Several weeks ago I devoted an entire blog to the beautiful gardens crafted by Maria Blanco all around her home at the corner of Phillips and Ridge Rd.
It struck me recently that Maria’s gardens, while spectacular, are not the only ones I admire on my daily walks. One of my regular walking routes takes me into the village, up North Ave. to the bike path, to Phillips, back into the village, and through neighborhood streets home. And all along the way, Rose of Sharon bushes, bursts of flowers and flowering shrubs, annuals and perennials, sunflowers, black-eyed Susans and whimsical signs cheer me and help quicken my step.
Yesterday, however, I slowed my step long enough to take photos of many of the gardens I see along the way. Perhaps yours is among them. If so, thank you for all your hard work and for brightening my mornings.
I make it a habit to stop at every lemonade stand I encounter when I’m walking or biking, or even driving. I like encouraging young entrepreneurs, and adding to the thrill they get from earning a few dollars. If you feel the same, then you’re going to enjoy hearing about this very special lemonade stand.
It was set up at the corner of South Ave. and Park Ave. in the Village of Webster, at the home of Doug and Patty Pucci.
It was no ordinary lemonade stand, however. Not only was it about the most official-looking stand you’ll ever see — complete with an American flag, pinwheel, umbrella for shade and an “open/closed” sign — it also raised almost $500 for St. Jude Children’s Hospital.
Nixie-Blu and a thirsty customer
The proprietor was 6-year old Nixie-Blu Howes, who was in town this summer with her mother, visiting her grandparents. Like any kid, Nixie-Blu loves the idea of making money, even though she said, “I don’t know what I want to spend it on.” But it was also her idea to donate half of her lemonade stand proceeds to St. Jude Children’s Hospital, in part because her aunt works there.
Just setting up shop in a highly visible location wasn’t enough, however. Nixie-Blu also made her own signs and posted them on trees throughout the neighborhood, pointing patrons to the stand.
Nixie-Blu first set up her lemonade concession when she was visiting in April. You may have noticed the stand and advertisements back then, and perhaps you even stopped by. This summer, however, she was really able to up her sales game when her grandpa Doug surprised her with the fancy new wooden stand.
The lemonade concession was open pretty much every day for the few weeks that Nixie-Blu and her mother were visiting. Business was steady; the stand attracted walkers and motorists nearly nonstop, paying what they wanted for their cup of lemonade. Nixie-Blu never set a price, instead asking her patrons to donate any amount they want to give. If they didn’t happen to have any money, she’d even give you some for free
Because kindness always begets kidness. And that’s the sweetest deal there is.
You might think you’re totally unfamiliar with the name “Jon S. Gerling.” But it may surprise you to learn that you’ve very likely passed by this name countless times, especially if you’ve lived in Webster a long time and have children.
That was the case for me. Despite having lived in the area for almost 20 years, and having visited the Ridge Park playground and pavilion dozens of times, it took me that long to notice the small memorial that stands at the south end of the park, easily visible from Ridge Rd.
It announces that the baseball field next to you is the Jon S. Gerling Memorial Field.
The first time I noticed the memorial, I did a little online research to find out what I could about Mr. Gerling. Which was not much. I did find out that he died in 1977 at age 35 after suffering a cerebral hemorrhage. And clearly he was a huge supporter of Webster baseball, since the obituary invited people to donate to the Webster Athletic Association in his memory.
Ridge Park, which is adjacent to Town Hall, is now home to Challenger Miracle Field of Greater Rochester, an outstanding adaptive playing field. So that kind of overshadows the Jon S. Gerling Memorial Field.
But let us not forget Jon S. Gerling. Perhaps next time you’re in the park, you can wander on over and take a closer look at the memorial and give a silent thank-you to Jon’s efforts to promote sports in our town.
If anyone has any more information about Jon Gerling, please email me!
In the 13 years I’ve been writing this blog, I’ve taken a LOT of photos.
I mean, they easily number into the tens of thousands. You know me; I can take 150 at one parade alone. Through the years, they’ve captured adults and children, chronicled events both happy and sad, helped announce new businesses and shined a spotlight on unsung heroes and hidden gems in the community. They are sometimes whimsical, sometimes very serious.
In a sense, the photos have become a historical record of Webster people, places and events.
One of the 24 photos I chose for the display
It’s probably partly for that reason that Laureen Anthony-Palmer at the Webster Public Library invited me to put together a display of my photos for the library’s Artist’s Wall. It took me a while to warm up to the idea, but eventually I decided it would be kind of fun, and I started digging into a dozen years’ worth of backed-up photo files and Facebook galleries.
Choosing just a small percentage of those photos, as you might imagine, was rather difficult. But it was indeed fun to look back through the years at all the events I’ve been to and people I’ve met. Eventually I selected 24 of my favorites for the display, wrote captions, mounted them and — with my husband’s help — hung them at the library a few days ago. They’re organized into three sections representing the main things I like to highlight in the blog: kids, community and events.
