Schools and Children

Posted on December 11, 2021

We’re so happy to welcome Winchester School back to the Holiday Card Contest after a brief hiatus, re-joining Sprucecourt for a bit of festive fun for the kids.

After much deliberation, the judges have selected a primary and junior winner from each school along with 2 runners-up. All 8 artists will receive a CRA ribbon. Each of the winners’ classes will get a Pizza Party Prize from the CRA too!

For Sprucecourt:

The Winners are:

• Sanika in Grade 3
• Sara in Grade 8

Runners up are: Beatrix in Grade 3 and Raisha in Grade 7

For Winchester :

The Winners are:

• Louisa in Grade 3
• Jaxen, Amari, Leo & Ella in Grade 7

Runners up are: Alyssa in Grade 3 and Evan in Grade 4

All the winning artwork will be framed and put on display over the holidays at Epicure on Parliament Street.

ORGANIZERS

Many thanks to CRA Member Lindsay Matheson, and CRA Board Members Lise Flynn and Katie Tozer for managing this years competition. And thanks, of course, to our three invaluable judges, Betty White, Cynthia Eldridge and Sarah Birnie , for working so diligently to select the winners.

JUDGES

Betty White is a professional artist and art teacher. She taught art to children for 28 years and continues to teach children in her Cabbagetown home since retirement.

Cynthia Eldridge is an art history major who uses design thinking to work with global thought leaders to address critical public health challenges.  She believes whole heartedly that a picture is worth a thousand words.

Sarah Birnie is an Interior Designer living in Cabbagetown with her husband, 2 girls and golden retriever. She believes all of us benefit from finding our own creative outlet!

Each of the winning entries has been made into holiday cards, which will be printed and distributed to CRA member households within the CRA boundary (Gerrard, Parliament, St. James Cemetery and the Don River).

Posted on November 6, 2020

Green Thumbs Growing Kids is a local charity actively creating school food gardens in order to connect children to food and their environment. They reached out to the CRA to share an update on their activities: 

For 21 years we have been at the forefront of garden-based elementary education in downtown Toronto helping teachers and families to start food gardens at their schools. 

This fall we wanted to connect with more folks in our  community and spread the word about the important work we do. If you live or shop around Cabbagetown, you may have noticed pumpkins in the shops accompanied with information about Green Thumbs. We want to thank all the local business owners who agreed to lend a hand and display a pumpkin, it was a pleasure to meet you. 

The pumpkins represent the kind of work we do at GTGK , demonstrating the magic of seeds, soil and water to children. Our school gardens and programming engage children, youth and even their parents. The exploration of nature and healthy food is at the heart of all our programs. The gardens are dynamic classrooms for vibrant hands-on learning in many subject areas including planting seeds, compost and making meals from the food grown. 

This year, like so many other organizations, we  have pivoted to online food and garden education in order to keep kids interested and engaged in growing food. Plus we have been able to use the school gardens to grow food and share it with those in need in our community. 

You can look us up and learn more about what we do at – www.greenthumbsto.org or on social media – Facebook, Twitter, Instagram. Reach out if you have questions or would like to support our work, we look forward to meeting more folks in our neighbourhood – info@greenthumbsto.org 

The Toronto library lets you watch, listen and read a huge selection of movies, music, ebooks, audiobooks, magazines and newspapers on your smartphone, tablet or PC/Mac — all at no charge!

All you have to do is register on-line using your library card. (If you don’t already have a PIN, try the last 4 digits of your phone number.)

No library card? No problem. Just download “Libby, by Overdrive” from your App Store and get instant online access with you local mobile phone number (must be 416, 647, 437). NOTE: some of the services below are only accessible with library card logon.

Services you can access:

Kanopy (movies & eBooks)
Hoopla (movies)
RBdigital (audiobooks & eMagazines)
BiblioBoard (eBooks from self-published authors)
Flipster eMagazines (current issues of popular magazines)
Safari Tech & Business Books (major technology & business publishers)
PressReader (newspaper & magazine for 100 countries in 60 languages)
NYTimes.com (New York Times newspaper)
CanTook Station (French-language eBooks)
Midici.tv (streaming video of classical music, operas & ballets)
Naxos Music Library (great music spanning medieval to modern)
Naxos Music Library (Jazz)

If you don’t have a library card, or you’ve ‘been there and done that’ you can try these other FREE services to keep you and your family amused:

CRACKLE (TV & movies)
hoopla (movies)
PLEX (movies)
Pluto TV (livestream ViaComCBS)
Vudu (movies & TV shows)
Tubi TV (movies)
TVO (documentaries, etc.)
CBC GEM (livestream TV, movies, docs)
Internet Archives (movies, audio, eBooks, audiobooks)
Project Gutenberg (eBooks)
Authorama (eBooks)
LibriVox (audiobooks)
ManyBooks (eBooks)
BookBub (eBooks)
Goodreads (eBooks)

Veg2grow is a new program from Building Roots a local organization providing fresh produce food baskets to vulnerable persons in Ward 13. They also run the Moss Park Market. 

On Earth Day they launched a fantastic new program to address food security and children’s education for Cabbagetown and the neighbouring communities called Veg2grow Garden Kits for Kids. 

Veg2grow provides free garden kits for kids to start an urban farm at home. The already have funding through private donations to provide 200 kits to the communities of Cabbagetown, Regent Park, Moss Park, and Corktown. But they need more help. Full details on the kit and how to register can be found at veg2grow.com.