The farmers market is an attention-grabbing weekly event, visible from either side of Park Avenue, as dozens of vendor tents, tables and booths fill Kennedy Plaza every Wednesday and Saturday during the season from late morning into the early afternoon. Now, for eight weeks throughout the summer season, Artists in Partnership is going to be offering a free storytelling and arts and crafts program for children from ages 3 to 6 every Wednesday from 10 a.m. until 10:45 a.m.
“The program will involve reading stories that relate to nutrition, to bees, to the market itself,” said Johanna Mathieson-Ellmer, the director of Artists in Partnership. “It’s themed around the market and food — where we get our food. What we’re hoping is that we’ll have some of the vendors possibly talk to the kids. We do have farmers there, so every fruit or vegetable you can think of is there.”
The subsequent craft session will be similarly themed to match the book that was read. In the first session last Wednesday, participants received small canvas bags that they decorated before ‘shopping’ for paper-made vegetables.
Title Wave Books, a mobile book shop, will also be present when scheduling permits. “If a parent wants a book,” Mathieson-Ellmer explains, “They can put that on order and she’ll give them a discounted rate and get the books for them.”
The farmers market at Kennedy Plaza is open 9 a.m. to 2 p.m., rain or shine, Wednesdays and Saturdays. On Wednesdays, young children can attend the free Little Sprouts story and craft time at 10 a.m.
On Saturdays, everyone can enjoy Arts in the Plaza, running simultaneous with the farmers market, when artists, jewelers and craftspeople offer handmade goods alongside the farm vendors. Live bands will also perform Saturdays at 10 a.m. and 11:30 a.m.