The photos will be on display through August, so I invite you to stop by any time during normal library hours and take a look. You might even see yourself or someone you know in one of them.
If you’ve ever driven down Lake Road in Ontario, perhaps you’ve occasionally seen a farmer standing by his fence giving you a huge smile and wave. If so, then you’ve “met” Bob, the main character of a brand new children’s book written by Pultneyville resident Keith Herman called Baby Donkeys for Sale.
Bob and his wife Karen own Wychmere Farms, a large, picturesque farm about a half mile east of Ontario Center Rd. For years, whenever Bob’s been out tending to his land and donkeys, he’s tossed a friendly wave to each passing car. For folks who frequently travel along Lake Road, Farmer Bob has become kind of a local hero. His friendliness has brightened the day for thousands of travelers, usually eliciting smiles and hearty waves in return.
Keith Herman is one of those thousands whose life Farmer Bob has touched. He has smiled and waved back along with everyone else. But he also decided to write a book about the farmer’s kindness.
Herman remembers when he started seeing the friendly farmer.
I would drive from Pultneyville to my office in Webster on a daily basis. After a while I started noticing a couple of things. There’s this majestic farm, cobblestone with silos, barns, split rail fences and some livestock. On occasion I’d see this sign out by the road in front of their house that said “baby donkeys for sale.”
But then something slowly started happening over time. If the farmer was out he would give me a wave. He didn’t know me. He would just give me a wave. And not just a wave. A kind of big wave.
It was hit and miss, but I would look forward to seeing him again.
One day, Herman decided to stop, pull into the farmer’s driveway and thank him for taking the time to wave. It was the beginning of a long friendship.
The more Herman got to know the farmer, the more stories he’d hear about others who stopped to say thank you. Like the neighbors who tucked a note into his mailbox which read, “You don’t know us, but know how grateful we are that you keep waving to people.” Or the woman who stopped and handed him an apple pie, telling him how much his waves made her day.
It was about three years ago that Herman decided to turn the heartwarming story into a children’s book. The idea came to him when he and his daughter Emily were doing some offshore sailing, working toward a goal of sailing around the world. It’s a sport which Herman characterizes as “99% boredom and 1% sheer terror.” It was during one of those exceedingly boring spells when he decided that writing a series of children’s books would help pass the time and give more purpose to their sailing quest.
Oliver visiting with a donkey
Baby Donkeys for Sale draws on Herman’s experiences and the stories Farmer Bob told him. It’s told through the eyes of Grampy (Herman himself) and his real-life grandson Oliver. (Oliver, naturally, is more interested in the donkeys than chatting with the farmer.) It’s beautifully illustrated by one of Herman’s Pultneyville neighbors, nationally-known watercolor artist Roland “Chip” Stevens.
It’s a simple story about how a small kindness can make a big impact, even though it might be subtle.
“I think the message would be … if you extend yourself and show kindness to people, it comes back to you in unexpected ways and you’re going to have a better life,” Herman said.
Herman says he’ll probably wait until he’s back on the sailboat, “bored out of my mind,” before he starts working on his next book in earnest. In the meantime, however, you might see him walking with his golden retriever around his Pultneyville neighborhood, waving at everyone who passes by.
Friday night’s first-ever Family Game Night seemed to be a popular event. When I joined it about an hour into the evening’s festivities, a few hundred people were milling around or seated at the tables. Many were enjoying their beverages or having dinner, others were listening to the musician, or chatting with friends, or playing games and chalking the street with their children.
Basically, everyone who attended was having a good time doing SOMETHING, appreciating the excuse to get out of the house again and spend some time with friends and neighbors on a beautiful summer evening.
The best part of the evening, however, was the opportunity for kids to have some fun in a safe environment while their parents socialized. The organizers — the Webster Business Improvement District — had put out giant games for the kids to play with, like Jenga, Connect Four and Cornhole. There was also plenty of sidewalk chalk to be had, and by the time I got there, West Main Street was already filled with artwork.
It was all a very pleasant ending to the village’s Christas in July Week.
Here’s a gallery of photos from the evening:
The happy meeting which I mentioned in the headline referred to the chance I had to meet and share a pint with Colin Minster, the new editor of the Webster Herald.
Colin replaces Anna Hubbel, who has been with the paper for the last seven years. Colin brings with him experience as a writer and researcher for the Finger Lakes Times, but this is his first full-time editing position. He’s fairly new to Webster, but in the short time he’s been here, he seems to have fallen in love with the town, and is looking forward to telling everyone more about it.
“I like Webster a lot,” he said. “There are so many cool, fun things that Webster does. It’s such a cool town.”
