Tucson, AZ

Our family has the majority of our produce delivered on a bi-weekly basis from a local organic farming company. It is a delivery our children look forward to, as the produce that gets delivered is different every week. Since our three-year-old daughter has shown a recent interest in learning about where our fruits and vegetables come from we thought it would be a perfect opportunity to take her and our son to a nearby orchard and farm.

This past week my husband and I took our children to the La Encantada shopping center, located on Skyline just west of Campbell on the North side of the street, simply to enjoy some time outdoors with the weather being gorgeous. Both kids gravitated toward the many fountains throughout the outside portion of the “mall.” They found joy and pleasure in the simplest of things: water dripping from an old rusty pipe, the lilly pads floating in one of the water displays. They spent twenty minutes just throwing pennies in one fountain. Amidst all these shops and restaurants is an entire park with beautiful flowers, green foliage, running water, and stone tortoises, which the children took pure delight in climbing on.

I have to say, it was just a series of little pink signs with clever rhymes, but seeing them day by day up and down Campbell Ave definitely did a good job of intriguing me. I’d long seen bats flitting around at twilight in my neighborhood, and had wondered where it was they might sleep during the day. I definitely hadn’t been able to imagine any caves within the city, and I didn’t think they’d fly so far as to come from open desert…but under any of the bridges crossing the Rillito River? There was only one way to find out, and that was to attend Bat Night!

The nights are getting cool in the Old Pueblo and as a result, I can be more easily coaxed out of my house even before sunset these days. I heard that merchants and artists would be participating in a free event on 4th Avenue from on a Saturday evening from 4:00-9:00 p.m., an event called Rendezvous on the Avenue, and it would be featuring live music, vendors, and a fashion show. To start things off, I met my friend Carol around 6:00 p.m. for a yummy slice of Magpies pizza. Since the Avenue was full of hustle and bustle and parking was at a premium, I parked in the lot nearly Brooklyn Pizza. The weather was nice enough to enjoy the sunset and live music on the patio outside Magpies. We snacked on our slices and listened to the band, Nobody Et. Al., play as tables filled with couples and families ate their dinner and indulged in a little dancing

The first thing that actually attracted me to the Native Foods Demonstration at Bookman’s was the chance to learn some local history – to maybe learn it in a hands-on way, or even a tastebuds-on way, was an added bonus. But then it occurred to me – at food demonstration, there might be free food! And at that, I was completely sold.
And as it turned out, plenty of free food there was – Celebrando el Pueblo de Tucson offered a great mix of history, hand-on, and food in the fun and laid-back Bookman’s setting.

We’ve been having a pretty mild summer in Tucson, but it’s still something hot, of course. When there was a dearth of rain for a few days in the middle of the monsoon, that didn’t stop us from still finding a way to cool off, though, and we even got to play in the mud at Mud Monster, mud puddle party in Reid Park!

We were all saddened to hear that after 10 years of hosting the “Locals Only” segment featuring local music from the Tucson community, Don Jennings was ending his tenure at KXCI radio. To give him a proper send off, his final show, a free Chango Malo performance, was to be recorded live at Club Congress. Friends and I converged for this early show on a Sunday evening.

okemon Trading Cards are as popular as ever. Trainers and collectors in Tucson can now come to the Heroes & Villains Gym to hone their skills under the tutelage of Gym Master Eric while battling other trainers from the Tucson area. The gym is located in the game room adjacent to Heroes and Villains Comics & Adventure at 4533 E. Broadway Blvd. (northwest corner of Swan and Broadway). We’ve been taking our young trainers there each Saturday from 1 to 4 pm, to learn the game and make some friends.

It’s been a while since I’ve been to a park; I drive by plenty of them, and often feel a little envious of the people I see relaxing in various ways in the oasis’s of grass and shady trees. So when I heard about flyball, a kind of relay race for dogs, I figured I’d get two birds with one trip, and woke up in the Sunday morning cool to check it out. Up to James D. Kreigh Park, and canines racing pell mell over hurdles!

A fairy kingdom lies in wait of my discovery, tucked away behind an unassuming glass storefront exactly where I least expect to find it, at Crossroads Festival in the center of Tucson on the northeast corner where Grant and Swan intersect. A sign on the glass invites me to bring my Cold Stone Creamery concoction inside, and how can I resist? I open the door of Mrs. Tiggy Winkle’s Toys and step into a magical wonderland where kids can be kids and grown-ups can be kids, too.