Caroline's Enchanted Garden: Fairy & Wizard Festival in Litchfield Hills

Fairy Parade

Connecticut Landmarks' Bellamy-Ferriday House & Garden located on 9 Main Street in the scenic village of Bethlehem in the heart of the Litchfield Hills will host the fourth annual Caroline's Enchanted Garden: Fairy & Wizard Festival, on Saturday, May 11th, from 1 to 4 pm.  

Children and families can participate in many magical activities offered at this unique festival for kids.  One popular activity is for kids to make a basket fairy house out of all natural materials including bark, leaves, twigs, pine cones, and moss to create a charming little home that any fairy would be pleased to move in to. Kids can bring the fairy house home as a souvenir or find a place for it in the Fairy Village to remain throughout the summer on the grounds of the Bellamy-Ferriday Gardens.  Another activity for kids is to follow the trail of fairy house's & woodland creatures made by staff and volunteers to the Fairy Village. Materials will also be available in the Fairy Village to make a fairy dwelling to stay on the property.

Fairy Castle

Back by popular demand, Cyril May, the Resourcerer and Director of Yale Recycling, will incorporate magic into a program that teaches children about the value of preserving open space using fairy and animal stories. He will tell tales while performing tricks around the Bellamy- Ferriday grounds, and give a Recycling is Magic show.

Other activities include a Garden Wizard offering children the opportunity to pot a small plant for Mother's Day, a strolling musician, story reader and puppeteer Sue Meister, pony rides with Joan Coogan of Watertown's Pony Tales and a game circle. Children are encouraged to come in fairy and wizard costume, and kids of all ages are invited to participate in hands-on craft activities, including making fairy wands out of apple tree suckers from the Ferriday orchard and creating wizard hats. The afternoon will conclude with a fairy and wizard parade around the Bellamy-Ferriday grounds.

Admission is $5 per person; $20 families/$15 CTL Member families.  http://www.ctlandmarks.org/?page=bellamy-ferriday-house-gardenhttp://www.ctlandmarks.org/?page=bellamy-ferriday-house-garden.  For area information www.litchfieldhills.com

About the Bellamy Ferriday House and Garden

The Bellamy-Ferriday House & Garden, located at 9 Main Street North, Bethlehem is open May through October. Hours are as follows: May – September, Thursday, Friday, Saturday & Sunday, 12 – 4pm; October, Saturday & Sunday 12 – 4pm. Open on Monday Holidays: Memorial Day, Labor Day and Columbus Day. Admission is $7 for adults; $6 for students, teachers and seniors; $4 for children age 6-18; children under 6 and Connecticut Landmarks' members are free. Families, 2 adults with children, are $15; groups of 10 or more are $5 each. For school groups and special curriculum-based programming, to reserve tours for groups of 10 or more, or to rent the facility, please call the Bellamy-Ferriday House & Garden at (203) 266-7596.

Bellamy-Ferriday House & Garden embodies the dramatically different passions of two extraordinary individuals. Bethlehem pastor Rev. Joseph Bellamy, a renowned leader of the Great Awakening, the emotional religious revival of the 1740s, built the house around 1754. In 1912, New Yorkers Henry and Eliza Ferriday acquired it as a summer residence. Mrs. Ferriday and her daughter, Caroline, designed a formal garden which today features historic-style roses, peonies, and lilacs. The Ferriday's other landscape improvements make the site a destination for gardeners. Caroline, an actress, conservationist and philanthropist, deeded the property and furnishings to Connecticut Landmarks on her death.

About Connecticut Landmarks

Founded in 1936, Connecticut Landmarks is the largest state-wide heritage museum organization in Connecticut. The historic landmark properties include: the Bellamy-Ferriday House & Garden, Bethlehem; the Butler-McCook House & Garden and Main Street History Center, Hartford; the Buttolph-Williams House, Wethersfield; the Hempsted Houses, New London; the Isham-Terry House, Hartford; the Nathan Hale Homestead, Coventry; and the Phelps-Hatheway House & Garden, Suffield.

Connecticut Landmarks' mission is to inspire interest and encourage learning about the American past by preserving selected historic properties, collections and stories and presenting programs that meaningfully engage the public and our communities. For more information, please visit www.ctlandmarks.org.

