Friday, Aug. 31: It's an Art
A diverse range of media is featured in Blurring Boundaries, opening at the Workhouse. The show brings together works by the Han-Mee Artist Association, a nonprofit organization consisting of Korean-American artists who have immigrated to the metropolitan Washington, D.C., area, over the last four decades.  Organized by curator Julie Jungsil Lee, the exhibition includes works by 34 artists in painting, calligraphy, sculpture, ceramics, metal (art), fiber art, mixed media and video art. 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. (Through Sunday, Sept. 23. A public reception takes place on Saturday, Sept. 1, from 5 to 7 p.m.) Workhouse Arts Center's McGuireWoods Gallery. Free. For information call 703-584-2900.

Also on Friday:
Ocean Orchestra: From mystical Celtic vocals to the stirring skirl of the pipes, Ocean is Celtic music for "Ancient Moderns." Called "nothing short of spellbinding" by The Washington Post, Ocean is a who's who of internationally known musicians, led by composer Jennifer Cutting (accordion and keyboards) and featuring Lisa Moscatiello (vocals and guitar), Steve Winick (vocals), Zan McLeod (guitars and bouzouki), Cheryl Hurwitz (fiddle), Tim Carey (highland bagpipes), Rico Petruccelli (bass) and Danny Schwartz (drums). Blending the timelessness of tradition with the power of pop, Ocean creates a Celtic cocktail that will make the generations join hands and dance. 7:30 to 8:30 p.m. Mason District Park Amphitheater. Free. Additional series performances on Friday include  Slightly Something at Grist Mill Park and city of Fairfax Band Alte Kameraden German Band at Lake Accotink Park. More information is available online.

Saturday, Sept. 1: Brother Against Brother
The 150th anniversary of Fairfax County's only Civil War battle will be commemorated with artillery demonstrations, period music, presentation of colors, speeches, wreath laying and living history interpreters during the Battle of Ox Hill/Chantilly Civil War Sesquicentennial Event. 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Ox Hill Battlefield Park. Free. Event parking is at the Fairfax County Government Center only. Free shuttle bus service will be provided throughout the day, 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. For more information call 703-324-8702.

Also on Saturday:
Dino Extravaganza Puppet Show: Enjoy puppet shows and activities featuring dinosaurs and walk with a naturalist to find hidden clues from the Jurassic era along the trail. Children must be accompanied by an adult. 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. Hidden Oaks Nature Center. $5/person. Register online. For information call 703-941-1065.

Moonlight Kayak Tour at Pohick Bay: Join volunteer trip leader Scott Stewart for an exciting adventure on the water of the Pohick Bay marsh. Glide on the water by kayak while enjoying views of bald eagles, great blue herons and other wildlife. No experience necessary. Ages 8 to 15 must be accompanied by an adult. Meet at the Pohick Bay Marina Boat Rentals. 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. Pohick Bay Regional Park.  $30/person. For information and reservations (required) call 703-339-6104.

Sunday, Sept. 2: Back to the Grind
The miller will be grinding grain and the blacksmith will fire up the forge at the Colvin Run Mill for a look at how things like flour, cornmeal and grits were produced and how steel was forged during the mill’s heyday. Grain grinding takes place from noon to 3 p.m., conditions permitting. The blacksmith will be at work from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Please call ahead to confirm. Colvin Run Mill Historic Site. Mill tours are $7/adult, $6/student 16 and older with ID, and $5/child or senior. For information call 703-759-2771.

via Fairfax County Newswire. Information was correct at time of publication.  Please contact individual event sites to confirm programs are being held as scheduled.  Many more events and activities can be found at the Parks and Library pages, and elsewhere on the Fairfax County website. A complete list of county calendars is also available online.

Visiting my parents & my dad left this motivational note on the fridge for my 18yo brother this morning.  Hilarious.

Tell us a little about yourself?
My name is Kristina Schnack Kotlus, and I live in Woodbridge, Virginia with my awesome husband and 3 great kids, who I home educate using a classical model.  I have a degree in Comparative Religion and used to work as a Children's Minister.  I am a Prince William County native- I grew up here and only left for college before coming back! I like pink, sparkles, iced tea, and reading. 

