Beacon Barks Parade, April 25, 2015 - A Celebration of Animal Love

Beacon Barks marks the coming of Spring and bringing animal friends and people in the community together. This year, the parade is on April 25, 2015, and everything begins at 10am and goes until 3pm. Beacon Barks is in its 9th season of animal love and glory parading down Main Street.  In 2015 Beacon Barks opened an Instagram account, the photos of which we blogged about here.

Sponsored and created by Beacon Barkery, our most delicious and nutritious pet store, and the Dutchess County SPCA, proceeds have helped support numerous animal welfare initiatives, including the opening of Beacon’s Dog Park along with supporting the great work of area shelter and animal rescue groups. It’s just as true today as it was all those years ago – Beacon Barks is the largest celebration of animal shelters and rescue groups in our area.

The full schedule of events is at Beacon Barks website, but it all starts at 10am with Opening Ceremonies and lining up of everyone in the parade. If you're driving, get here early to find parking on side streets. Follow along Beacon Barks' Instagram account for cute dog photos 

Here's what you can expect during the day:

• A lot of fun.
• A lot of sun (hopefully!!).
• A lot of happy dogs, some in costume.
• A lot of dog enthusiasts and kids who love dogs.
• A lot of walking and shopping from a market of vendors you may not have seen before, and the shops on Main Street.
• A lot of food! This is your chance to eat your way down Main Street, between the vendors and the shops, you will be happy.

More annual events are coming up, don't miss them! See A Little Beacon Blog's Annual Events Calendar for several don't-miss events.

Beacon's City Wide Yard Sale - June 13, 2015

Beacon's City Wide Yard Sale is Saturday, June 13th, 2015 from 9am - 3pm. It's one of my favorite weekends in Beacon because I am a trash picker and love collecting things from people yards. So to have an official day for it is beyond exciting. This is one event that you will want to drive, because you will be collecting unimaginables from around the city, and you won't be able to take them home. Parking in front of people's yard sales usually isn't a problem because people are yard hopping constantly, moving from one yard sale to the next.

Participating in the yard sale can happen one of two ways - you can register your address as an official yard sale and get on the map (try calling the City of Beacon at (845) 838-5000), or just put stuff out on your yard and tag it. People will surly be driving by and will stop. Some families get really into it, and are letting their inner antique shop out, or are professional flea market vendors who happen to live in the neighborhood. This year, the City of Beacon Recreation Department is opening up the Recreation Center at 23 West Center Street to host yard sales from individuals who don't have yards or enough stuff to fill a yard yet want to sell during the yard sale. More information about the flea market style yard sale is here in their newsletter archives.

Finding yard sales is as easy as just driving around Beacon. The City does put out an official map, and will most likely be in the windows of shops on Main Street.

Items You're Likely to Find:

• Tools. I found a great table saw for $5!
• Bikes
• Baby and Kid items.
• Patio Furniture
• Books
• Trinkets
• Weight Lifting Things
• Whatever you need, it's probably sitting in someone's front yard...

Tips for Running a Successful Yard Sale:

• Put up signs a block away from your house that have arrows and your address.
• Tag everything with prices, or have tables that are different prices. Make it easy for the shopper to pick something up and know the price.
• Serve lemonade or something easy and fun to keep your shoppers hydrated and happy.

You can always get your fix of vintage and estate sale type shopping at Beacon Flea Market every Sunday on Henry Street in the back parking lot, behind the Yankee Clipper Diner.

Kayak Storage Locker at Long Dock Rental Lottery From Scenic Hudson

The kayak pavilion at Long Dock Park prior to rental season.

Kayak season in the Hudson Valley begins in the spring, and kicking it off is the seasonal renting out of the kayak storage lockers in the pavilion at Long Dock Park where many kayak rental companies including Mountain Tops launch their paddling tours.

Come spring, these metal slots will be filled with colorful kayaks.

Did you ever wonder how you could score a kayak locker for seasonal kayak storage in the new pavilion so that you could leave your kayak locked on the bank of the Hudson River without hauling it back and forth each trip? The only way to do it is by entering into a lottery organized by Scenic Hudson, who will send info about the lottery signup the week of March 30th 2015

(EDITOR'S NOTE: Scenic Hudson sent their newsletter, and the form is here on their website). 

People will have until April 17, 2015 to enter. Entries are chosen at random with no special attention given to partners or households entering. There are 34 spots available. Each unit is $175 for the season, which ends October 31, 2015.

