Our new neighborhood playground

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/baltimore-city/bs-md-ci-playground-ravens-20110616,0,1740688.story#tugs_story_display

Last Thursday found scores of purple-clad volunteers converging on the German Park playground to erect a brand new playground for the neighborhood children. The Ravens helped pay for it and energized a community effort to provide the local children with play structures that they were actually excited about.

RHHP resident Anna was one of those volunteers who put in a day's of hard work and had sore muscles to prove it. There was a party at the playground this afternoon to celebrate the opening of the park. An ice-cream truck stopped by and handed out free ice-cream cones.

Sarah's big concert

Sarah, of Sarah and Jeff, our housemates and neighbors on the second floor, recently pulled off a chorus performance involving half the student population of the Baltimore Highlands Elementary School. It was a musical featuring space aliens (green, of course) who delivered an urgent message that the earth is fragile and needed to be protected. It was a clever way to encourage greater environmental consciousness through conservation and recycling . Feedback from the parents and her colleagues was overwhelmingly positive. One parent had said that this concert was the most successful in 20 years! The principal also gave her a rave review.

Also, Paul Schlitz, member of North Baltimore Mennonite Church, accompanied the chorus and band. We were greatly impressed by Sarah's professionalism and the way she exercised command over a situation involving large numbers of squirmy kids. Any number of things could have gone wrong and they did but she handled those with great poise.