Flamingo Follies

The 25th annual Flamingo Follies Holiday Art Show is this weekend! This is one of my favoriteFlagler Avenue events! It is November 14th & 15th from from 9 a.m. - 5 p.m. More than 120 artists and crafters from around the state will display their work. Artists, entertainment and food vendors will line the Avenue. Admission is free.

Please call the City of New Smyrna Beach Recreation Department at 386.424.2175 for more information! 

Sugar Fix

Have you visited the Beachside Candy Company on Flagler Avenue? The new owner took over in May and it is as fabulous as ever, maybe more so! It is the same quaint building with a fresh new interior and delicious candy of all varieties! I spoke to the owner Julie today and she is very excited to join the Flagler Avenue business community.

Let's talk about the chocolate..dark chocolate, milk chocolate, nonpareils, espresso beans, chocolate covered raisins, malted milk balls..the list is long and so so good. She has salt water taffy, ice cream (think root beer floats), one entire wall is candy you can purchase by the bag. A child's dream! Actually, my dream..but we won't tell my trainer that. I was chatting with some very nice people who are here on vacation, they told me how their kids can't wait to come to the Beachside Candy Company and spend their money...they seemed to be doing a good job.

Looking for a gift? Fill a gift bag with an assortment of chocolates, maybe a specialized box, she has them for every occasion, even a sand bucket makes a great vehicle to deliver candy in!

The Beachside Candy Company is located at 221 Flagler Ave and is open Monday-Saturday 10:00 am-9:00 pm and Sunday 11:00 am-5:00 pm.

St. Patrick's Day Celebration

The Party is on Flagler Avenue for St. Patrick's Day. Come on down to Flagler Ave in New Smyrna Beach tomorrow and celebrate from 6pm-9pm. There will be a Treasure Hunt, live music, Irish Food and of course green beer.

Support your local business!

Christmas Village Art Walk

This Saturday, November 28th from 10am-5pm is the annual Christmas Village Art Walk on Flagler Avenue. Many local merchants and vendors will be on hand selling everything from paintings to Christmas ornaments and gifts. Food, entertainment and a visit from Santa will all be part of the day!

Shop local, support local business!

Christmas in July

Start your shopping early this Saturday from 10am-5pm on Flagler Ave. It will be Christmas in July at the monthly art walk. Sponsoring galleries are Galleria di Vetro, 310 Flagler; Jewelry of Joy, 307 Flagler; Palms Up Pottery, 413 Flagler; and Ta Da Gallery, 113 Flagler.

Many of the galleries and merchants along the avenue will be serving holiday candy and cookies and will be decorated for “Christmas” in July, so be sure and check out the local shoppes as well.

The Gallery Group has issued a “call for artists” for upcoming Art Walks. Visiting artists’ works are judged on “originality, skill, workmanship and uniqueness” each month. Prizes include ribbons and cash awards: first place, $100; second place, $75; and third place, $50.

Support your local business!

Seaside Fiesta

Seaside Fiesta, this New Smyrna Beach, Flagler Avenue family block party, will be held on Thursday, June 18th from 5-9 p.m. Thursday. This annual event is hosted by the Merchants of Flagler Avenue and the New Smyrna Beach Parks and Recreation Department. Featuring booths, live entertainment, arts and crafts, food, and a variety of games for adults and children.

Entertainment at this year’s Seaside Fiesta features Acousticon at the Seaside Station stage.

The performance stage will be set up at Flagler and Peninsula avenues and will feature local groups such as American Martial Arts, NSB High School Color Guard and Terri’s Twirling Tornadoes. The Christian Rock Band “Holy Smoke” will be featured at the gazebo at the corner of Flagler and Pine.

Many of the Flagler Avenue Merchants will remain open late. Restaurants on the street will be open and festival food vendors will offer fresh squeezed lemonade, kettle corn, Gran Arepas, sausage and pepper sandwiches and many more treats.

Flagler Avenue will close to cars at 3 p.m., and will stay closed until 9:30 p.m.

Things To Do

Wii Sports lessons are offered at the Brannon Center every Friday from 10 a.m. to noon, seniors are invited to come and take lessons, playing bowling, golf, and baseball with our new WII sports game. For more information, please call Nicole at (386) 424-2280.

CorMeth Boutique on Flagler Avenue will have a Father’s Day Sale during the week of June 15 through June 20. All men’s clothing, sports equipment, and accessories are reduced. The boutique is open Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Marine Discovery Center offers Sunset and Eco tours of the Lagoon and Estuary. Click here for more information. They also have room in several of their summer camps. Both my children attended camp their last year and will again this year, it is a really great experience.