Book Signing with Mother Dolores Hart

Mother Dolores Harts' autobiography, entitled "The Ear of the Heart - An Actress' Journey from Hollywood to Holy Vows" will have a book signing at the Jubilee Barn at the Abbey of Regina Laudis on Sunday, May 5th from 1:30 - 4 pm. The public is invited to meet Mother Dolores and to join in the Abbey's celebration of the publication of her autobiography.  The Abbey is located on 273 Flanders Road in Bethlehem CT.  

The book details the acting career of rising star Dolores Hart in the 1960's.  She appeared in ten highly successful movies. Then, she made a shocking decision: Hart left the glitz and glamour of Hollywood and entered a contemplative monastery. Now, 50 years later, Mother Dolores gives a fascinating account of her life, with co-author and lifelong friend Richard DeNeut in THE EAR OF THE HEART: An Actress' Journey from Hollywood to Holy Vows.

Dolores was a bright and beautiful college student when she made her film debut with Elvis Presley in Paramount's 1957 Loving You. She acted in nine more movies with other big stars such as Montgomery Clift, Anthony Quinn and Myrna Loy. She also gave a Tony-nominated performance in the Broadway play The Pleasure of His Company and appeared in TV shows, including The Virginian and Playhouse 90. An important chapter in her life occurred while playing Saint Clare in the movie Francis of Assisi, filmed on location in Italy.

Born Dolores Hicks to a complicated and colorful Chicago family, Mother Dolores has travelled a charmed yet challenging road in her journey toward God, serenity and, yes, love. She entered the Abbey of Regina Laudis in Bethlehem, Connecticut, at the peak of her career, not in order to leave the glamorous world of acting she had dreamed of since childhood, but in order to answer a mysterious call she heard with the "ear of the heart." While contracted for another film and engaged to be married, she abandoned everything to become a bride of Christ.

About the Abbey of Regina Laudis

Regina Laudis is a monastery of contemplative Benedictine women living in union with the Roman Catholic Church and following the Rule of St. Benedict according to the Primitive Observance. Founded in 1947 in Bethlehem, Connecticut by Mother Benedict Duss. Regina Laudis was elevated to the status of an abbey in 1976. The community of Regina Laudis is presently made up of 40 women, representing a wide diversity of personal and professional backgrounds. Regina Laudis means Queen of Praise. Their prime mission as contemplative Benedictines is to pray the Divine Office or Liturgy of the Hours, keeping the prayer of the psalms resonating through the day and night, every day of the year.

Annual Spring Show of the Kent Art Association in Litchfield Hills

Daskam - Dock and Dory

The Kent Art Association was founded in 1923 by nine well established artists who knew each other when they lived in New York before moving to Kent: Rex Brasher, Elliot Clark, Floyd Clymer, Williard Dryden Paddock, F. Luis Mora, George Laurence Nelson, Spencer Nichols, Robert Nisbet and Frederick Waugh. Six of these artists were National Academicians. 

When the Kent Art Association was first founded, these nine artists held an annual show in which only their work was exhibited. Later, more artists were accepted into the Association and others were invited to be associates.  Today the Kent Art Association invites emerging and established artists to display their artwork to a wide audience in their gallery’s several times a year.

Inside this well lite and spacious gallery, located on Rte. 7 (Main Street) in Kent about 100 yards south of the intersection of Rte. 7 and Rte. 341, you will find two stories of exhibition rooms.  In addition to the works exhibited on the walls, all of which are for sale, there is a Portfolio Gallery offering unframed work by members of the Association.

To kick off spring in the beautiful Litchfield Hills, the Kent Art Association is holding its first juried show of the season that runs Sunday, April 21 through Monday, May 27. The Gallery is open April- May 17, Friday – Sunday from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. and May 21 – Oct. 18, Thursday – Sunday from 1 p.m. – 5 p.m.  

Visitors will also enjoy the work of Juror Rick Daskam, chairman for Oils at the Hudson Valley Art Association and a a graduate of Paier College of Art in Connecticut where he studied with Rudolf Zallinger and Ken Davies.  Daskam was honored with the “Most Outstanding Illustrator Award in addition to the Dumond Award from the Hudson Valley Art Association, Collectors Award from the Butler Art Institute, and the Larry Newquist Award for Excellence at SCAN.

The Judges for this exhibition are Marc Chabot, Diane Dubreuil, and Rick Daskam and $1000 in prizes will be awarded.   All work must be original and for sale.  A copy of the prospectus can be found at www.kentart.org. For more information call the Gallery at 860.927.3989.  

