January 2010
New entries are at the bottom.
Archives
Photos © Nancy F. Little unless otherwise noted.
Professional appearances are in large bold in the text.
January 4, 2009
"On the 10th Day of Christmas..."
Finally, today, on the 10th day of Christmas, I finally solved the wicked hard 9-piece puzzle my neice Chloe gave me for Christmas. Here's the proof:
Friday, January 8, 2010
"On the Road Meeting #1"
Nancy and I drove east to Cambridge MA this afternoon where we have the use of a 4th floor walk-up apartment on Mass. Ave, dropped off our stuff, and then drove south to Riverside RI for an FNCA camp Summer Session Committee meeting. I'm the camp's Activities Director and Nancy's the camp Registrar so we're both on the Summer Session Committee ex officio.
It was wonderful to see some of our camp friends again and to get some important work done in the process.
Saturday, January 9, 2010
Yesterday I told you that I'm on the FNCA's Summer Session Committee. Well, I'm also on the 
FNCA's Board of Directors, and today was the Board's mid-winter meeting. Besides the fact that I love this camp (been attending since pre-birth) and that I love these people (I've grown up with them), I also love the way we operate.
We had a dozen or so people around a bunch of tables pushed together at The Elephant Walk 
restaurant in Waltham MA. The three Elephant Walk restaurants are owned by our treasurer, Bob Perry, who's been hosting our mid-winter meeting and providing us with an awesome lunch since he joined the Board early last decade. (Before that, we were brown bagging it at someone's house, so this is a marvelous improvement! Thanks Bob!)
And in five hours (including lunch), we efficiently covered all the business we had to take care of, discussed several things that required our attention, and came up with some nifty ideas to make camp even better than it already is. YAY!
"Third Time's A Charm!"
This is highly unusual and due to a bit of a fluke: For the third time in two weeks, I entertained at The Grand Summit Hotel at Mount Snow in W 
Dover VT. Usually, I'm there once a month December through March plus their huge New Year's Eve party. It turns out, one of the scheduled entertainers wasn't going to be there tonight, and I got the gig at the last minute. My regular December gig there was the 27th, plus NYE and this one put me there 3 time is the space of only 15 days! Wow! It was great! I could be quite happy performing there on a weekly basis.
So this time, I had to race out of our meeting in Waltham MA literally the minute it was over, drove 3 hours to the gig, did most of 2 hours there, and then drove the 3 hours back to Boston because Nancy & I have plans for tomorrow there.
I always love performing at the Grand Summit Hotel at Mount Snow --- it's one of my favorites. As I always do, I got there way early, put on my stilts and hung out in the lobby and took a stroll through the restaurant before my performance to drum up an audience. It always works: I usually get a pretty big crowd, and this time was no exception. I had about 60 people of all ages gathered around the big fireplace in the front lobby. And one of the wonderful things about this time was that instead of just watching like they usually do, most of the adults actually participated this evening and had just as much FUN as the kids!
Sunday, January 10, 2010
"A Good Day"
Got to see some very interesting people this morning and had a fine time with my lovely wife this evening, but the best part of my day was that I got to have lunch with my son Jason this afternoon! It was great!
Nancy & I and Jason walked to Fire + Ice right near Harvard Square in Cambridge MA. First you pick out all your ingredients and sauces(s) from five or six food "stations" huddled on one end of the room. Then they cook them for you on this huge round griddle in the middle of the room while you watch. It's pretty FUN!
Well, it was wonderful to hang out with my son for a while, find out how he's doing, what he's working on, and a' that, an' a' that. We talked pretty much the whole time. Lots of smiles, bunches of laughter, plenty of sharing, joyful little interactions, family connections, open minds & hearts, making contact again, good feelings, happy visit. YAY!
After lunch, we walked around Harvard Square for a while. Just to add some icing to the very satisfying cake, Nancy took us to the The Million Year Picnic comic emporium, so Jason and I got to explore this jam-packed-to-the-gills little comic store in Harvard Square for about an hour while Nancy got a coffee and did some shopping.
Monday, January 11, 2010
"Another Meeting... With Lots of Soup!"
It's the regular monthly meeting of the Hats Off Performers Guild today. And for our potluck lunch, there were four(4!) kinds of soup: tomato soup, miso soup with onions, miso soup without onions, and moroccan cous cous stew. YUM!
My lovely wife as in Boston at an American Library Association Conference this weekend. She had business cards to network with made up before she left. They say: "Nancy Little, MLS Candidate" on them. (MLS = Masters in Library Science) YAY NANCY!
Saturday, January 16, 2010
"A Last Minute Gig" Contacted a potential client on craigslist on Thursday and he booked me Friday for a party on Saturday. So today, I entertained at Sean Dyson's 7th birthday party at the brand new J & J Buffet in Hartford CT.
There were about 15 kids, mostly around 7 years old, in the back room when I arrived. The kids were pretty antsy, so I entertained them informally while they had their dessert (the dessert bars (yes, plural) were amazing!), and then did a rousing show for them before it was time for cake (yes, dessert and cake!).
Monday, January 18, 2010
"Just Me and 46 Women!"
Today, it was just me and 46 women, alone, in a church, in Middletown CT.
It was one of my Cooperative Play Staff Development Trainings called A New Approach to Team-Building for the Town & Country Early Learning Centers.
