Oak Ridge Today

Experience world cultures at Children’s Museum International Festival

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Folk dancers representing many cultures around the world will be among entertainers at the International Festival on Saturday, February 29, at the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge.

The family-friendly International Festival will present entertainment, crafts, and cuisines from many countries, with musical and dance entertainment on stage throughout the day and crafts for children to make and take home. The festival entertainment will be from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Februar 29 at the Children’s Museum at 461 West Outer Drive in Oak Ridge.

Entertainers include the Oak Ridge International Folk Dancers; Spice of India Dancers; Kinetics Wellness Studio, with instructor Katrien Sevrin and students presenting contemporary Egyptian dance; Pasión Flamenca, performing flamenco and Spanish folk dances; the Meriaki Greek Dancers from St. George Greek Orthodox Church; the Tennessee Irish Dancers; Debka and the Oasis Dancers; National Martial Arts, demonstrating martial arts with audience participation; and the Asian Culture Center of Tennessee, along with the University of Tennessee Japanese Program. [Read more…]

International Festival at Children’s Museum to feature entertainers, food, crafts

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The Knox Accordion-AIRs, Wolfgang Schaber and Linda Warren, will be featured performers at the Children’s Museum International Festival on Saturday, Feb. 17, 2018. (Submitted photo)

The Knox Accordion-AIRs, Wolfgang Schaber and Linda Warren, will be featured performers at the Children’s Museum International Festival on Saturday, Feb. 17, 2018. (Submitted photo)

 

The Knox Accordion-AIRs will be the featured performer when the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge hosts its annual International Festival on Saturday, February 17. The lively accordion duo will join Native American dancers, Greek and Indian folk dancers, hip hop dancers, and others during the multi-cultural festival, a press release said.

The family-friendly International Festival will present entertainment, crafts, and cuisines from cultures around the world, with musical and dance entertainment on stage throughout the day and crafts for children to make and take home. The festival entertainment will be from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday at the Children’s Museum, which is at 461 West Outer Drive in Oak Ridge.

The Knox Accordion-AIRs are Wolfgang Schaber and Linda Warren. Schaber began studying the accordion as a child in his home country of Austria, the press release said. Warren, who describes herself as “a Tennessee girl through and through,” has been playing accordion since she was six. She enjoys squeezing country, rock ‘n roll, and Memphis blues and gospel music on her accordion. Schaber enjoys playing polkas, marches, a waltz or two, folk tunes, and classical music. [Read more…]

Model railroad items sale benefits Children’s Museum during Holiday Express display

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Holiday Express at the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge features G-scale model trains and a miniature village decorated for the holidays, filling the Museum's gymnasium. (Submitted photo)

Holiday Express at the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge features G-scale model trains and a miniature village decorated for the holidays, filling the Museum’s gymnasium. (Submitted photo)

 

Knoxville Area Model Railroaders are offering model railroad items for sale during the Holiday Express model railroad display that fills the gymnasium at the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge.

HO-scale, N-scale, and large-scale items are being offered at attractive prices. They could be gifts for your child or that grown child who still plays with trains. Sales will be open during the Holiday Express operating hours, with a portion of all sales donated to the Museum, a press release said.

Holiday Express features a miniature holiday village with 10 garden-scale model trains and thousands of lights at the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge Visitors may wander through a 2,500-square-foot G-scale railroad display inside the gymnasium, open weekends and during Christmas week through January 1. [Read more…]

Holiday Express trains coming to Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge

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Holiday Express at the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge will feature G-scale model trains and a miniature village decorated for the holidays. Here, a CSX model train passes the train station, ready for the holidays. (Submitted photo)

Holiday Express at the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge will feature G-scale model trains and a miniature village decorated for the holidays. Here, a CSX model train passes the train station, ready for the holidays. (Submitted photo)

 

All aboard the Holiday Express at the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge!

A miniature village with 10 garden-scale model trains and thousands of lights will open at the Children’s Museum on Friday, December 8. The Holiday Express features a 2,500-square-foot G-scale railroad display inside the Children’s Museum gymnasium, with the 10 trains running consecutively. The display will be open through January 1.