For area information visit www.litchfieldhills.com.

Ives Concert Park announces first five shows of Summer Concert Series

After much anticipation, Ives Concert Park has announced the first five artists slated to perform in its 2013 Summer Concert Series. The venue, located on the Western Connecticut State University Westside campus, 43 Lake Ave. Extension in Danbury, has featured a wide variety of performers representing all eras and genres of music for nearly 40 years. Now, thanks to a new partnership with New York-based promoter The Bowery Presents, the summer line-up is starting to take shape.

All shows are rain or shine and tickets for the five shows announced are on sale at ticketmaster.com. Additional shows and ticket sale dates will be announced soon.

Scheduled to perform are:

moe

• moe. with the Wood Brothers at 6 p.m. on Saturday, June 1

Reserved tickets are $35; lawn tickets are $20.

Gov't Mule

• Gov’t Mule at 6 p.m. on Sunday, June 2

Reserved tickets are $35; lawn tickets are $20 in advance and $25 on day of show.

Tony Bennett

• Tony Bennett at 8 p.m. on Saturday, July 13

Reserved tickets are $86; lawn tickets are $36.

• Summerland Tour 2013 Alternative Guitars starring Everclear, Live, Filter and Sponge at 8 p.m. on Friday, July 19

Reserved tickets are $35; lawn tickets are $20.

Brandi Carlile

• Brandi Carlile at 8 p.m. on Saturday, July 20

Reserved tickets are $39.50; lawn tickets are $25.

A special two-show ticket has been created for the back-to-back moe. and Gov’t Mule shows on June 1 and 2. A reserved ticket for both nights will be $50 and a lawn ticket will be $30.

Music-lovers who subscribe to the Ives “Backstage Buzz” e-newsletter will have the opportunity to purchase tickets one day before they go on sale to the general public. To sign up, visit the Ives Concert Park website at www.ivesconcertpark.comwww.ivesconcertpark.com. For contests and announcements, follow Ives on Facebook at facebook.com/ivesconcertpark and Twitter at @IvesConcertPark.

For Regional information www.litchfieldhills.com

Creating Habitat Oases for Migrating Songbirds

Join Audubon’s Patrick Comins and Michelle Frankel on April 28 at the Garden Education Center of Greenwich on 1 Bible Street in Cos Cob for a special presentation and walk through Greenwich’s Montgomery Pinetum to learn about simple ways to enhance backyards, school grounds and public parks to provide quality habitat for migrating songbirds. This event is co-sponsored by Audubon Connecticut, Greenwich Tree Conservancy, Bruce Museum and Garden Education Center. An RSVP is suggested to the Greenwich Tree Conservancy at 203- 869-1464. The program takes place from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m.

The Audubon’s Habitat Oases program identifies, improves and conserves important stop-over habitat for migrating songbirds all along the Atlantic migratory flyway, focusing on urban and suburban areas and other landscapes where there is limited quality habitat. The program, performed in collaboration with Audubon chapters, state and municipal parks departments, and other groups, engages volunteer birdwatchers – citizen scientists – in migratory songbird surveys of urban/suburban green spaces. The surveys help to determine the characteristics of high quality stop-over habitat and which species of plants are most beneficial as food sources for migrating songbirds.

Audubon and its partners are using the results of this study to promote the protection of critical stop-over habitats by helping government agencies, corporations, land trusts, and other landowners make informed land use and land protection decisions. They also work to improve the quality of public and private lands as stop-over habitat for migrating birds by guiding the management and landscaping practices of natural resource managers, private landowners and professional landscapers and strive to develop regionally-specific lists of “bird-friendly” native plants that may be used to guide landscaping practices in parks, gardens and backyards.

Patrick Comins is a graduate of Trinity College in Hartford, and has worked in the bird conservation arena for the last 15 years. Patrick began his career with the Connecticut Audubon Society, doing bird surveys on the coast at the Stewart B. McKinney National Wildlife Refuge and then worked for the US Fish and Wildlife Service as a biological technician at the refuge. He has been with Audubon Connecticut as the Director of Bird Conservation for Connecticut since 2000, overseeing Connecticut’s Important Bird Areas and other conservation programs. He is the principal author of Protecting Connecticut’s Grassland Heritage. Patrick is a past resident of the Connecticut Ornithological Association and was the 2007 recipient of their Mabel Osgood Wright Award. He has written several articles on bird conservation and identification for the Connecticut Warbler and is currently chairman and vice president of the Friends of the Silvio O. Conte National Fish and Wildlife Refuge.

