One way to feel good about taking part in the hyper consumerism of the holiday season is to shop locally. That’s why your pals at Perfect Duluth Day have again compiled a gallery of gifts produced by the hands and brains of your friends and neighbors. Click on the pics for details about each item.
Just like last year’s guide, the fabulous showcase below is by no means comprehensive. List your own suggestions in the comments.
There’s a carnival from 11 until 3 on Saturday, Oct. 30 at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Duluth, 835 W. College Street. Free admission and some free activities. Games, cake walk, fortune telling, Vasili the Clown, caramel apples, lunch items, and more. Open to everyone.
Just in time for the Elections Halloween, I stumbled across Mad Monster Party. I’ve seen a lot of Rankin/Bass stuff, but have never even heard of this one. This is a making of, split into two parts.
It’s amazing how much these guys put out, we saw a Rankin/Bass marathon on cable a few years ago, and they seemed to cash in on pretty much every holiday. Some of them were pretty unwatchable. But we watched anyway.
If you’ve got fabulous Halloween photos, it’s Halloween banner time. But hurry, ‘cuz I shoulda had this call out a couple weeks ago. We’ll start putting the Halloween banners up as soon as we get enough to rotate.
Halloween banners must follow the same guidelines as the other banners. Basically, the photos have to be cropped to 960 pixels wide by 167 pixels high. The Perfect Duluth Day logo will be added by PDD’s art department.
Thanks to everyone who stopped by the PDD Canopy of Joy yesterday.
It was a good day at Chester Bowl.
Sunshine. Pan flute. Cheese curds. Matching puppies.
I love this time of year. The leaves may be falling, but the Perfect Duluth Day sticker harvest has just begun. Stop by the Perfect Duluth Day booth at Chester Bowl’s Fall Fest this Saturday, Sept. 18, from 9:30am – 4:30pm to pick up your own free Perfect Duluth Day bumper sticker.
This is a brand new batch of stickers with a slightly different design than the original. (If you have an old sticker, you will officially be stuck in the past after Saturday.)
The PDD booth will be on the right side as you enter the park from Skyline, about halfway down the row.
Weather should be good, but the rain date is Sunday, Sept. 19, same time.
If you can’t make it to Fall Fest but still want a sticker, send a S.A.S.E to PDD.
I’m thinking about getting a handheld GPS. We’d use it hiking, maybe try geocaching with the kids and when paddling. So if was waterproof and usable in the car, that’d be great, but not necessary.
Anybody have recommendations or have one they want to get rid of?
Here’s another video from Monday night’s Homegrown Music Video Festival, in case you weren’t there. It’s Josh Carlon’s fantastic animated video for “The Old Clyde Road” by The Bitter Spills.
This year during Homegrown PDD will be featuring Homegrown-related photo banners. If you have photos to submit, we’d love to see them and possibly put them in the rotation.
e-mail your JPEG file (960 pixels wide by 167 pixels high) to: banners (at) perfectduluthday dot com
If you need a refresher on banner specs, there’s info after the jump, as well as a slideshow of photos from last year’s homegrown.
The ski hill at Chester Bowl is scheduled to stay open through this weekend, but it looks like Mother Nature may not be patient and cooperative. Already this weekend, the creek started flooding the bottom of the hill. So if you’re interested in or watching a waterskiing run at the Bowl, today might be your day. The lift is open from 4:30 – 8:30 tonight (Monday 3/8). The next scheduled day the lift is open will be Thursday, but that’s a long way away. Lift tickets are $5 at the concession stand. While you’re there, pick up a nifty Chester Bowl Hoodie or long-sleeve T-shirt at the concession stand.
You know you’ve always wanted to see somebody go off those jumps at Chester Bowl, now you can.
Just in time for the Olympics, learn about Duluth’s world-class ski jumping history, and support both Chester Bowl and WDSE public television at the same time. Come take in a movie and hear some stories from Chester’s ski jumping legends. Kid-friendly early and late showings, conveniently overlapping the Paul Lundgren Happy Hour right upstairs.