Check on the Sea Turtle Nesting for our area on the Volusia Sea Turtle Society website. Scroll down on this page and check out the great photo of the shuttle coming home.

The annual Seaside Fiesta on Flagler is this Thursday from 5pm-9pm. More on that later in the week.

Enjoy the rest of the weekend!

Art Walk On Flagler

This Saturday from 10am-5pm is the monthly Art Walk on Flagler. This is a special "Martini Art Walk". You can purchase a ticket for 10.00 at the gazebo at Pine Street and taste different flavored martinis at 11 different venues. Yum, perhaps we won't call it the Art Walk, maybe we should rename it the Art Stagger, or Art Fall Down.....oh the possibilities.

Yes2Local News has all the information on the event.

Cinco De Mayo Celebration on Flagler

The Merchants of Flagler will hold their 2nd annual Cinco de Mayo Celebration on Flagler tonight at 4PM with 10 venues featuring live Latin entertainment, dancing, iced cold cervezas and tasty Mexican food. Strolling Mariachi's will serenade the avenue from 5PM to 9PM covering a 3 block stretch from Pine Street to the ocean along.

The event is free to the public. Ten of the Flagler Ave Restaurants will feature a variety of traditional Mexican food, cold cervezas, colorful Margaritas and Sangrias, fantastic music and entertainment from Mariachi, Latin jazz/rock and Salsa bands and Latin Dancing exhibitions.

Participating merchants include: Flagler Tavern, OM Bar & Chill Lounge, Peanut's Restaurant & Sports Bar, Trader's Sports Pub, The Breakers, Flagler Avenue Coffee Shop, Flip Flops Grill & Chill, The Seahorse Inn, Shoppes of Seaside Station and Toni & Joe's.

History of Cinco De Mayo

All things Jalapeno

Enjoy!

St Patrick's Day Party on Flagler

The Merchants of Flagler will sponsor the 2nd annual St. Patrick's Day Party on Flagler this Tuesday, March 17th. The Om Bar will have free Corned Beef and Cabbage all day long, and there will be music, music, music at 10 different Flagler Ave Venues. A treasure hunt and traditional Irish food and drink will be featured. Should be fun for all so come on down to Flagler!

Art Walk on Flager

This weekend will be the last Art Walk of the year sponsored by The Gallery Group.


This Christmas themed event will feature area artists and vendors, food and entertainment. It will run from 10am-5pm. Jazz It Up Flagler will be held from 5pm-7pm and Bike Night from 5pm-9pm. That should cover just about everyone!

The annual Christmas Parade will begin at the Flagler Ave. parking lot at 4pm on Saturday the 6th and will travel west along Flagler Avenue and the North Causeway, south on Riverside Drive and will turn west on Canal Street and will end at Orange Street. As soon as the Flagler parade is over the Boat Parade will begin!

Light Up Flagler

The Merchants of Flagler Avenue will once again host Light Up Flagler this Friday, many of the Flagler Avenue merchants will be holding an open house at their place of business, serving refreshments, and many will be decorated for the season. There will be live entertainment on the avenue, including Coronado Methodist Chancel Choir Singers, Indian River Chorus, Read-Pattillo Chorus, Chisholm Chorus, Alaia & Company, NSB High School Jazz Ensemble, Marine Discovery Center Carolers and strollers from the Little Theatre of NSB. There will also be demonstrations by Yvette Harley Dancers, American Martial Arts, Terri's Twirling Tornadoes, the Black Belt Academy and Cheer Team and flameworkers at Galleria di Vetro.The Dream-A-Wish Foundation, with Santa and his sleigh, will be at the corner of Flagler and Cooper. Santa will be giving rides up and down the avenue for a donation.Flagler Avenue will be closed to vehicular traffic from Peninsula Avenue to Atlantic Avenue (just west of the Beacon Restaurant) from 5-8 p.m.

We went last year and it is a very nice event! If you don't get enough lights on Flagler go to Christmas Lights City and check out their lights.

Flamingo Follies

The Holiday Season has begun, whether we like it or not, right after Halloween everyone starts thinking about Thanksgiving and Christmas. This weekend is the REAL start of the Holidays in New Smyrna Beach.

The annual Holiday Art show is this Saturday & Sunday from 9am-5pm. Sponsored by the Merchants of Flagler Ave and The Gallery Group this event is great fun! There is food, entertainment, great arts and crafts.

Last year I decided to buy all Christmas gifts locally in New Smyrna Beach. I urge you to do the same this year. There is a wealth of great merchants here in our community that need our business.

