With love from Day Nursery Indy Colts fans

I am packing up the books I owe Royal Castle Child Development Center in New Orleans.  They won the books when the Saints beat the Colts on Sunday.  We were winners too because we made some great new friends.  Center Director Pearlie Harris and her staff are just starting their quest for NAEYC accreditation, a process we have been through many times in our 110 years of service to the community and so we have promised to mentor them any way we can.  You can be sure I will be including some “local color” in the box with the books in the form of pictures of our pint-size blue and white clad Colts fans. 

Day Nursery centers are open

All Day Nursery centers are open this morning.  Drive safely!

Text4baby campaign

I just read about this on Ragan’s Healthcare Marketing and Communication News this morning.

Moms-to-be are going to be getting a new tool—pregnancy tips sent directly to their cell phones. The free “text4baby” campaign is being sponsored by Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, WellPoint and CareFirst BlueCross and Blue Shield. Several wireless carriers have agreed to waive fees for receiving texts. Moms who text “BABY” to 511411 will receive weekly text messages that focus on nutrition, immunization, and birth defect prevention.

Please drop me a comment if you sign up for this service.  I would love to hear if you think it is helpful.

Ft. Harrison center closed today

 UPDATE AT 1:00 PM: Repair work is underway and all indications are that we will be open for business as usual tomorrow.

The boiler is out at the Day Nursery Start Smart 4 Children and we have no heat today.  The staff is in the process of calling all the parents of children to tell them to pick up their children. If you have a question and can’t reach the center due to the high volume of calls, you are welcome to call us at the Day Nursery administrative office at 636-9197 ext. 227.

Our Colts fans are true blue

It’s game day so I thought you might like a little last-minute blue spirit from the pint-size Day Nursery Colts fans.  These pictures are courtesy of Shannon Garrity, Director of the Day Nursery Ruth A. Lilly Center on Central Avenue.

Prize puppets delight Day Nursery children

As we head toward the big game this Sunday, I wanted to share with you a picture of the puppets we won in our wager with Community Day Nursery in East Orange NJ over the Colts-Jets game. Since we have 7 locations, it was hard to decide which classroom should get these very special puppets so we may have to purchase some more so everyone can enjoy them.  Today I visited our Indiana State Government Center location for their Colts parade and presented three puppets to the Twos II room lead by teachers Ms. Patricia and Ms. Nikki.  They were just sitting down to story time when I arrived so Ms. Patricia quickly incorporated the puppets into her story. The puppets were created by dollmaker Ida Clowney, who, in addition to being a talented seamstress, also performs as rag doll clown Miz Happi.  If you would like to get in touch with Ida about getting some of these puppets for yourself, she can be reached at Iclowney@aol.com. Our thanks go out to Kathy Burke, Executive Director of Community Day Nursery for sending us six of these adorable handmade puppets.  It was fun to make some new friends in the early childhood community and we were especially thrilled to find out that Community Day Nursery was founded in 1897 which makes them even older than we are, which makes us both part of a very special group of early childhood professional!

Bring it on Saints, Day Nursery is ready for New Orleans

If you have followed the blog these past few weeks, you know we have had a lot of fun and made new friends in Baltimore and NY/NJ thanks to some friendly football wagers.  I am happy to report that we have received our “winnings” from both the Ravens and Jets fans and I am working on getting some pictures of our prizes being distributed in the centers.  In the meantime, I have connected with a great child care center in New Orleans and they have agreed to our next wager.  The Royal Castle Child Development Center is located in Orleans parish.  Like many child care centers in that area, they suffered extensive damage during Hurricane Katrina.  This year they are celebrating 15 years of serving the community and they are grateful to Saints quarterback Drew Brees and his family foundation for helping get them back on their feet after Katrina.  While researching who might be interested in a friendly Colts-Saints wager, I found Pearlie Harris and her center.  Like Indiana, Louisiana has a child care rating system.  When I saw that Royal Castle Child Development Center was a four star center, I knew I was on the right track.  Then I watched a video about this center and I knew we had a match. Pearlie and I immediately hit it off on the phone and she was quick to accept my Super Bowl wager.  The winner will receive 5 of the losers favorite preschool books.  Pearlie joked that I better get my list ready because her team was going to win. I promised her we were going to put up a good fight and here are a few pictures of our Day Nursery team spirit submitted today by the staff and children of our Start Smart 4 Children center at Ft. Harrison.  Teachers Theresa Gilliam, Nicole Dorsch and Kim Townsend did a great job of decorating the lobby.  Hopefully you can see the detail that went into the life-size football players on the window as well as the very shiny trophy they crafted. This center has openings for preschool children so call Director Debra Ballard if you are interested in enrolling your child.  She can be reached at 377-7015.

Wordless Wednesday from the Day Nursery Federal Center

Infants in the Day Nursery Federal Center got a sensory experience this morning by playing in CoolWhip.

Infant care openings at Day Nursery in Avon

If you are looking for infant care in Hendricks County, we have several openings at our Day Nursery Early Care and Education Center in Avon.  Several children have recently transitioned to the toddler room leaving some spaces open for new enrollments of children 6 weeks to one year.  If you would like to take a tour, call the center at 271-2603.  The center is located on the campus of the Clarian West Medical Center and is open to the public.

Parent Essentials for Your New Baby program needs your support

The Child Care Aware Parent Network is the National Association for Child Care Resource and Referral Association’s (NACCRRA’s) initiative to help support parents. Day Nursery’s Child Care Answers program is the local NACCRRA affiliate for the Indianapolis area.

To further that mission, NACCRRA is in the running to win a grant from Pepsi to create an online training for parents that will prepare them for their baby’s first three months. You can help them win the grant by casting your vote for NACCRRA’s “Parent Essentials for Your New Baby” Training. Through its Pepsi Refresh Project, Pepsi is giving away millions of dollars in grants each month to fund great ideas like NACCRRA’s “Parent Essentials for Your New Baby” Training. The public’s votes will decide which ideas get funded – which is why they need your help.  You are encouraged to visit the website sign up as a voter, and vote for NACCRRA’s “Parent Essentials for Your New Baby” Training. You can vote once every day for this idea until February 28, 2010. At that time, the voting will close, and Pepsi will tally up the votes to determine which ideas get funded. Help  provide new parents with the tools they need to get their infants off to a safe and healthy start.