So you can expect the Herald to continue to cover hard news stories, like the recent sewer consolidation discussions, but also lots of community news, like Colin’s reflections on the recent Waterfront Arts Festival. Both stories ran on the front page of last week’s edition. He also hopes to fire up a few columns of his own.
Colin currently lives in Penn Yan but is looking to buy a house in Webster.
Welcome to Webster, Colin. I think you’re really going to like it here.
The 250-foot long, 4-1/2-foot tall fence stands atop a small hill on the north side of the Karpus Family Playground, separating it from Miracle Field. Joshua, a Life Scout from Troop 108, chose to tackle the project after consulting with a couple of local agencies. He wrote,
I contacted Friends of Webster Trails to see if they had any projects they needed done. They did not, but they put me in contact with Webster Parks and Rec, who had some projects available. One was a kiosk, and another was the fence.
A few years ago, Joshua helped his brother build a kiosk for his Eagle Scout project, so he wanted to do something different. After meeting with Parks Director Glenn Morrell and discussing available projects, he decided on the fence.
This was a pretty major project, too. Even before construction could begin, it took two months to plan and get approval, funding, and order materials. Finally, over the weekend of July 12, Joshua and almost two dozen friends, family members and Scouts from Troops 108, 163 and 363 came together to erect the fence.
Joshua and his team also received funding from L3Harris Technologies and fencing materials from Miracle Field co-chair Ron Kampff. Altra Rental and Supply brought in excavation equipment and Rhino’s Pizzeria and Deli supplied lunch for the work party.
The project wasn’t without its challenges, either. Joshua’s mother Rhonda wrote that the hill they were working on used to be a landfill for the highway department. So the grounds were littered with hidden rocks, concrete slabs and car parts. Hence the bucket excavator needed to dig through it all.
The new fence is a beautiful addition to an already beautiful park. Ever since the installation of the completely accessible Karpus Family Playground, the park’s original chain-link fence looked shabby. The new split-rail fence, Josh wrote, “is not only eye appealing, but it should help keep kids in the playground from running down the hill and sustaining injury.”
Miracle Field is located on Ridge Road behind Town Hall. This beautiful facility was specifically designed for individuals with physical and/or cognitive challenges and is fully wheelchair accessible. It offers those with developmental, physical or intellectual disabilities a barrier-free, safe, accessible place to experience the health benefits and joy of play through baseball, other team sports, and adaptive recreational equipment.
The fence was also installed just in time for this Saturday’s Heroes Helping Heroes Day from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Challenger Miracle Field. It’s a whole morning of baseball games pitting Challenger athletes against first responders, and will also feature food trucks, a dunk tank, carnival games, police vehicles, a fire truck, the mounted patrol, a visit from Spikes the Red Wings mascot, and more. Click here to read more about that event.
Here’s a slideshow of photos from Joshua’s project, courtesy Rhonda:
Just a quick post today to thank the young people who chalked these messages last week on the sidewalk in front of their Park Ave. house.
They appeared, not coincidentally, on the afternoon of the last day of school, and they made me smile. ‘Cause it was the last day of school for me too. 🙂
I love living in the Village of Webster. The people are friendly, the streets are extremely walkable, there are parks within walking distance, and great restaurants and pubs just around the corner. We live on a street, but feel like we are part of a neighborhood.
Saturday (June 12) was a great example of what’s to love about Webster. For starters, that afternoon our Park Ave. neighbor Doug Pucci hosted his second annual Village Block Party, featuring two food trucks and a free concert by his Red Hot and Blue Band, playing from Pucci’s spacious porch.
Everyone in the village was invited, and more than 100 answered the call. Adults spread their quad chairs across the lawn and closed-off street and listened to the music, or stood in small groups visiting with neighbors. Children chalked in the street, played with bubbles and danced in the grass.
It was the perfect opportunity for long-time neighbors to reconnect after a long pandemic. It was also a chance for new residents to meet their new neighbors and start to to know the feeling that they are part of the village community.
It was the quintessential village experience.
The lemonade sales force: Emilio Martinez, Owen Knapp and Will Brunswick
The home office
Earlier in the day, I was riding my bike and happened upon a woman setting up chairs and a table in the lawn of the apartment complex near my house. She was taping some kind of sign onto the table. Curious (and being who I am), I stopped to find out what was going on.
Her name was Jennifer Martinez, and she explained that she was setting up the table for her son and his friends, who were going to hold a Free Lemonade stand later that afternoon.
Apparently every year since her son Emilio was very young, Jennifer’s mother Gail had held a garage sale. And every year during that sale, Emilio would set up a lemonade stand. This year, Gail wasn’t able to hold her sale, so Jennifer suggested that Emilio simply set up his stand outside their home instead.
