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Bright Spots
Finding Bright Spots in the Midst of Uncertainty By Nicole M. Young, MSW 2020 started off promising. The California legislature passed the first-ever statewide resolution declaring January as Positive Parenting Awareness Month. Go parents! I took a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Australia in February to present at an international conference for Triple P providers and researchers. My kids had enjoyed a long break from their rigorous high school and college classes and were gearing up for their spring semesters. Life was busy but good. And then came COVID-19…and racial unrest…and the wildfires…and repeated disruptions to our daily lives. This year has been filled with one challenge after another, and at times…
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How to Avoid Email Scams
How to Avoid Email Scams By Luigi Oppido With people’s home phones diminishing and less and less communications happening via phone calls, scammers have moved into the world of email. Email scamming is the easiest way for a thief to gain personal information about you without doing much work. There are multiple ways that email scams can come into your home, with or without your solicitation. We’re going to talk about some of the ways you can recognize those email scams and what to do about them when you think you’ve got one. The first thing to understand is reading an email scam does not do anything to your computer…
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Teacher of the Month
We always want to do more for teachers and here’s something we can all do. Send your nominations for a teacher who deserves to be honored. Write us a letter about why this teacher is special.We will print your letters and choose teachers to receive cash, flowers and a bottle of wine! How has your nominee gone above and beyond to help your kids?How have they inspired your kids during the pandemic? We are looking for teachers of all grades, from preschool to college. You can even send us a video. Let’s celebrate those who do so much for all of us. Even though they deserve to be paid as…
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Is Halloween Really Canceled?
Is Halloween Really Canceled? BY christy shults Online neighborhood groups are filled with Halloween protest post. Has Halloween really been canceled? It is not. Like everything else this year, Halloween will look different from usual. Large groups are still not allowed, and this will dramatically affect parties and trick-or-treating. We posed the question to our readers and received a wide range of responses, along with some great suggestions on how to keep the magic alive. I think this year is for decorations! Let people walk or drive by and enjoy whatever spooky or fun creations you can put together. I’m so sad, I love Halloween and I love trick-or-treating with…
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Trail Now
Forget the Rail, Trail is the Way to Go Now By Brian Peoples It has been a decade since the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission bought the Santa Cruz Branch Line. But reserving the rail corridor for a train is preventing the construction of a world-class Santa Cruz Coastal Trail. 10 reasons why the Santa Cruz Coastal Trail should be built NOW: Never-Ending Costly Studies. three train studies conducted over the last five years and costing $2.5 million have proven that a train would not reduce traffic, would cost over $1 billion and would increase adjacent surface-street traffic and congestion. Legal Restrictions. Federal guidelines require that any trail built…
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JULY EDITORIAL
July Editors Notes We are living through tough times right now all over the world. Sure, we haven’t been asked to make the sacrifices people had to make in bigger catastrophes. Other generations would laugh at our “problems,” like being asked to wear masks or to stay home and watch Netflix, but we are also seeing firsthand the plight of losing the business you loved and built as the economy goes into a tailspin. Like most, we are shaking our heads trying to awaken from a bad dream and wondering what will come next and how we will deal with it. The good news is that our community is filled…
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June Editor Note
Editor’s Note To say these are confusing times is an understatement. With all of our scientific knowledge and advancement, a pandemic has sent us back to a primitive world, when family and tribes were central to life. Despite the high tech gadgets that keep us linked, there are still the daily questions: What comes next? When can we see our friends? Is it safe outside? What will school be like when and if it opens?The only reassuring note we saw in the news today was the Disneyland is planning to open in the middle of July. At least that was a smile we could pass on to the kids…although, like…
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Suzanne Fiore