How did you first become involved in with blogging?
I used to keep a calendar of events for friends in a mommy group, and since I'm a true local, I always knew about various places around the area.  A friend encouraged me to make the information accessible to everyone, so PwcMoms.blogspot.com was born.  It took off, and now, thanks to some work from my web guru/husband, it's now just PwcMoms.com

Tell me about some of the people you’ve met while working on your blog?
We've had so much fun meeting people! Since my children are home schooled, they come everywhere with me and we've had a blast meeting everyone from local business owners at places like Swim Kids to local media moguls like Rebecca Barnes from Prince William Living to fun personalities like the Ringmaster at Ringling Brothers or Elmo.  My favorites, though, are the local business owners who are also moms.  Their ability to juggle family, children's activities, and a business is such an inspiration to me. 

What do you do when you aren’t working on your blog?
My kids take up a lot of my time. They play hockey and football and are year-round swimmers.  My daughter just took up figure skating, and the boys are in art, piano, and scouts.  I really love entertaining, so I'm always cooking up a storm for dinners or hosting game nights, and I've been really trying to convince myself I love running.  I ran the Cherry Blossom 10 miler in April and I'm doing some local 5k's while I decide on my next race.  I'm slow, but I love the feeling of accomplishment when I finish! My whole family is local, too, so we enjoy boating and camping with them, as well.

What websites do you visit every day?
Proverbs31.org for my morning devotion, PotomacLocal.com, Google News, Twitter, InsideNova.com, and Facebook.  Unfortunately, writing/interviewing, school and our family doesn't let me read as many blogs as I'd like! I have a few homeschool blogs that I love, but I don't visit them very often, either!

What is your favorite drink – and where can you find it in Northern Virginia?
I actually don't drink very often! I'm fun enough on my own ;) But, at our last MamaMafia dinner at Manzo/Carmellos, I definitely loved their martini menu.  All of it.

What book do you casually put out on your coffee table to impress visitors?
I'll admit to casually throwing down a scrapbook or two, but other than that our coffee table usually prominently features Ranger Rick and Cobblestone!

What are your top 3 favorite people/places/things in Northern Virginia?
Person- Delegate Rich Anderson.  When my son (at age 5) wanted to get involved in politics, he didn't laugh me out of his office when I showed up to volunteer with a 5 year old in a suit, a 3 year old asleep in a stroller, and an infant in my arms.  He's also so kind about my website and sent me a congratulations card when I won Blogger of the Year from Northern Virginia Magazine and when I broke 2,000 Facebook fans, even though I'm sure he doesn't read my site often!
Place- Historic Occoquan.  This was hard for me, because there are so many great places out there! We love the Workhouse Arts Center, Potomac Overlook Park, Mount Vernon, and more, but Occoquan is such fun to walk with a few girlfriends!! I worked at Touch of Gold for awhile and just really fell in love with all the great local merchants.  Walking around to shop and then grabbing a sandwich or cupcake and sitting in the gazebo by the water is a great way to spend a weekend!
Thing- Art Lessons at Edgemoor Art Studio.  This isn't your typical arts and crafts lesson, Ruth Johnsen really teaches these kids art using classical concepts and artists while still leaving room for imagination.  I spend $180 a month on lessons for my kids and would cut out just about anything else before letting these go. 

What is your goal for retirement?
This question sounds like it would require some kind of foresight or planning.  I'm going to skip it on principle. In a previous interview, I said that I love my community and love telling its stories.  As long as I can keep doing that and being happy, I hope there will be a place in my life for my website.  That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

Do you have any advice for women who would like to start their own blog?  
Learn to knit.  It's way less drama.

On my first trip to Haiti in 2003, I fell in love with the people and the place.  Even in complete poverty and dire situations, the people were so happy. My parents has been to Haiti twice before and had asked me if I would go with them.  On this trip, we interviewed and measured 57 children to enter them into the sponsorship program that my parents were starting for the first time. No education in Haiti is free and with most of the population living on less then two dollars a day, for a lot of children education is only a dream. Education is also what saves a lot of them as children are entered into school at age 3 it provides a safe place for them to be while their parents are looking for work and most schools give them a meal which for most of them is the only thing they eat that day. Education also gives them a step up to actually go out and find work once they have completed school. 

