Day: October 10, 2012

Rockport HarvestFest: Awesome Food, Live Music & Cooking Demos!

Posted on by S.D. Kelly

Scroll down for a HarvestFest Schedule of Events. And be sure to pick up your Scarecrow Stroll Contest Ballot! Great cash prizes awarded courtesy of Granite Savings Bank to the winning scarecrows!

HarvestFest All Day Events: October 13th from 10 am to 6 pm

Information Booth & Music Tent in Dock Square. Pick up information about all there is to do and see during HarvestFest and listen to some great live music in the heart of Rockport!

Local Fare Fair on T-Wharf.  Featuring food made locally on Cape Ann and in New England, with Cape Ann Brewing Co. offering a taste of some local brews from 11 to 6 o’clock.  Cooking demonstrations to take place at 11am, 1pm & 3pm. Click HERE for more information.

Scarecrow Stroll Contest throughout Downtown. Don’t miss Rockport’s unique & artistic collection of scarecrows from Front Beach to Bearskin Neck to Harvey Park!  (And be sure to vote on your favorite!). Great prizes offered to the winners sponsored by Granite Savings Bank in Rockport. Click HERE for more information.

Kids’ Zone in Harvey Park.  Climb the hay bales and more! And don’t miss our scheduled events: pumpkin painting from 2 to 4 pm and the costume parade, The Great Scarecrow Chase, at 4:30!

Glass Art Installations by John Bassett, seARTS Partner With an Artist 2012 Winner. Bassett’s work will be on display at three downtown restaurants, right in the heart of the new Rockport Cultural District. Bassett has created the colorful Hannah Jumper series with slumped and fused recycled glass from Rockport’s transfer station.

WOCA Fair in Harvey Park.  The What’s On Cape Ann Fair highlights area non-profits, organizations and sponsors.  Enjoy interactive booths as you learn just what resources are available to Cape Ann residents and visitors!. Click here for more information.

NYRE Food Booth in Harvey Park.  Proceeds to benefit New Year’s Rockport Eve, an annual tradition in Rockport.

HarvestFest Scheduled Events*

Cooking Demonstrations

11 am: Cooking Demonstration with author and educator Nancy Singleton Hachisu under the tent on T Wharf. Hosted by food writer Heather Atwood. Nancy will also be available to sign copies of her recently published cookbook, Japanese Farm Food.

1 pm: Cooking Demonstration featuring Chef Frank McClelland of Boston’s L’Espalier and Apple Street Farm in Essex. Hosted by food writer Heather Atwood.

3 pm: Seafood Throwdown Sponsored by NAMA and emceed by Heather Atwood of the Taste of the Times. For more information, click here.

Live Music

11 am -  12:15 pm
Tom O’Carroll playing in Dock Square.  Traditional Irish & Folk. Click here

12:30 pm – 1:30 pm
Nicholas Bogosian and Michael Knoblach playing in Dock Square. Old Timey Roots Music. Click here.

1:45 – 3:15 pm
Daniel Dye & the Miller Road Band playing in Dock Square.  Indie Americana. Click here.

3:30 pm to 5:30 pm
Brad Byrd with full band playing in Dock Square. Indie/Alt Rock

11 am -  12:30 pm
Courtney Reid playing on T Wharf.  Indie/Alternative Rock. Click here

12:45 pm – 3:15 pm
The Sturdy Oak Boys playing under the tent on T-Wharf. Bluegrass

3:30 pm to 5:30 pm
Old Cold Tater playing under the tent on T-Wharf. Bluegrass

2 pm – 3 pm
Rockport Legion Band in Harvey Park. Click here or here to watch a video clip.

Activities for Families

11 am – 1 pm
Make Your Own Instruments with Rockport Music! In Dock Square at the Old Firehouse Trust Building. Create your own guitar from cigar boxes and other supplies. Sponsored by Rockport Music.