Local Artist Spotlight Suzanne Fiore Suzanne’s love of animals, nature, monsters, pop-culture, and storytelling has molded her into the artist she is today. She creates illustrations in both traditional and digital media. Would you love to own one of her one of a kind pieces? You can visit her website fiorecreation.com. Follow Fiore Creations on social media to see her imagination come to life @fiorecreation on Instagram and Facebook.Your kids can get hands-on instruction from this talented artist either through one-on-one lessons or at Santa Cruz Mountains Art Center’s camps or after school programs. Suzanne received her BFA in traditional illustration from the Academy of Art University, San Francisco. She…
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Letters to Mom
Letters for Mother’s Day Here is your chance to show your female role model or guardian (mom, aunt, friend, etc) your love! Write a letter for Mother’s Day and send to [email protected] to have it published for FREE in our May issue! Here’s the details: Write 250 words about what your mother means to you and send us a great photo of her and maybe the whole family too, and we will print it in our May Mother’s Day issue. Send your message to [email protected] by April 25.And, we have a gift for the family. Ten of you will be chosen in a random drawing to get four passes to…
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Artist Spotlight
Artist Spotlight Bliss Gervais I’m Bliss Gervais and Santa Cruz is the town I grew up in, so I am delighted to be in this magazine! My husband, Peace, was also born in Santa Cruz.Our parents gave us our unusual names and we happened to meet eachother and instantly felt a strong connection. Now we are raising our wonderful son here. His name is Chakra and he is almost 7 years old. I have been creating art for as long as I can remember. My family is very creative in many ways and I tried a wide variety of art forms at an early age. Pen and paper has always…
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Virtual Kids Day
Sadly due to the shelter in place order Kids Day Downtown has been cancelled. We still want to give a shout out to all of the great kids minded businesses that sponsored the map page for our March issue.
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Online Resources
List of online resources for staying at home with your kiddos during the shelter in place order.
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Our Coloring Contest Entry Winners!
Our Coloring Contest Entry Winners! We had some amazing entries to our December coloring contest. Check out our winners below!
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The First Placement for our First Foster Child
The First Placement for our First Foster Child By Amanda Firth This is part of a short series about Foster Parenting and Adoption in Santa Cruz County. Proper names in the story have been changed for the privacy and protection of the children involved. We were ready for a new baby. There was a half size crib in our bedroom with green and yellow sheets and baby blankets, a few baby outfits, and a toy. That was it. Oh, and a new credit card that was only usable at Babies-R-Us. Honestly, we did not believe this was really going to happen. We had trained, interviewed, and been thoroughly prepared and…
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Baby Photo Contest 2019
We Have a Winner for our 2019 October Baby Contest! Our baby contest is sponsored by Alicia Telfer Photography. You can find her at iplaywithlight.com and email [email protected] to learn more and book a session! We had SO much fun collecting your adorable baby photos and seeing the votes pour in! We had almost 1,500 votes and the results have been counted! While we have a top 5, all of our babies received a lot of votes. Congrats to everyone! First Place Second Place Third Place Fourth Place Fifth Place
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July Pet Photo Contest!
Vote for our July Cover! Which is your favorite kid and pet pair? Leave a comment on this post with the number of the photo of your choice. Only one entry per person. DEADLINE IS JULY 26TH! 1) Bella and English Bulldog Bubba 2) 3) 4) Gabriella and Shimmer the Beagle…also know as “Beagle and the Beast” Sent by Kimberly Gomez 5) Echo guarding her “baby boy” Wyatt, sent by Susan Lorbeki 6) Adalyn who is 4 years old and her pet chicken cupcake. This chicken fallows Adalyn around the yard hoping for chicken treats and also to Adalyn’s delight likes to try and hop in the car. 7) Mason…
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Color and Win PJ Masks Tickets!
Color and Win PJ Masks Tickets! Growing Up in Santa Cruz is having it’s first coloring contest with a BIG PRIZE: A family pack of four tickets to see the live PJ MASKS show in San Jose on Feb. 20 at 6 p.m. Have your kid color the page and submit it one of two ways: either scan it and email to [email protected] or mail it to Growing Up in Santa Cruz, Box 3505, Santa Cruz, CA 95063. We’ll have a drawing to pick the winner, but you have to send in a colored page to win. We will also ask the winners to take a picture of their family…
