The other day the baby and I went way up St. Charles to Danneel Park. We had passed by the park a few times before on our way to other locations but this time we made a special trip just to go to the park. Danneel Park is at the corner of St. Charles and Octavia Streets. There are three different “Jungle Jims” in the park as well as a fire engine and a slide that I had heard used to be part of a jump into a sand pit? Behind all the play sets along Octavia the park opens up into a grassy field for running and playing. For those geocachers in the audience there is a cache in the park as well. Some of the park is fenced in and some is not so you have to be careful since the street is very close. It seems once they start walking it only takes a second for them to reach the edge of the road.

It was great having a play set just for really little ones, the baby could climb up there all by himself all he needed was a spotter and that is of course one of a Parent’s many hats. We also spent a good bit of time “driving” the fire truck, see driving the fire engine While we were at the park four or five families came and went, it is definitely a park that gets used but even so it is clean and the equipment is in good repair.

On the way out of the park I stopped to read the wood sign and stone marker near the front fence. The sign stated the usual park rules and list of officials that sit in plush chairs in big offices and signed the papers to help keep this spot a park under NORD (New Orleans Recreation Department). The stone marker is carved with two names and a date, Hermann Danneel, his wife Maria Louisa Grace and 1906. This I could not let lie I needed the story so when I arrived home I did a little searching and this is what I found.
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Parents Unite! It sounds like I am rallying for a protest or something, I am not. When we moved here, Just after Katrina there were little to no services/groups for parents let alone anything really for kids. Hell there weren’t even schools yet, so anyway I was a little discouraged and after the baby came I was lonely. It happens to the best of us but NOLA is a big city I knew people were moving back (and still are) and I knew there had to be something out there. After much searching I have found a few playgroups that have been so helpful and fun for me. They have given me and the baby an opportunity to get out and meet new people. I have learned that the alone feeling is not just a depressed NOLA thing it is sort of a feeling you get after having a baby no matter what. There are new people joining our playgroup all the time. So if you are out there and you are a parent who is looking to get out and meet other parents and let the kids socialize and have fun then you should check out these area groups. I know there are a lot of other groups out there; you could even start your own group with friends or neighbors you just have to set the dates, get out of the house and actually do something. There are meet up groups for the three big areas of the city. The New Orleans group is geared more toward city dwellers most of the events are centered in the city, The Metairie group is a bigger group and that holds most of its events in the Metairie area, the Westbank group is centered on that bank and does most of it’s events in that area. There are more parent/child meetups close by too as well as other meet ups on the website for all kinds of other interests as well, check it out and get out and socialize.

I have always seen a need for a computer technology center in New Orleans, or hell, like eight of them. CTC’s are community centers with a focus on computer tutoring. I thought I could start one in Treme once I got my house done over there. . . but due to a wicked turn of events, that didn’t happen.

I sort of gave up on that project over the last couple of years. But New Orleans is funny to me, it seems to secretly hold all my wants and desires and places them squarely before me to cure a bad episode of city cynicism. Rewards for my loyalty and perseverance.

So one day in December, when life was looking rather dreadful, I sat down and had three beers with Jack Ware. I figured his life is likely scarier than mine . . . he’ll help me keep my perspective. So, we’re yappin and he starts telling me that he’s set up this network for a computer lab at the Freret St. Community Center. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Completely stunned. The facility was there, the computers had been found, the operating system installed. All I had to do was get in and start teaching. I just went into shock. I couldn’t believe that Jack, with all his, non-community-meetin’-bullshit talk had done this! I explained to him that this was something that I had always wanted to do in the city and he and Kimberly had already done all the really hard stuff that I would have had to plod through in order to get to the part that I really wanted to do.

So the lab is up and running and we have been doing a soft rollout with some students which has already proven extremely rewarding. I teach on Saturday mornings, which means my Friday nights are pretty nerdy too . . . but it is a really great facility and the students are so grateful. The workshops are student driven and very flexible because we truly are teaching the fundamentals of using a computer and I do not want people to feel that they have any pressure on them. They can’t fail. Most of them are doing the two finger poke on the keyboard but that’s ok, we dive right in and start mousing around the desktop and Googling their curiosities and creating emails.

Kimberly VanWagner and Kate Peak run the center. They have a broad spectrum of programs/activities for kids and adults from FREE yoga on Wednesdays, to math workshops and there is an art gallery in the center with rotating exhibits. There is a nice backyard with a small stage, it’s a wonderful space.

The kids from the center made $600 from their art booth at the Freret Festival last week and today they did a math class about there profit/investments and about philanthropy and decided how much they would give back to the center.

For more information about activities at the center:
Freret Neighborhood Center
4605 Freret
New Orleans, LA 70115
504.373.6403 phone

Since adding the baby to our little family we have been searching the city for a new type of restaurant. We used to be looking for a bar with food somewhere with drinks and a good menu or damn good drinks and an ok menu either way we were not concerned so much with the atmosphere. As long as we did not feel as though we might leave the place with blood spatters on our clothes (though that can make for one hell of a story) we were pretty much good to go. Now however things have changed just a bit. The places we frequent for food and drink must be kid friendly. They don’t have to be kid oriented like Chuck E. Cheese but they need to at the least allow children through the doors. They get double points if they actually have high chairs in stock.

Finding these places in a city known for its drunken debauchery can be a little challenging. Ok maybe debauchery is a little far but New Orleans certainly hasn’t been known for its kid friendly aspects. That being said I also find a lack of high chairs in restaurants. We live in the Marigny and sure there are actually quite a few restaurants that we can even walk to that will allow the baby inside but if they don’t have a high chair then it is a logistical challenge to enjoy a meal there. Anyone with kids will tell you it is a bit of a challenge to enjoy a meal in a restaurant with the little one(s) in tow under the best of circumstances so making in harder on me by frequenting non highchair venues is not top on my list of things to do.

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As a child of the 70’s, like many of you, I grew up watching Sesame Street on public television. Needless to say, when I had my daughter, I immediately introduced her to the fun loving puppets created by Jim Henson, that teach children their alphabet, numbers, and how to interact in social situations with adults and their peers. Now up until her recent discovery of Barbie, Elmo was the greatest thing in my toddler’s life. Elmo, who speaks in third person when referring to himself in conversations, was a buddy to my toddler whom she could relate to when going to the zoo, trying new foods, playing music, and even going on the potty. Now suddenly Elmo and the rest of the Sesame Street gang are being accused of brand promotion by the Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood according to an article written by David Crary from the Associated Press.
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