To be informed of this signup date in the future, go to Scenic Hudson's website and sign up for their email newsletter. They will send the announcement with directions on how to enter yourself during the week of March 30, 2015. Otherwise, click here for the lottery signup form.

Good luck! If you don't get picked, thank goodness you hopefully have a shed in your yard to store your kayak!

Zero to Go's Compost Project Will Strike Black Gold in the Hudson Valley

A food waste sundae that could become compost in Zero to Go's new pickup program.

Recycling wasn't a thing in our house until our local trash company, Royal Carting, put a new orange-topped trashcan in our driveway. Pangs of guilt would hit me each time I tossed a metal lid of cat food into the trash, or stuffed a plastic or cardboard egg carton into the rest of the waste. Until researching this article, I did not realize that recycling was mandatory by law for Dutchess County enacted in 1990. Around 2012, Dutchess Country went "single stream", which means that consumers can put mixed items of recycling into one trash can, which is when Royal Carting dropped off the orange-lidded can for single-stream recycling pickup and changed our waste habits for good.

When recycling pickup in Beacon became official, and Royal Carting picked it up every other week, we sprang for a new dual side trash can to separate the trash from the recycling, and now I gladly fill up the recycling side to the brim. Now that so many materials can be recycled, we have more recylcing in our smaller trash can than we do the larger trash can. What's left on the trash side? Mainly food. And being a Backyard Farmer, I wanted to compost the food, but there's too much city-girl in me to deal with the flies. So it's the food I now look at with longing - longing to turn it into compost - the black gold of soil.

Enter Zero to Go. The education-based waste management company who's been literally sweeping the Hudson Valley to separate trash, recycling and compostable material since 2013. Zero to Go has handled 18 events throughout the Hudson Valley and Manhattan, including the Sheep and Wool Festival in Rhinebeck, The Peekskill Hop and Harvest Festival, Beacon’s Riverfest with Local 845, the Iron Pour, benefits for Common Ground Farm and other local events. And now Zero to Go's founder, Sarah Womer, wants to collect it from your home or business.

The Compost Project is the newest initiative from Zero to Go that held its first Town Hall Meeting about it last week, and hosts its second Town Hall Meeting today, Saturday, at 11am. The pilot program is designed run on business and residential investment and donations. Only 30 residential slots and 4 business slots are available in the pilot program, and as of this morning, 18 of those have been filled! The application to sign up to be one of the first in the project is here.

Participants in the pilot program will be given a special trash can to hold food waste (those who sign up in later phases can buy the trash can). The can will be collected weekly - by bike - by Zero to Go. If you're an avid recycler, you'll know that the every-other-week pickup for recycling could easily be converted into weekly for your own needs.

During this first phase, the food waste will be carted to network of industrial compost sites and farms in the Hudson Valley. This is where it will turn into "black gold" as Sarah calls it, to be used to make the soil even more nutrient rich for farming, backyard gardening, and even Main Street flower tending.

Zero to Go is hosting a Kickstarter campaign to fund-raise for the bins they need to begin collecting material from the first 34 customers. Compost material will be used by sources in the Hudson Valley. In order to deliver it back to Beaconites, Zero to Go will need to build its own infrastructure, which it plans to begin fundraising and grant seeking for in 2016.

CSA and Local Produce Round-up for 2015 Season

Happy Equinox! Ignore that snow out there and let's turn our minds towards Spring. This is the perfect time to sign up for your 2015 CSA (Community Supported Agriculture group). You pay at the beginning of the season and receive a weekly box of fresh, local produce. Below are not only some local produce options including the traditional CSA, but you can now try a new flexible CSA subscription program, an educational U-Pick option, and of course the local Farmer's market we all know and love. Click on each option to learn more about the farms involved, growing practices, and the types of produce offered.

