New and exciting events are on the horizon at Maplewood Child Development Center. Over the last two weeks wheels have been turning and plans drafted. Here is a short list of the Autumn and Winter Events and projects we have planned.

Social Give Back Projects

Maplewood will be supporting the Irving Park Community Food Pantry this November by collecting non-perishable healthy foods and non food items such as toiletries, house hold cleaning products and supplies, winter proofing materials, and more. A complete list of items can be obtained at www.irvingparkfoodpantry.com

This months second charity and social service organization is the Connections for Abused Woman and Their Children, www.cawc.org. There is a great need for young adult literature, which we are collecting for their literacy for young adults program. We are also accepting on their behalf, children’s books, cold weather scarves, hats and gloves/mittens and a slew of other items which can be found on the organizations’ wish list posted to their website. For every book donated, Maplewood will match with two books.

Community Out Reach

Most neighborhoods in the Chicagoland area have a public library. Unfortunately our own does not. This is why Maplewood has joined the Avondale Neighborhood Association in their project to bring a public or private LIBRARY to our neighborhood. In the mean time, Maplewood will be partnering with Word World, Home Depot, our Alderman Deborah Mell and local contractors to build LENDING LIBRARY TREEHOUSES to be located at a few of the local children’s parks and businesses. We are very excited about this project.

No neighborhood feels complete without a little Autumn twinkle and light. Here at Maplewood, we value the creative arts and the art of story telling. We’ve got in the works a beautiful LANTERN LITE NATURE WALK planned for our neighborhood families. Over a few weeks in November and early December we will be making lanterns out of nature collections of the beautiful falling leaves, twigs, flowers and what ever else little hands pick up. Then on one day to be scheduled in early December, Maplewood will be meeting at a neighborhood park to get together just as the sun begins to set. We will march off on an outdoor adventure, a nature walk, with each of our lanterns, lighting up our beautifully tree lined streets. We encourage families to take pictures of your lanterns and email them to MaplewoodCDC@gmail.com or post them to our www.Facebook.com/MaplewoodCDCavondale so we may include them in an article for our local Avondale newspapers and blogs.

For our Neighborhood & Maplewood Families

As the weather chills outside we will be hosting a number of indoor MY CHILD AND I PLAYDATES for infants, toddlers, and preschool age children at Maplewood Child Development Center. It is our plan to provide a variety of days and times over the upcoming months to allow flexibility for our busy neighborhood families. During the month of November, all playgroups will be free of charge in lieu of donations to the Irving Park Community Food Pantry and the Connections for Abused Woman and Their Children organization.

We are also paring up with local yoga and fitness instructors, chefs, artists, musicians and contractors this autumn and winter to provide fun EARLY CHILDHOOD CLASSES for our Maplewood families.

In & Around Maplewood Child Development Center

This autumn and winter our plans for our two OUTDOOR CLASSROOMS are being set in motion. Drafts have been drawn and we are already starting to collect nature playscape materials like boulders and bridges. We are eagerly awaiting Spring so the gardening and landscaping designs can start to take shape. We are partnering with three very talented individuals from our local Chicago Botanical Gardens, Morton Arboretum, and Dirsmith Construction.  So EXCITING!

Indoor winter gardening, you say? What does that even mean? This fall we are designing and building some beautiful indoor garden plant beds along side Urban Farms – ModPod and partnering with a two local artists at Ravenswood Community Art Center who will be making us some beautiful indoor container gardens. We are very eager to set the date for our WINTER GARDENING PARTY with our Maplewood families. We will be providing indoor sized garden plot kits for each Maplewood family who attends. Already, our beautiful spider plant has sprouted spiderlings who as they grow up with be ready to find new homes on our Maplewood family’s in-home garden plots.

Learn about the newest, coolest, slimiest house pet…. PET WORMS. Yes, and what great pets they make. They eat your garbage and feed your garden and house plants. Maplewood families, are you ready? We are! Next up on our list of things to do is to build our worm home and we want you to help. Our tumbling compost bin outside is full to the brim and ready to hibernate for the autumn and winter. So we are now need to adopt some pet worms. We will be building our vermicomposting bin and invite you to learn about why these squiggly squirmy hungery little critters are going to be our favorite house pet this season. For a donation of healthy non-perishable foods to the Irving Park Community Food Depository, we are supplying the materials so you may take your own worm house home. Date: TBA