12 noon
CAAA’s Best Dressed Dog Parade from Harvey park to Bearskin Neck and back again. Registration for the Parade begins at 11am with the actual Parade starting at noon. The winners will be announced and prizes awarded immediately following the parade at the CAAA table in Harvey park. Sponsored by the Cape Ann Animal Aid

2 pm – 4 pm
Pumpkin Painting at the Kids’ Zone! Paint a pumpkin to take home as part of your Autumn decor! $5 suggested donation – proceeds to support Rockport Festivals programming.

4:30 pm
The Great Scarecrow Chase!  Children of all ages can join us for a costumed parade throughout downtown, ending up with a very special surprise and treat!  Parade begins in Harvey Park at the Kids Art Zone. Click HERE for more information.

Art & Culture

11 am
Narrative of the Battle of Sandy Bay: Rockport during the War of 1812, as seen through the eyes of five speakers portraying real historical characters who instigated and lived out events in wartime Rockport. The Narrative will be followed by Gaetano Micalizzi reading his award-winning essay on the War of 1812 as well as a brief musical presentation by students.   Located at the First Congregational Church and Sponsored by the Cape Ann DAR

1 pm
MIT Juggling Club on T-Wharf. Traditional street entertainment: juggling, unicycles & more!

1 pm
Glass Art Installation at Brackett’s Oceanview Restaurant on Main Street. Meet Partner With an Artist 2012 Winner John Bassett. Light refreshments. Presented by seARTS and the Rockport Cultural District.

1:30 pm
MIT Juggling Club in Dock Square. Traditional street entertainment: juggling, unicycles & more!

2 pm
Glass Art Installation at Roy Moore’s Fish Shack in Dock Square. Meet Partner With an Artist 2012 Winner John Bassett. Light refreshments. Presented by seARTS and the Rockport Cultural District.

2 pm
MIT Juggling Club on Bearskin Neck. Traditional street entertainment: juggling, unicycles & more!

3 pm
Glass Art Installation at the 7th Wave Restaurant on Bearskin Neck. Meet Partner With an Artist 2012 Winner John Bassett. Light refreshments. Presented by seARTS and the Rockport Cultural District.

4:00 pm
Scarecrow Stroll Contest winners announced in Dock Square! Sponsored by Granite Savings Bank.

For More Information:
www.rockportartfestivals.com
rockportfestivals@gmail.com
978-501-3593

Rock The Baby Daycare

Posted on by Donna Ardizzoni

Rock the Baby Daycare Fall Festival

By Jenn Fisher and Carolyn Jean Sanchez

15 Lexington Avenue

Gloucester, MA  01930 (Magnolia)

Saturday, October 20, 2012

12:30pm until 2:30pm

Join us as local   author Mick Verga shares his book “The Lonely Little Horse: A Chinese   Adoption Story”

Families with children of all ages are invited and costumes are welcome!
There will be fall snacks, crafts and games!

RSVP and receive a mini pumpkin for your children to decorate!

Questions?
Jenn@rockthebaby.com
or
978.381.3074

Double dose of Orville this week

Posted on by Vickie & Peter
Orville Giddings – always smiling Who’s in the background? You’ve seen him on Treme & with others on Cape Ann

Our favorite smilin’ blues man Orville Giddings is a favorite guest at the Rhumb Line this week.  Tomorrow (Thursday) he’s Dave Sag’s guest and Sunday he’s with Allen Estes.  Orville is great solo, with others and with his full band, who you can see the day before Thanksgiving at the Stone Soup in Ipswich.

Back in April we featured Orville on gimmesound.com, with videos of him performing solo, with Allen Estes and with his band.  See those featured videos here.

But don’t wait for tomorrow.  Tonight is the night of great Gloucester guest musicians.  Brian King, Fly Amero, Steve Caraway and Dennis Monagle are all hosting excellent guests.  See the full lineup here.

Check out this duo of Orville with Allen Estes on his show, Local Music Seen.  Before they start, Orville talks about how he performs this song at different tempos depending on who he’s playing with.  Fascinating.