	Common Ground Farm Common Ground Farm is a farm project that serves our community as an educational model for people of all ages to learn how foods grow. With education in mind, Common Ground doesn't offer the traditional CSA delivery, but offers the U-PICK program and the experience of picking your own own herbs, veggies, and flowers! This summer's U-Pick plot will include sugar snap peas, cherry tomatoes, scallions, carrots, lettuce, arugula, peppers, beans, herbs (including dill, cilantro, and basil) husk cherries, and more. The season is June 20th to September 8th, with a discount if you sign up by April 1st. U-PICK SIGN UP HERE
	Fishkill Farms Their CSA runs weekly, June through mid-November with two CSA pickup locations: at Farm Store in East Fishkill, NY, and at the Old Stone House in Brooklyn. Members picking up at the Farm Store will receive weekly bonus pick-your-own items! You can expect a variety of fruits and vegetables from the farm. Fruits may include berries, peaches, nectarines, plums, pears & apples. Vegetables may be greens, tomatoes, squash, beans, onions, potatoes, garlic & broccoli. SIGN UP HERE
	Glynwood Glynwood CSA members enjoy more than 40 different types of Certified Naturally Grown vegetables during a 24 week season. You will receive a weekly newsletter with information about the share that week, including preparation tips and recipes from Glynwood's Executive Chef. If you pickup at Glynwood’s Farm Store, you can check out their pasture-raised meat and eggs in addition to a handful of other local products. SIGN UP HERE Obercreek Farm Obercreek grows chemical-free, winter greens over in Hughsonville, NY. Using passive-solar greenhouses they cultivate carefully crafted greens mixes 52 weeks a year (that's year-round!). This summer they are partnering with Common Ground Farm & Hearty Roots Farm to bring you a Summer CSA Share (22 weeks of local, organic, seasonal vegetables!). Get a discounted share if you sign up before the end of March. SIGN UP HERE Field Goods NY based Field Goods offers weekly deliveries of local produce from a variety of area farms in three sizes of fruit and vegetable subscriptions. Rather than buying an entire season's share at once in the spring, subscriptions can be started anytime and can be easily cancelled or placed on hold. They also provide an email with what to expect in your delivery along with cooking tips. Local pick-up at Beacon Pantry (a great place to round-out your delivery with eggs,cheese, meat and pasta!). Personally recommended as a flexible, winter stop-gap for local produce. SIGN UP HERE Beacon Farmers' Market You can find the produce of many of the above farms and more at the Beacon Farmers' Market. They are open every Sunday down at the Riverfront during the summer and at the Scenic Hudson building during the winter. This year they will be back at the waterfront on April 12th. No subscription needed, buy when you like!

Katie of A Little Beacon Blog to Speak at Ladies Night for The Chocolate Studio

Let's meet!

If you know me, you'll know I do many digital things online - social media and blogging being one of them. I also work with and celebrate small businesses via this blog, and my other venture, Tin Shingle.  This Thursday, I get to be part of the delicious Ladies Night at The Chocolate Studio, formerly Gourmetables, that shop down by the falls that smells of melting butter and caramel corn when you walk by in the summer.

I'll be the entertainment (crazy!) talking about why social media is your friend if you run a business or if you're nurturing a passion project. I'll talk about how you can easily and enjoyably make this part of your day to reach people in this community and other communities, but most importantly, why using social media is imperative to your business - no matter if you're a retail store, a service provider, or a regular person who loves making things.

There will be chocolate bliss and other chocolate treats and coffee. So come! It's from 6-8pm at The Chocolate Studio - 494 Main Street Beacon NY.

13 Desserts and Friday the 13th at Towne Crier Cafe

When we took our visiting family out for Valentine's Day, which this year was on February's Second Saturday, we happily landed in the Towne Crier Cafe. As promised in a glowing New York Times review, the dessert case welcomed us as we walked in, promising a selection of 13 desserts for a ravishing end of the evening. At least, 13 desserts were available that night. Their norm is 12 desserts, and every so often, they offer a special pastry.

It was from our waiter that we learned that the Towne Crier's pastry chef, Mary Ciganer, was his mother and is part of the foundation of the restaurant with her husband and founder, Phil Ciganer. He didn't mention that Mary had formerly been at New York's legendary Le Cirque, but by then, we had ordered the Apple Walnut Danish with Chocolate Chips and were totally intent on trying her dessert. It was a hard choice, as we could have ordered the Chocolate Truffle Torte, or the Sour Cream Plum Coffee Cake, or my other favorite, the simple but deadly Carrot Cake, or the friendlier Poppyseed Cake made with out dairy, sugar or eggs.

Here's how the Apple Walnut Danish with Chocolate Chips went over at our table:

Apple Walnut Danish with Chocolate Chips with a mandatory
scoop of vanilla ice cream. All forks on deck.

The sweet sauce is quickly wiped up by my neighboring
father who leaves no evidence of his swoop.

Forks are beginning to fend for themselves, and
we are wishing for spoons for bigger scoops.

Elbows are out.
The photo is blurry because things have surpassed getting serious.