What a great group, too! It's often hard for me to get volunteers at the beginning, but today, someone stepped up every time I asked. Sometimes, there's a whole bunch of stuck-in-the-muds who bow out of several activities, but today there were just a very few who didn't do some of the most active stuff for health reasons. Sometimes there's an entire group that just plain isn't interested in having some FUN with their peers, but today the group was very much into it and seemed to have a blast with their co-workers all the way through. So a special thanks to center director Judi Kenney for bringing me in to work with this enthusiastic group of day care providers. Ya-Hoo!
Saturday, January 23, 2010
"Upstaged By A 1-Year-Old"
The Senior Center in Coventry CT is in a building that also houses the park lodge in Patriot's Park on the edge of Lake Wangumbaug (aka Coventry Lake). It was a bit of a surprise to find the town's senior center in a building in a town park, but it sure was an ideal location for Nicholas Thomas's 1st birthday party today!
Arrived about 15 minutes early, I found the hall already burgeoning with people. There were at least 50 people there, including about 30 adult, 10 kids, and a whole slew of toddlers ages 3 and under. There was also a great spread of food (which Grandma kept trying to feed to me!), and a long table full of pretty cool craft stuff.
Right at the start, I pulled out my Airzooka and one at a time sent a blast of air at everyone in the room. (It really got their attention!) Then I let the older kids play with it while I got ready for the show.
One of the joys of this profession is noticing how differently different people react to what I do. Today, as soon as I had all my equipment in the room, one of the older girls immediately turned her chair around so it was facing me and watched me setting up pretty much the whole time. Another kid, a younger boy, spent a lot of the party just walking around the room checking out everything else.
But when, halfway through me show, the little Birthday Boy just came wandering up to me in front of everyone, picked up one of my toys pieces of equipment off the floor and started innocently playing with it while I was starting to do a trick, suddenly most of the adults in the room were craning their necks to see exactly what that precious little child was doing... basically, ladies and gentlemen, I was upstaged by a 1-year-old!
And when he did a repeat performance about 10 minutes later right at the beginning of my very last trick and he brought a little girl with him too who ended up walking away with the piece of equipment which I so readily gave to her when she asked... WELL, I NEVER!
Another wonderful touching moment in show business, folks, another delightful little surprise.
Well, lots of adults participated in a lot of what I did today: most of them watched all the tricks, responded to pretty much everything, and played some of the games, too. But when I got them all standing up for the 7th inning stretch, the adults only lasted one partner game (I usually play three) before most of them suddenly dispersed to various corners of the room. But that's the way it works in this biz. So I played a few circle games with the all the older kids and a few adults before playing some running games across one end of the room with just the kids.
After we were all done with everything --- the show, the games, and Project: Ribbon Dancer, too --- Nicholas the Birthday Boy came wandering up again while I was packing up my stuff and started climbing on my suitcase. I just couldn't help interacting with him, this child is just so precious. And then suddenly the cameras came out in droves! There were at least 7 or 8 people with cameras all clicking photos at the same time for the entire 10 minutes that Nick and I were playing on that suitcase together. I sure hope at least one of them sends me some pictures! (See the red "Contact" link at left for where to send them. Hint hint.) (Note: And you'll know they did if some appear on this page.)
So, what a great gathering! What a great clan! What a great party! And what a great kid! Thanks for inviting me Coleen! It was a pleasure to help you celebrate your son's 1st birthday!
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
"Blissful Hour" 
Remember a couple of weeks ago when I told you on Jan 15th that my lovely wife was at a library conference for the weekend? Well... a few days after she got home, she got notification that she'd won one of the raffles she entered! The prize was a $150 visit to the spa of your choice!
Very soon thereafter she was making reservations for two at East Heaven Hot Tubs and Paradise Spa in Northampton MA right next to the main gates of the Smith College campus and across the street from the Forbes Libary. They have this couples package called "Blissful Hour": it's a half hour hot tub followed by a half hour side-by-side massage for only $65 per person. (They got a $20 tip.)
It was awesome! Thanks Nancy! And thanks to the American Library Association, too!
Saturday, January 30, 2010
"A Little Bit Different at Mount Snow"
For the fifth time this winter, I drove the hour and a half north to W Dover VT and entertained the patrons of the Grand Summit Hotel at Mount Snow. Today it was a little different, though. They've been wanting to draw the crowds away from the lobby and the front desk during the most active time of the day --- which is between roughly 5:00-8:00 p.m. --- just to reduce the noise and lower the ACL (Apparent Chaos Level).
So I did my 4:00 show in the lobby as usual. There were about 20 people there to enjoy the whole show, with another 20-40 who stayed briefly to watch a short bit, or who watched some or all of the show from one of the upper levels but didn't really participate. But my 7:00 show was in Deerfield North: one of their really nice function rooms on the main floor. (It's right next to Deerfield South.)
They had about 30 chairs set up in the room when I arrived, but there were at least 40 people there at the beginning of the show, quickly grew to over 50 within a few minutes, and peaked at nearly 75 by the midpoint of my act. There were a boodle of kids sitting on the floor on both sides as well as a whole big crowd of adults and teens crowded around the doorway taking in the performance. It was great!
So I think their strategy worked. If I managed to pull almost 75 people down a hallway and into a function room for the hour right after suppertime, I'm sure the staff at both the front desk, the crew at the valet station, as well as the folks sitting around the two big fireplaces in the lobby all found it relatively more peaceful around the main entrance during that special hour this evening.