Michelle Frankel, Ph.D., is a Conservation Biologist with Audubon Connecticut and is coordinating the Habitat Oases program in CT, and facilitating the implementation of the program in a number of other states along the Atlantic migratory flyway. Michelle previously worked with Audubon of Florida, where she originally piloted the Habitat Oases program. Prior to her work with Audubon, she was Education Director for Earthspan, a nonprofit that develops and applies advanced technologies for wildlife conservation. Michelle received her Ph.D. in behavioral ecology from Boston University, focusing on forest fragmentation effects on migratory songbirds. She subsequently pursued a post-doctoral fellowship with Tel Aviv University and the International Center for the Study of Bird Migration in Israel, where she studied the impacts of urbanization on the globally-threatened Lesser Kestrel.

Twined Art at the Institute for American Indian Studies

The exhibition Woven from Milk Weed by Wabanaki Artist Vera Longtoe Sheehan opens at the Institute for American Indian Studies in Washington Connecticut runs through May 31, 2013. There is no charge for this exhibition. The Museum is open Monday through Saturday 10 am to 5 pm and Sunday 12 noon to 5pm.  The last admission is at 4:30 pm.

Vera Longtoe Sheehan is a fiber artist who follows in the footsteps of her ancestors. When she was young, her father started teaching her how to harvest and process plants to make cordage. He also taught her the various techniques that she uses to make twined bags, baskets and textiles.

Vera combines her tribal and family knowledge with many years of researching Wabanaki history, culture and tradition to create her one of a kind twined woven items. She uses both hand-rolled and commercially rolled plant fiber cordage. Each of the hand items can take hours, days, weeks or even months to complete.

Her twined art is environmentally friendly because it is made from plants, which are quick growing, renewable resources. She is currently teaching her children to twine, so that this endangered art form is not lost. Some of her twined bags, baskets and textiles have appeared in films and literature.

The artist and her family reside in Vermont. She offers a variety of programs for schools, museums and historic sites. 

“Meet the Artist” Reception is Sunday, April 7th from 1pm -3pm.  The reception includes refreshments at 2pm.

For more information about the Institute for American Indian Studies located on 38 Curtis Rd. in Washington CT call 860-868-0518 or visit www.iaismuseum.org.  For area information www.litchfieldhills.com.

Daffodils in Litchfield Hills

Daffodils beginning to bloom in Litchfield at Laurel Ridge

As the winter snow melts and the days become warmer and longer daffodils, the heralds of spring in New England's Litchfield Hills and Fairfield County slowly begin to emerge.

The best place in the state to watch the sea of yellow unfold is at the Laurel Ridge Foundation located on Wigwam Road in the Northfield section of Litchfield Connecticut. For information about the Foundation visit www.litchfielddaffodils.com.

The Foundation, located on a winding country road in the scenic Litchfield Hills is open to everyone from sunrise to sunset during the time period daffodils are in bloom which is typically late March through early May. The fields are closed the rest of the year. Visitors are encouraged to take photos of the field and are invited to submit their photos on the Laurel Ridge website a t www.litchfielddaffodils.com/gallery.phpwww.litchfielddaffodils.com/gallery.php. Bulky photography equipment however is discouraged. The Foundation is on private property; picnics and household pets are not allowed.

A walk among the daffodils at Laurel Ridge Foundation is a rare early spring outing in an unspoiled oasis. The wild natural landscape of gently sloping woodland, fields and aged stonewalls overlooks a small lake dotted with two tiny islands. The park land and one of the islands is completely carpeted with gold and white blossoms, a glorious sight that is nirvana for photographers.

In Wilton, located in Fairfield County visit Weir Farm National Park located on 735 Nod Hill Rd. which has daffodils in bloom amid its many stone walls and in fields. For information on Weir Farm visit www.nps.gov/wefa/index.htmwww.nps.gov/wefa/index.htm. Weir Farm, Connecituct's only National Park was once the home of and workplace of J. Alden Weir (1852-1919) and is now considered to be the best preserved landscape associated with American Impressionism.