The end.

Beacon's Universal Pre-K and Kindergarten Programs and Satellite Classrooms

Pre-Kindergarten used to be a concept that parents could sign their 3 and 4 year olds up for if there was a program run by a business or a church in their area. The hours were short, but the experience was invaluable to the child by way of reaching their spongy brains at an early age. These days, spreading across the nation is Universal Pre-Kindergarten which is a federally funded program recently encouraged by the Obama Administration by way of a $10 billion investment over 10 years in public preschool programs that states have to apply for. However, local school districts within those states need to also apply for the grant and be awarded, and not all districts in New York state have been awarded a grant. 

One little in-school assignment to learn numbers.

Beacon City School District is one such district that has offered the Universal Pre-K program to 4 year olds for a number of years for a half day of learning, either in a morning program or an afternoon group. In 2014, A total of $340 million was awarded to 81 school districts and Community Based Organizations in New York. In fact, Newburgh is the largest recipient of Pre-K funding outside of New York City. The reality of school as a form of child care is a real issue, and is becoming more recognized at the federal and state levels, especially with this passage of $794 million to "provide working families with affordable child care" by Governor Andrew Cuomo in August 2014.

SATELLITE CLASSROOMS OUTSIDE OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL BUILDINGS

Not as talked about is the participation of daycare or child care programs in Universal Pre-K, which offers a small price break for parents as well as a consistent day of coverage for the child. For five years, Rose Hill Manor on Wolcott Avenue has been a satellite classroom, offering half-day morning Pre-K  from 8:30-11:30am for free for those who enroll with the district and Rose Hill in time before their allotted seats fill up. This includes the paid option of a full day of "wrap around care" until 5:30pm which is especially good for parents who have difficulty getting their children from Pre-K or Kindergarten due to work or other obligations. This includes lunch, nap, snack and more structured play/learning time.  

As of 2014, Rose Hill has been the only center who year after year took on the requirements and paperwork required to offer the program. Astor Services for Children and Families had offered it  before the school district itself took it on, but has not offered it in recent years. Acceptance into the program means that a school must have a certified teacher on board, and must "meet or exceed" public school requirements, and weave these requirements into their own curriculum. Schools including the Randolf School, Hudson Hills, BCAP, Astor, or Kids Place do not offer the program, reasons usually being that the paperwork is too overwhelming, or that they don't want to be held to public requirements.
[UPDATE 1-21-16]: Cedar Street Daycare is also a satellite option for the 2016-2017 year, in addition to Rose Hill Manor. 

To get into a satellite program, parents must apply with the public school at the start of Pre-K registration, usually in February of each year, and tell the public school administrator that they intend to be in the program at a satellite school.

Images of heart-health with food choices and activities.

SNOW DAYS - CANCELLATIONS AND WEATHER DELAYS

A real issue for parents are snow days. The pattern in Beacon is to have a 2-hour delay of school or a cancellation entirely if snow falls on a school-night for the next day. Children enrolled in the morning program of Pre-K often have their day of school canceled if there is a 2-hour weather delay. Those enrolled in the afternoon program at their public school are not as impacted by the weather delays, but still miss school on an early dismissal or school closure.

A benefit of enrolling a child in the satellite program of a school like Rose Hill is that they operate as a business, and are open 95% of the time. So if school is closed, children enrolled in the full day wrap around care at Rose Hill are the only ones in town still going to school that day for a full day of engagement versus the alternative of Netflix, videos, and desperate Pinterest searches for crafty projects while a working parent's day of meetings and deadlines got cut like a paper snowflake.
Note: this option is only available to kids who are additionally enrolled in full time daycare with Rose Hill.

BUSING & GETTING KIDS TO SCHOOL

Another issue for working parents is busing. Beacon City Schools offers busing to kids who live 1.5 miles away from their elementary school. For Pre-K, this includes one-way transportation. For morning classes, students are transported to school; for afternoon classes, they are transportation home from school. Hudson Hills offers one-way transportation, as does Rose Hill. For kindergartners, for example, if parents need to be at work before the bus picks up from their house, they can drop kids off at Rose Hill, who then accepts bus-loads of "big kids" in their after-school program starting at 3:30pm.

The schedules of children is no joke, and fitting this in with grocery shopping and work schedules is a tricky puzzle figured out daily. Thanks to the growing number of families moving to this area, parents are experiencing a greater number of options for their priorities and budgets.