans

Our beautiful, sparkling Bay is contaminated by plastics. Find out how they enter the Bay with hands-on activities like an albatross bolus dissection, plankton examination, and the building of a plastic bottle barge. Bring one or more plastic bottles from your recycling to help us build the barge!

When: Sat., 5/30, 1-4pm; Age 3+; Free.

Where: Richardson Bay Center & Sanctuary, 376 Greenwood Beach Road (at Tiburon Boulevard), Tiburon, 415-388-2524; tiburonaudubon.org.

JAMband Family Concert

The lively, happy, kids band, fronted by effervescent movement coach Charity Kahn, gives a free morning concert in Dolores Park.

When: Sat., 5/30, 11am; All ages; Free.

Where: Dolores Park Playground, 20th and Dolores Streets, 415-425-0372; jamjamjam.com.

Suddenly-crowded parks and overstuffed preschool waiting lists don’t lie: according to an article in the San Jose Mercury News, San Francisco is experiencing a baby boom. Long known as the one of the most barren cities in the nation, San Francisco’s birth rates have suddenly spiked with over 9,000 born in the city for the first time since 1994, and the biggest brood of kids in general since the 1970s.

The Merc theorizes the new baby boom is a reversal of the yuppie trend, where parents moved out of cities and into suburbs as they spawned. The new class of mostly white, mostly upper class San Francisco parent loves city life enough to pay for private schools and the best neighborhoods.

My theory: parents started leaving SF in droves once the housing boom made it impossible for them to buy in the city. Now that housing in all the nearby cities is unreasonably inflated, discouraged parents vow to just rent rather than buying…and if you’re going to rent, goes the reasoning, why rent in Albany or San Mateo when prices are similar in San Francisco? Regardless, the influx of tiny citizens is probably a good thing for local parents, leading to more restaurant kids’ nights and more potential playmates on your block.

Monograms, unless they’re on hotel sheets, are generally pretty tacky. But who could begrudge the homespun pleasure of a child seeing his or her name on an ordinary household object? The monogramming company Fontaine Maury puts out one of the more attractive lines of kids’ monogrammed items I’ve seen, particularly their personalized melamine dinner plates. Named “Parker’s Plates” after Fontaine Maury’s own son, the plates feature your child’s name in a choice of 13 colors and 15 styles of type, surrounded by modern designs like these green-and-brown horizontal stripes.

At about $25 a plate, personalization included, the unbreakable, dishwasher safe plates make a cool shower or gift, one that’ll be used long after the My Breast Friend has been packed away.

Fontaine Maury Parker Plates, $23-25 at stationery stores including Papyrus; to see a list of Bay Area stores, click here.

But you’re not going to buy those hard, yucky, white-inside berries from the grocery store, are you? Get the very best berries, and teach your children a lesson about nature at the same time, with a trip to a local farmers’ market. The produce in Northern California is some of the best in the country, and the farmers’ markets are thus bursting with stalls selling fruits and vegetables so fine they’re the stuff of fever dreams. Carrots as sweet as apples! Peaches with juice that runs down your face and you don’t even care!

Picking through piles of produce can also help introduce kids to new fruits and vegetables. The delicate swirls of sweet pea shoots and mounds of emerald kale and mustard green are so beautiful, they must be tasty too, right, kids?

Some markets have prepared-food stalls too: honey, dips and jams, nuts, ethnic food. Or there are fish, egg, or fresh-poultry sellers, it’s not all about produce. But it is about buying food that’s as beautiful as it is healthy. To find out what markets are near you, visit localharvest.org.

If you don’t have plans for Memorial Day Weekend, well, now you do.

Carnaval San Francisco

The two-day-long party is a bit raucous and boob-centric for some parents, but it’s still a vibrant street festival with food, music, dancing, a parade, and colorful costumes.

When: Sat. & Sun., 5/23-24, 10am-6pm Sat., 9:30am-6pm Sun., Age 4+; Free.