Heart of the Home

Posted on by Kimsmithdesigns

The 5th Annual Heart of the Home Kitchen Tour to benefit the Wenham Museum, Saturday, October 13. For tickets to the tour, call the museum at 978-468-2377 or purchase online at www.wenhammuseum.org

Be inspired by nine extraordinary kitchens in Beverly Farms, Boxford, Hamilton, Wenham, Ipswich, and Manchester By-the-Sea on the 5th Annual Heart of the Home Kitchen Tour to benefit the Wenham Museum on Saturday, October 13 from 11am to 4pm. Visit traditional and contemporary homes that highlight interior design in the room that is the heart of every home—the kitchen.

Get the party started in an open-concept kitchen with plenty of room for guests at an oversized island and cocktail lounge!  Remodeling? Find inspiration in a kitchen honoring the home’s 1765 heritage with historical elements blended with the conveniences needed for a busy 21ST century family, and “Take Joy!” as a whimsical menagerie greets you in a bountiful garden as you enter into a retro 1940’s kitchen bursting with colorfully painted cabinets, Big Chill appliances, and a circus train traveling around the ceiling! Visitors will discover how families lived and cooked more than three centuries ago with a visit to the cooking hearth in the museum’s 17-century Claflin-Richard’s House.

Tour guests are encouraged to bring a donation of non-perishable food to the museum on the day of the tour. Food donations will benefit the North Shore Families serviced through Beverly Bootstraps. Donations may also be delivered to the museum at 132 Main Street, Wenham, MA now through October 15, 2012. A link to the list of the top ten food items needed is posted on the museum’s website.

The museum is grateful to event co-chair Yvonne Blacker: Designer and Marketing Director at Designer Bath, and to the event volunteers, homeowners and designers including Howell Custom Building Group, lmk interiors, ltd, Meadowview Construction, Northshore Kitchens Plus, Wilson Kelsey Design, Inc., New England Design Works, and Designer Bath and Salem Plumbing as well as additional kitchen tour sponsors Renewal by Anderson, and the Salem Five Charitable Foundation, all who made this event possible.

Tickets to the tour include admission to the museum currently featuring It’s a Snap! Community LEGO Art now open through October 21 followed by the Train Time 17: Model Train Exhibit, November 9 – February 24. Proceeds from the kitchen tour benefit the museum’s educational programs and exhibitions, which help to educate over 3,500 school children and 35,000 annual visitors. For tickets to the tour, call the museum at 978-468-2377 or purchase them online at www.wenhammuseum.org.

Preparing the Crane to Offload the Turbine

Posted on by Manuel F. Simoes

Appling multiple  TEN TON Counter Weights to the crane base to be able to lift off the Turbines off the barge scheduled for Monday.  Workers indicated that the barge will be offloaded, first from one side and then must go back out to turn around to offload the other side.

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Discover Gloucester Off-Season Mug Ups Getting Started

Posted on by Joey Ciaramitaro

Mug Ups are not done!

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Though the Sunday morning mug ups at Khan/GMG Gallery are over for the season, the Discover Gloucester off-season Mug Up Meetings are just beginning!

Anyone interested in area tourism is welcome to attend on Thursday, October 11, 5-6:30 PM at the Rocky Neck Cultural Center. Share how your season went; do some networking and start to make plans for the 2013 season- it’s not too early!

RSVP to info@SeaportGloucester.org

Linn

Orville Giddings to join Dave Sag’s Blues Party this Thursday @ The Rhumb LIne

Posted on by Joanne

Dave says,

Just back from a world tour of Ipswich, let’s welcome back that guffawing guitarist and Gleem® spokesmodel, Mr. Orville Giddings. Hooray! It’ll be a pleasure to have him back. Besides playing some really infectious covers, his original toons are are pretty damn good. you’ll like ’em!
Fleshing out the rhythm section will be that fleet-fingered tapper of the keys, Mr. John Cameron, Forrest”Frosty” Padgett, on skinning machine, and yours truly on base.  It’s gonna be a great nite!  Use only as directed.

 http://www.reverbnation.com/orvillegiddingsband

Posted on by Alicia Pensarosa

My name is Clooney and I am a three-month-old affectionate male Terrier/mix male pup.  I have a handsome chocolate coat.