In years past, Emilio had charged for his lemonade. But not this year. When I asked Jennifer about that, she said that the idea to hand out the lemonade for free was “just to be kind.” Then, after giving it a bit of thought, she added, “It’s nice to be among people again.”
Emilio and his fellow business owners Will Brunswick and Owen Knapp, all 7th-grade friends at Spry Middle School, were enthusiastic lemonade hawkers, even though they weren’t earning any cold, hard cash. They stood out on the sidewalk yelling “free lemonade!” to all the cars driving by on busy South Ave, and any time a biker, walker or runner got within 50 yards of the table, one of them (usually Owen, wearing a flag cape), would chase them down “selling” their wares at full volume.
At first the salesmen were only getting a lot of honks and waves from passing cars. But while I was there (getting my free lemonade), they were able to wave down a passing FedEx delivery truck, whose driver gratefully accepted the refreshment. And if yelling to someone didn’t work, they would take the lemonade to their customers, at one point skittering across South Ave., two-fisting cups of lemonade, to deliver them to people who were setting up for the block party.
The highlight of the day was probably when the boys were able to attract the attention of a passing police car. The officer didn’t stop, but she did come back a few minutes later and invited another colleague to join her. So at one point two Webster police officers were standing at the table enjoying some lemonade.
The kids even earned a little money after all. Some patrons couldn’t resist throwing a dollar on the table, and one family brought them some fresh-picked strawberries.
A friendly neighbor who didn’t mind at all a random stranger stopping to chat. Free lemonade and kids having fun doing something other than sitting in front of a screen. Just two more things I love about village life.
Two of the boys’ favorite customers
Jennifer handing out a free lemonade
Owen, Emilio, Jennifer and Will with Jennifer’s parents Gail and Rich
If you live in or near the village, you may remember the Village Block Party held back in September on Park Ave. The event was hosted by The Red Hot and Blue Band, who set up on the porch of RHB band member Doug Pucci, who lives at the corner of Park Ave. and South Ave.
The band played for three straight hours, while community members sat around and listened (socially distanced of course), and children danced and made chalk drawings in the middle of the closed-off street. It was a much-needed and greatly appreciated respite from the depths of the pandemic.
Well, the Village Block Party is back again this year, and it’s going to be even better.
On Saturday June 12, Webster community members are all invited to come together to enjoy the rockin’ sounds of the Red Hot and Blue Band, beginning at 3 p.m. And bring some cash, too, because this time the party will feature two food trucks, Terry’s Tips and Beef and Netsins Ice Cream.
Aside from the food trucks, there’s no charge for this event. Just bring your quad chairs and join your neighbors for an afternoon of good music and good food. It all happens on Park Ave. between South Ave. (Rt. 250) and Lapham Park.
This week’s Friends of the Webster Public Library Pop-up Book Sale has become a Bring-Your-Own-Bag Book Sale!
On Thursday June 10 from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., bring your bag to the library and fill it with gently used books for just $4. It’s an inexpensive way to stock your personal library for a summer-full of great reading for you and your family.
The sale will be held in the Webster Publc Library parking lot, at the rear of Webster Plaza, 980 Ridge Rd. All monies raised will go to support library initiatives.
Don’t forget about this weekend’s WebsterSummer Celebration, returning on Saturday June 12 to the Webster Recreation Center.
From 5 to 10 p.m., the whole family is invited to come out for dinner and snacks from some great food trucks (including Wraps on Wheels, Nancy’s Fried Dough, Effortlessly Healthy, Bay Vista Taqueria and Seabreeze Catering and Hot Sauce), while enjoying some great live music.
Festivities will conclude at 9:45 with a fireworks display. For more information, especially about parking for the fireworks, please visit the Webster Parks and Recreation webpage.
This Saturday also maks the opening of the Joe Obbie Farmers’ Market.
This blurb from the market’s Facebook page seems to indicate that exciting changes are in store:
Things are lining up for what we believe to be one of our biggest and best market years ever. We are happy to announce that the market has grown with new vendors being added. We are pleased to see many old faces return as well. And also very pleased to announce the addition of a food truck and a possible lemonade truck.
The market is located in Webster Towne Center plaza, in front of Old Navy and near the gazebo. It’s open every Saturday through November from 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Several Village of Webster shops will be holding a sidewalk sale next week on Friday June 18 and Saturday June 19. Take a stroll through the village, pick up some bargains and visit with with some of our very friendly small business owners.
The shops that will be participating in the sidewalk sale include Lala of Webster, Nest Things, The North Bee, Yesterday’s Muse Books, and the Village Quilt Shoppe.
I feature the people and places and events that make Webster the wonderful community it is — and throw in some totally-not-Webster-related personal ramblings every once in a while as well.
I love it when readers send me news about the great things happening in their schools or the community, so please email me anytime at missyblog@gmail.com
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