Designed by landscaper and train enthusiast Mark Fuhrman, the display includes rivers, waterfalls, and more than 100 scale model buildings decorated for the holidays. The trains include logging trains, freight trains, and passenger trains. Many buildings in the village Fuhrman created are scale model replicas of East Tennessee structures, most depicting the architecture during logging days in the Smoky Mountains. [Read more…]

Children’s Museum hosts Celebration of the Young Child on Friday

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Children's Museum of Oak Ridge Celebration of the Young Child April 28 2017

Crafts, storytelling, a teddy bear clinic, and a magician’s visit will be among activities planned for the Celebration of the Young Child from 10 a.m.-3 p.m. Friday, April 28, at the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge, which is at 461 West Outer Drive.

Magician Danny Gillette will entertain with mystifying magic tricks from 11:30 a.m.-noon, engaging the audience in his family magic show. The Oak Ridge Fire Department will lead a fire safety program, and the Oak Ridge Police Department will present a stranger danger program.

Children’s author Adele Roberts will tell stories from her Sammy the Skunk series of books, accompanied by her Sammy puppets. Her stories are designed to stimulate children’s imaginations and to teach character values based on the situations the animals encounter.

Children may be “kids in motion” with the National Fitness Center’s obstacle course, and they may bring their teddy bears to the clinic hosted by the Methodist Medical Center. Children can make a wind chime craft at the Museum, and take materials to make a Chinese dragon and a hovercraft at home. [Read more…]

Children’s Museum to host International Festival Feb. 18

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Obayana Ajanaku of Indigenous Vibes will create positive vibes on the djembe drums Feb. 18, 2017, at the Children’s Museum International Festival. (Submitted photo)

Obayana Ajanaku of Indigenous Vibes will create positive vibes on the djembe drums Feb. 18, 2017, at the Children’s Museum International Festival. (Submitted photo)

 

Indigenous Vibes, a culture-based entertainment group that creates positive vibrations using traditional West African drums, will be the featured performer when the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge hosts its annual International Festival on Saturday, February 18.

Led by Obayana Ajanaku, Indigenous Vibes drummers use the djembe drums to bring the message of diversity, confidence, unity, and pride through their entertainment, a press release said. The festival audience will be invited to participate in dancing to the drum rhythm.

The family-friendly International Festival will present entertainment, crafts, and cuisines from cultures around the world, with musical and dance entertainment on stage throughout the day and crafts for children to make and take home, the press release said.

The festival entertainment will be from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. February 18 at the Children’s Museum, which is at 461 West Outer Drive, with doors opening at 9:30 a.m. [Read more…]

Partnership benefits Children’s Museum, model railroaders

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Knoxville-Area-Model-Railroaders-Tutt-Acly-December-2015

Brad Tutt, left, and Peter Acly, with the Knoxville Area Model Railroaders, run a model of the American Freedom Train at the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge. The train with its steam engine is a replica of the 1976 train that carried symbols of America throughout the country to celebrate its 200th birthday. (Submitted photo)

 

Larry Burkholder grew up next to the railroad tracks in Portsmouth, Ohio, where the mainlines of the Norfolk and Western Railroad guided thundering steam engines through town.

“I spent a lot of time next to the tracks, to the consternation of my parents. It just got into my blood back then, all the big and smoky steam engines. You’d stand beside them and cinders would blow down on you head,” Burkholder recalled. That childhood experience inspired a lifelong interest in model railroading, though it wasn’t until he retired that he had the time and space to set up a train layout in his basement.

He joined the Knoxville Area Model Railroaders soon after that, and the donation of an extensive model train layout by Milton Lloyd and his family to the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge kicked off a long-term and mutually beneficial relationship linking the museum with Burkholder and the model railroaders. [Read more…]

Children’s Museum hosts International Festival Feb. 21

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Spice of India dancers at the Children's Museum International Festival

Spice of India dancers at the Children’s Museum International Festival. (Photo by Rob Welton)

 

The Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge will present entertainment, crafts, and cuisines from cultures around the world at its annual International Festival on Saturday, February 21. The family-friendly event will feature musical and dance entertainment on stage throughout the day, international food and culture booths, and crafts for children to make and take home.

The festival will be from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. February 21 at the Children’s Museum at 461 West Outer Drive in Oak Ridge. Food will be served from 11 a.m.-2 p.m.

Children will be invited to make and take Chinese dragons, Japanese geisha masks, and Indian elephants at craft stations during the festival, as well as crafts at several International Bazaar booths. [Read more…]