Archive - Feb 21, 2010
This Week In Woodbridge
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Sun, 02/21/2010 - 21:40After a particularly quiet week last week, this week in Woodbridge starts off with a flurry of activity. On Monday, starting at 6 PM, there will be a special meeting of the Board of Selectmen to review department budget requests for FY2011 and to vote on the recommendations to the Board of Finance for the FY2011 budget. At the same time, the Board of Fire Commissions will hold a meeting at the new fire house. This meeting will also be discussing budgets, building use. The EMS Commission is scheduled to start at 7 PM at the Town Hall.
Over at Beecher Road, there are two meetings taking place, both starting at 7 PM. The regular meeting of the Woodbridge Board of Education is scheduled for the Media Center. At the meeting, there will be a report on the monthly enrollment as well as actions on the school district’s participation in the Open Choice Program and the Wintergreen Magnet School.
The board is also scheduled to act on a recommendation of the BRS Town Building Committee to retain Dimeo Construction as the construction manager for the BRS building project. Acting as a committee of the whole, the board will review curriculum issues as well as the strategic school profile.
The recreation commission will meet at the same time at the South Assembly Room. The agenda will cover mostly the same topics as the January agenda, but in a slightly different order.
At the Library on Wednesday evening, starting at 5:30, there will be a career networking meeting. The regular meeting of the Board of Selectmen is scheduled to take place at the Town Hall starting at 6 PM. The Woodbridge Park Association is also reportedly meeting on Wednesday and the Massaro Farm Board is reportedly meeting on Thursday. There will also be a screening of The Time Traveler’s Wife at the library starting at 7 PM on Thursday.
Ending off the week will be The Hoot at Beecher Road School from 11:30 to 3:30. Also, starting at 1 PM on Saturday will be storytelling about maple syrup starting at the public library, followed by a hike in the Alice Newton Street Park.
This will be followed by a Gala Purim Masquerade Ball at Congregation B’nai Jacob in Woodbridge starting at 6:15 PM. Sunday, starting at 3 PM there will be a Purim Carnival at the Jewish Community Center.
(Cross-posted at the Woodbridge Citizen).
Lyman Orchard's Winterfest 38
Submitted by Aldon Hynes on Sun, 02/21/2010 - 11:10I’ve lived in Connecticut for about twenty years now, and my wife and two youngest daughters were both born here, so it is a surprise that none of us have ever been to Lyman Orchard’s annual Winterfest. Yesterday, we corrected this error and had a great time.
One of the main draws for us was seeing Bill Covitz’s ice sculptures.
Of course Fiona was especially interested in sampling some of the food that was for sale in the store. They had lots of great samples, and I want to highlight some of the best. One of our favorites was the Mango Spice Salsa from Giff’s Original in Cheshire. It was very tasty and they use as much local products as possible in their relishes, chutneys and salsas.
There were quite a few other really good salsas and sauces available as well. Besides buying some of the Mango Spice Salsa, we picked up some Sachs Brand Barbecue sauce. Another good sauce that we sampled was All Natural Frank’s Marinara sauce. Frank used to run a restaurant up near Hartford, and now makes his sauces from Hebron, and you can find his sauces in a lot of stores around Connecticut.
Another honorable mention goes to Rich’s Sweet Heat crossing the line from Coventry, RI. Also notable in the sauce and salsa category is Salsa Delievery from East Granby with their Fresh Salsa of the Month club.
In the drinks category there were samples of fresh cider from the orchard, East Haven’s Foxon Park White Birch Beer, and Sweet Leaf Tea which had various ice teas and lemonade available for sample. Sweet Leaf Tea is actually from Austin Texas, but they’re making a big push in the northeast. Rounding out the drinks section was Lebanon, CT based Farmer’s Cow.
Across the aisle from the Farmer’s Cow samples were sample cider donut holes and cherry pie from the orchard and nearby were nuts from The Nut Lady from Agawam, MA.
With our food sampling complete, Fiona insisted that we stop and say hello to the puppies. Guilding Eyes for the Blind had a display up about their puppy raising program as well as several very cute puppies.
Ending off our day, we visited the igloos. These were small, but still large enough for Fiona to climb into. After this we went on a brief sleigh ride. Although the snow was melting around us as the horses pulled our sleigh across the field, it was a great experience.
As we left, Fiona asked if we can come back every year. I tend to take things a little more ‘one day at a time’, but agreed that we would put it on our list of things to try and come back to in 2011.
As a final note, in light of recent FTC rulings about bloggers endorsing things, I should let people know that the only things we have received for this favorable review was the good times and good samples we had at the Winter Festival, as well as a free cherry pie that we have been offered for putting some pictures of the event up on the Lyman Orchard’s Facebook Fan page. Fiona and I are really looking forward to Kim picking up the cherry pie.
For more pictures of the event, check out the pictures tagged ‘winterfest38’ on Flickr.