The Ski Flyers: a Jumping Tradition, including additional archival footage of ski jumpers
Wed Feb 10, 5:30 and 7:00 pm Zinema2
Tickets: $3 for 5:30 show, $5 for 7:00 show. Seating is limited; advance tickets and more info are available at this link. Remaining tickets will be available at the door.
Here’s a really cool video showing one R&D company’s view of the future of e-readers. Having been in the publication design biz for years, I loved seeing somebody take the idea of an electronic magazine beyond the blog or web site format. Some of the stuff they do in here is really cool, and features the photography and art beautifully.
Somewhat related, I saw a few posts today speculating about the fabled Apple Tablet, what it will actually be, and whether it will be a disappointment or not. I was saving up for an iPod touch, but I think I’ll wait to see what shakes out from Steve Job’s announcement in a few weeks.
I was just wasting time following a twitter link to the Walker Art Center site, and saw this. Holy poop, my seagull is right there on the Walker site IN FRONT OF Joel and Ethan Cohen.
Take that you famous Hollywood / Minnesota guys.
The time to spend money we don’t really have is upon us. So why not give that money from the future to our friends and neighbors?
With that sentiment in mind, the folks at Perfect Duluth Day have compiled a selection of locally produced goods and services to add to your shopping list. Click on the pics below for details about each item.
This fabulous showcase is by no means comprehensive, of course. We at PDD would like you to contribute to it through the comments. If you know of a local something special for that special someone, let it be known.
The ski lottery was held a few weeks ago at Chester Bowl, but there are still some ski rental packages available. The Chester Bowl Improvement Club provides inexpensive season ski packages, including skis, poles, boots, helmets, and season ski passes, for those that want to take part in skiing, lessons or other activities at Chester Bowl. You also get a day pass to Spirit Mt. and Mont du Lac. Many parents call the Chester Bowl Ski Program the best deal in town, but for those unable to afford the already low prices, scholarships are available. Check out the Chester Bowl website for more info.
Jason Wussow and Dan Dresser, the guys who made the movie Cooking on the Car, are taking their mobile kitchen on the road again soon. They’re hoping to challenge Jay Leno to a cook off – putting their Toyota Camry up against one of Leno’s fancy schmancy cars. Or maybe Conan is still driving his Taurus.
2nd Annual Chester Bowl Wine & Beer Tasting and Silent Auction
Saturday, October 17th, 6:30pm-9:30pm
Baja Billy’s Restaurant – Fitger’s – 600 E. Superior St.
$25 Per Person in Advance
$35 Per Person at the Door
This is the major fundraiser of the year for the ski program and other kids activities at Chester Bowl. See more info and buy tickets online at chesterbowl.org
It’s October 1st, and that means the best holiday in the world is only 30 days away. We’re looking for Halloween banners for PDD. There have been a few showing up in the rotation, but if you have more, send ‘em in. We want to display Halloween-only banners on Halloween. Remember, here are the rules. Images must be 960 pixels wide by 167 pixels high. Don’t stretch the image to make it fit those dimensions, that always looks poopy. Believe it or not, we have standards here. The Perfect Duluth Day logo will be added by PDD’s art department. If you’d like to add the logo yourself, here’s a layered Photoshop template.
The lower portion of banner photos serve as background to the navigation bar, so crop your image with that in mind. Make sure essential elements are not in the area that will be obscured.
E-mail the masterpieces to banners @ perfectduluthday.com
To view the banners on PDD, click here.
To view the huge pile of PDD banners on Flickr, click here. Feel free to add tags or fun facts about your photos in the Flickr comments.
Today is one of four days of reckoning for the self-employed among us. I thought it was funny that these were the only stamps I had left on the sheet to put on my federal and state estimated payments.
Today I turned 44. Which is probably the reason I was left out of the 20-under-40-movers-and-shakers-around-town list today.
That, and the fact that I don’t move or shake so good no more.
Anyway, I sent both kids off to school this morning then loaded up the kayak to treat myself to a quick paddle on the lake. (more…)
If you’ve got kids and need something for them to do this summer, there’s still open spots in the Chester Bowl summer program. They’re doing things like kayaking, hiking, field trips (Twins game, Valleyfair, park point sailing and swimming, and other places around town.) Scholarships are available. Details, fees, schedules and more can be found on the Chester Bowl Site.