I am residing at the Cape Ann Animal Aid located at the Christopher Cutler Rich Animal Shelter, Four Paws Lane, Gloucester.  Please stop by and visit me and if you haven’t seen the new shelter – you will be impressed. I am so excited about finding a forever home, I could just cry.

If you would like to learn about some of our upcoming events, please visit CapeAnnAnimalAid.com. As you know, we are always in need of items and we have a “wish list” of items such as ceramic bowls for cats and dogs.

I have to run, the nice volunteer is here to take me for a walk and we have beautiful paths outside and I just love to look at the birds and the beautiful woods around us.   Please don’t forget, my name is Clooney and I am not certain why, but everyone is asking me if my first name is

George….. I just don’t get it?!

GFAA Golf Fund Raiser at Bass Rocks a success

Posted on by Manuel F. Simoes

Gerry Hart writes:

Thanks to Bass Rocks and the Favazza Johnson Insurance Agency, … Gloucester Times, Good Morning Gloucester, 104.9 radio, and al the Friends of GFAA ….

Below are some photos of some of the people who enjoyed a day of Golf at Bass Rocks Club.

Team02B

Team01B

 

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Over A Year Later We Revisit Google+ Google Circles

Posted on by Joey Ciaramitaro

Back on August 23, 2011 I wrote that I thought Google Circles and Google plus were probably not going to take off the way some folks were predicting-

GMG Tech Talk- Google Plus, Google Circles

Posted on August 23, 2011 by Joey C

How many of you are actually using these services?

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When they first appeared around what seems like a couple of weeks ago lots of people were signing up and tech media were predicting that it was going to turn Facebook on it’s ear. ahem (Paul Morrison).

The numbers of people were signing up for the services were enormous as there are already a ton of people who use and trust Google products to begin with.   So the growth was probably from people saying sure, what the hell, I’ll give it a try and with the sheer number of Google users to begin with those numbers of new accounts when reported in the media are staggering.

Well Google products have a long history of success and I use many of them daily. Gmail, Google Calendar, Documents, Google Music and Google Listen among a few I use most every day.  There have been a few misses with products that may have been a little ahead of it’s time or too smart to catch on universally.  Among one that comes to mind was the collaborative tool Google Wave which promised real time online collaborations.  I used it once or twice and it was interesting but not enough folks caught on.  Kenny and I edit our podcast shownotes in Google docs sometimes simultaneously and Google Docs seems like it took a lot of things from Google wave and integrated them.

As tech savvy as I consider myself I still can’t get the hang of circles.  It may be just a little too slick and I just don’t have the energy to figure it all out right now.  So my intuition tells me that if I can’t figure it out in a snap that most grandmothers will say fuck it and not bother.  This is a huge difference between Facebook and Google Circles.  Facebook seems just super easy peasy lemon squeazy whereas Google Circles seems like people really need to sort a whole bunch of stuff out to make it manageable.

Google +?  I’ve clicked on that +1 button on a bunch of different sites including this one when there are things that I find interesting and I figure it will share that somewhere but I’ve yet to figure out where that +1 button is visible or who gets to see the post or page that I find interesting enough to click the +1 button for.  Again, I consider myself pretty much a 9.5 on the scale from 1-10 on the tech geek scale so for me not to understand it gives me a strong sense that a good majority of people don’t understand it either.

Maybe once my season slows down and once the winter doldrums set in I’ll have time to get more into it but I’m just not sure the masses will and isn’t that what Google wants to capture with it’s products-  the masses?

Now over a year later I see a few hard core geeks (and I say that in the most complimentary way) ahem Paul Morrison, are using these services and it hasn’t made a tiny nick in the armor that is Facebook from what I can tell. 