Where: Festival is on Harrison Street (at 24th Street), San Francisco; Parade begins 9:30am Sunday and runs along 24th and Mission Streets; carnavalsf.com.

San Ramon Art & Wind Festival

Pretty things in the sky to look at, fun things on the ground to do. Food, entertainment on three stages, and kites, kites, kites.

When: Sat. & Sun., 10am-5pm, All Ages; Free.

Where: San Ramon Central Park, 12501 Alcosta Boulevard (at Bollinger Canyon Road), San Ramon; ci.san-ramon.ca.us.

“Curious George, Let’s Get Curious” opens at Children’s Discovery Museum

What kid doesn’t love a monkey? The Curious George exhibit drives home the show’s science focus with hands-on activities like weighing fruits and vegetables at the produce stand and operating wheels to help George climb a building.

When: Opens Sat., 5/23, 10am-5pm, All ages; Free-$8.

Where: Children’s Discovery Museum of San Jose, 180 Woz Way (at Auzerais Street), San Jose, 408-298-5437;  cdm.org.

Octopretzel

Part of perennial family favorite Ashkenaz’s May/June “Silly Sundays” series, this band’s get-up-and-dance show for kids features puppets, and songs with strings.

When: Sun., 5/24, Doors 2:30pm, show 3-4:30pm; Age 2+; $4-6.

Where: Ashkenaz Music & Dance Community Center, 1317 San Pablo Avenue (at Gilman Street), Berkeley; 510-525-5054; ashkenaz.com.

It’s (almost) enough to make me want to have a second child: John Robshaw’s Lapis crib bedding set, in resolutely non-cutesy neutral colors and with a batik, ethnic feel. Since designer Robshaw is known for his Indian block print textiles and exotic accessories, this line of baby bedding seems a natural extension of his talents; but it’s unlike anything else out there I’ve ever seen.

See the Lapis bedding along with other bedding at swanky home-accessories store Nest, 2300 Fillmore Street (at Clay Street), San Francisco. Call 415-292-6199 or visit nestsf.com. The collection is available at several other Bay Area boutiques; or just buy online.

Lapis Crib Bedding, $370 for set

Healthy-food-oriented parents whose kids attend a SFUSD school will want to be at Mission High School on Thursday night, at a special meeting organized by parents who hope to change SFUSD’s food policies. Here’s what the flyer says:

Are you interested in learning more about the food in SFUSD schools, and how to improve it? Do you want to see more fresh fruits and vegetables served with school meals? Perhaps you have heard about the food in Berkeley schools and wonder why San Francisco is different? Are you dreaming about locally-grown foods in our cafeterias?”

Why, yes! Yes, I am! I’ll see you there. This is just an evening of brainstorming; petitioning the SFUSD will come later. The meeting is at Thursday, May 21 at 7pm at Mission High School, 3750 18th Street (at Dolores) in San Francisco. Email lenabrook@yahoo.com or visit groups.yahoo.com/group/sffoodsystems/.

For more inspiration, see our earlier post on Ann Cooper, Director of Nutrition for the exemplary Berkeley Unified School District.

It’s really too bad that baby/kids store Modern Nursery doesn’t have a bricks-and-mortar outlet, because I’m betting that Hushamok’s Modern Bassinet (pictured) or Jenny Sauer’s beautiful wall prints would really be something to see in real life. No matter, Modern Nursery has the gush-over-goods you want. Baby bedding, diaper bags, furniture; Modern Nursery has everything you need to create the sleekest baby’s room you can imagine.

Modern Nursery’s toy selection is particularly choice, with toys nicely grouped by age (now you know what to get that seven-year-old nephew!). There aren’t pages and pages of toys, just a few, carefully selected, stylish, eco-friendly, and so pretty you want to display them rather than hiding them away in a storage bin.

Modern Nursery was launched by San Francisco mom Trish Meyler, yet another escapee from the corporate world. She’s since moved to Grass Valley, but her signature store maintains its sharp city aesthetic, one that will make droolers out of all who visit.