Be creative and buy local this holiday season!

.....and yes those pathetic flamingos are in my backyard, I guess I need to do some weeding!

Weekend Events

Another beautiful sunrise in New Smyrna Beach. Lots to do this weekend. The Jazz festival starts tonight, the monthly art walk on Flagler is this Saturday from 10am-5pm. The weather is picture perfect and should stay that way thru the weekend.

The surf is still rough so be careful on the beach.

Enjoy the weekend!

Chomp & Other Stuff

The shark bite record has been tied in Volusia County, at least this shark chose to bite someone in Ormond and not New Smyrna, this is good, well as good as shark bites get.

The Jazz Festival is this coming weekend on Flagler. This is good stuff, more on that later this week.

The weather is getting gorgeous and there are no people around, it is so nice.

Checked out the gas prices this week, the 7-11 beachside went from 3.69 last Friday to 3.95 over the weekend. IF you see a jump of over 25 cents, report it to the Attorney General, 1-800-no scam.

You can still find the lowest prices in your area here.

All Kinds of Friday Stuff

Ladies, go on Oprah and download a free copy of Suze Orman's book, Women & Money. It is good only til 8pm tonight so don't delay. She is on Oprah today as well.

Jr Lifeguard camp in New Smyrna was a roaring success. The kids had a blast!

My son attended, and then he plays baseball in the evening. This can create some issues. For example on Monday and Tuesday his shoulder hurt, Wednesday he had a rash in an unmentionable area. This required a call to his uncle for male "rash" advice, a trip to the drugstore and alot of moaning, for just a minute I thought he was giving birth without benefit of drugs. Thursday it was better and today "it" is back. So I walk into my living room earlier and he is sitting on the couch sort of wrapped in towel, reading the can of Cruex.

He says "MOM" (every sentence starts with Mom) I said, "YES"....he said, "Mom, I think we need to contact Poison Control." (Yes I am rolling my eyes), so since he was reading the can and not writhing on the floor in agony, I calmly said, "WHY"..."because I accidently sprayed this stuff in my eye." I am trying valiantly to contain myself at this point. So I said "can you see?"

So this kid has the nerve to say to me "well, Duh Mom I am reading the can."

I could no longer control myself, I said "well at least you don't have to worry about a rash in your eye."

He was not as amused as I was.

This Saturday is the Art Walk on Flagler. It is always a good time.

Whatever you do make it a great weekend!

Summer Events

With school getting out it is officially summer in New Smyrna Beach, for some of us that means summer camps, more baseball, the beach, the pool, all that kid stuff. There are some fun events coming up on Flagler Avenue...HERE is a great schedule of events for the whole year.

One that is happening this month that is worth checking out is the Seaside Fiesta on June 19th. Flagler Ave will close from 3-9pm and the local merchants have food, drink and special events for all. I hear it is a good time.

The Summer Concert Series in Riverside Park has begun, here is the schedule. This is every Thursday at 7pm in Riverside Park, bring chairs or a blanket, maybe some bug spray!!

There are a BUNCH of great summer camps going on for kids, horse camps, art camps, Volusia County Parks, DBCC, Marine Discovery and more, I have a comprehensive list that was put together by the Hometown News and the News Journal. Email me if you would like more information.

Stay Cool and have fun!

Build It and They Will Come....

But what are they building and who will end up coming? That is the question that some local residents are asking about a proposed 125 room hotel and 3 story parking deck that is going before county commissioners. I am not sure when it is scheduled to be voted on, but the plan is to put this at Flagler and Florida Avenue.

Residents are meeting to discuss this and have invited the developer, the meeting is scheduled for this Wednesday, March 19th at 6pm at the Coronado Methodist Church. You can get more information and follow along with the residents at

Keep New Smyrna Quaint

I remember a brief article in the paper awhile back about this hotel but it has not gotten much press. I googled and searched the News Journal website but could find the article I saw. I checked the City Commission schedule, agendas and minutes and did not find anything there either. This is apparently a pretty well kept secret or I am just not up to my usual searching capability.

Whatever your thoughts are it is important to stay informed.

Flamingo Follies

Today was the first day of the 2-day art festival on Flagler Ave known as the Flamingo Follies, I took a walk down there today, it was great, many street vendors with great gift ideas for the holidays, fantastic art, entertainment and food vendors were located at Pine St. Some of the booths had some great ideas, I went without money on purpose so I could look and not buy. Tomorrow I am taking my daughter and we are going to get a few gifts for the grandparents. Check it out if, there is ample parking at Coronodo Church and along Peninsula and you can walk the whole street.