It’s rare that I use either of the two, how bout you?  Do you still use Google Circles or Google+?  Do you think it will stay as part of the Google ecosystem?  I imagine they are still adding users but my guess is that the rate at which they are adding subscribers compared to the first couple of months when they were rolling out the service has dropped to a teeny tiny fraction of what it was.  Back a month into the roll out I found it preposterous that analysts were extrapolating the numbers of people signing up in the first month for Google Circles far into the future as if that growth wasn’t simply the shear number of Gmail users that were trying it out for the first time.

When I hear social media pundits like my boy Ryan Pinkham talking about relevant services I never hear them talking about Google+ or Google Circles the way they talk about Facebook, Twitter or Instagram and I find that telling.  Maybe he will chime in here and give his take.

Your thoughts on the service?  Your thought on how you use it compared to the way you use Facebook?  Comment below- 

Social Media Guru Ryan Pinkham adds-

There’s been a lot of talk of Google+ being a ghost town. The way that Google reports on how many people use it is really out of whack, so while they may say they have 100 million+, the level of activity doesn’t match up.

When I have a blog post or find an article I like, I never think “Hey let me share this on Google+” It doesn’t come close to matching the reach of FB, Twitter, or even LinkedIn. Also it doesn’t offer enough of a unique experience to make me put in the effort. I’m a lot less interested in learning about a site that’s trying to be the new Facebook than a site like Pinterest which is offering a unique experience.

I also have never met a business owner who says Google+ has helped their business, would love to hear from anyone who has seen success.

Truthfully I would love to see Google+ takeoff because I think people are getting kinda Facebooked out, but they’re still a long way away.

That all being said, if your a business owner it’s worth it to hop on Google+ and claim your business name now, before someone else takes it. That way, if Google+ takes off in the future, you’ll be ready to go.

Community Stuff 10/10/12

Posted on by Joey Ciaramitaro
15th Anniversary Party @ La Provence!

Hi Joey C!
We’re celebrating our 15th Anniversary at La Provence with a Party!  Join us during Rockport’s HarvestFest, Saturday, October 13th to celebrate!
Be sure to stop by and say hello and enjoy some homemade treats & shop specials! 
Merci!
Dawn Noble @ La Provence
4 Main Street
Rockport, Ma 01966
978.546.5868
www.laprov.com

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Eoin Vincent Show AT RAA

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COASTLINE – The New Works of Eoin Vincent

COASTLINE is the newest collection of photographs by Cape Ann Photographer Eoin Vincent. "I have been photographing the New England coast for a long time. This most recent series of images came together as I challenged myself to look deeper at my surroundings.”

After the completion of his EYES OF TANZANIA project, Vincent notes that his camera stayed in its camera bag for a long time. At that point he knew he needed to commit to himself to take a photo everyday. This in turn became his blog CIRCADIAN TRANSPARENCY that can be found at eoinvincent.com. He was able to post 240 photos in 365 days but regretfully soon after the first year his blogs database “blew up” and he had to start all over again.

During the process of trying to shoot every day he noticed that the images brought him back to his home on the coast of Cape Ann and other parts of New England. “The year of photography reminded me of the time in my teens when I shot many photos as I wandered the coast from both sides of the tide.”

Vincent, grew up near Halibut Point and spent many hours hiking around the oceanfront  and sailing. He is the grandson of artists Kenneth and Elizabeth Vincent and the nephew of marine painter Peter Vincent. “I was lucky, I started my artistic career painting and mimicking my family and other great artists in the Cape Ann area, but very early on I started taking photos and working in my grandfathers darkroom. That is where the magic of photography began for me.”
 
COASTLINE, Vincent states, is more than a new series of photographs. “It’s the beginning   of my study of the New England coast that I have been working on for the last 25 years.”

The photography show, COASTLINE – The New Works of Eoin Vincent, will be at the Rockport Art Association from October 14th to 25th, with an opening reception on October 14th from 2:00 to 4:00 pm. Open to the public.