On my 3rd trip to Haiti I remember seeing this little girl screaming and clinging to her mother. Completely terrified of the "blancs" (french for white) wanting to take her picture. I remember my friend Tiffany struggling to try to capture her sweet face in hopes of getting someone to sponsor her so she could attend school. I think at best w e have a photo of the side profile of her face with tears streaming down and her clawing her laughing mother who was telling her "the blancs wont eat you." She was one of the many young children that we had photographed but by far one of the worst photos.

Something stirred inside me and I knew that finding a sponsor that would choose to sponsor a child with hardly a photo of her probably was not going to happen. I walked over to my mother who was interviewing the children and told her that I would sponsor the "screaming girl" whose name was Chama. As my trips to Haiti continued so did my relationship with Chama. She was a bit shy at first and then the shyness grew into excitement to see me. I would look forward to seeing her just as much. I would think of her all the time in my usual day-to-day busyness but never thought much about what she was thinking about. On my trips I would hear that she was not a big eater and how her mother would tell her she needed to eat or that I would be sad and crying. Or how she prayed for me and my family every night. I would receive letters every once in a while with all sorts of flowery language which is such a cultural thing wishing me Gods blessings and how much she thought of me. On my last trip Chama didn't know I was coming and her mom hid me in her house and went and got her to come home.

I remember standing in the back room of the cinderblock house with no electricity and sheets in the doorways blowing in the breeze with my heart beating out of my chest. I then reflected on where the relationship had started and how far it had come. From a horrible photo of a screaming child, to the girl who tells me her skin color is from her Haitian mother but her face looks like her "Mama blanc". When I finally popped out from behind the curtain, I remember the look on Chama's face of complete shock and then a koala bear hug with tears streaming down her face.

At times it’s still hard for me to grasp how big our relationship is with the separation that our lives have by distance and material things. It’s hard for me to grasp how such a small thing in my life in terms of the $50 twice a year for school sponsorship can grow into something so big. Even if it never did, it still is special to me to think that somewhere out there the life of a small child is changing drastically because you were willing to give something as important to them as the ability to go to school. You never know where giving is going to take you! I encourage you to see! The program has been running for 9 years now and has over 1500 children from 11 communities in Haiti. The program is all run by volunteers so 100% of the money you donate to the children goes to the children. None of it is used for overhead, expenses, or operational fees.

Sponsor a child at hishandsforhaiti.org at the "children in need" page or follow what is going on with the program on Facebook at www.facebook.com/HisHandsSupportMinistries. For more information, you can email questions to jamie@hishandsforhaiti.org.

 ~ Kirstin Wardrick

via my girl KV  YelpNOVA: Donate to a good cause for DC's third annual CupcakeCampDC and eat expertly baked cupcakes and enjoy free games such as skeeball, shuffleboard, darts, board games, hoops and pool at Rosslyn's Continental Modern Pool Lounge. Not only will you help end cancer, but you'll also meet fellow cupcake lovers and vie for the chance to win great raffle prizes. Put your baking skills to the test for the chance of winning CupcakeCampDC's Best Cupcake!

Join Virginia Gateway to we celebrate the end of summer the RIGHT way!
On August 30th from 5:30-8:30pm head over to the Gazebo on Atlas Walk and enjoy live music, free popcorn, free face painting, a photobooth, and MORE!

Fashion’s Night Out Comes to Tysons Corner Thursday, Sept. 6 - pick up your official FNO tour book in Fashion Court and join Tysons Corner for desserts, drinks, informal modeling and cosmetics by Bloomingdale's!
Plus, enter to win a pair of tickets to see Cirque du Soleil's "Totem" at National Harbor!

went into Michaels for one thing... came out 38 items later...

October is Breast Cancer Awareness month! Belle Mode Intimates @ Fairfax Corner is inviting you to drop your bra off at their store to support breast cancer and the Tigerlily Foundation. Donated bras will be hung across the Fairfax Corner Plaza (near the fountain) on clotheslines to bring awareness to the cause - bras will later be donated and recycled to benefit Tigerlily Foundation.

if you donate a bra, you will receive a free @Pinkberry coupon as well as an exclusive shopping discount at Fairfax Corner's hottest lingerie boutique. Also, mark your calendars for a sip & shop on October 21!

Stop by Belle Mode for more information - or tweet them @ BelleModeVA with the hashtag #BraDropNOVA.