One of my favorite things about my job is building relationships with the people and places that I visit on a regular basis. One of those places that is close to home is the Early Childhood Resource Center (ECRC) in Canton.I have performed numerous children’s programs for them as well as taught some professional development classes for early childhood educators.

For awhile they used to have a display of puppets for sale right when you walked in the door. Anyone who knows me well knows that I love puppets. Put me in front of a puppet rack, and I’ll be entertained for a good long time. Whenever I would come to perform at the ECRC, I would gaze lovingly at the puppets, and of course, try on my favorite ones! (They had a sale around Christmas-time and a few made their way home with me too!)

Well, sadly, they have discontinued their puppet sales, but on my last visit I decided to ask them if they still had the rack that they used to display them as I was interested in purchasing a rack for my puppet collection and wanted to see if that one would be a good fit. Children’s programmer David motioned to me and had me follow him into his office where the puppet rack sat, unused. “Take it! It’s yours,” he said. “I’ve been trying to get rid of it.”

I was pretty excited as I’d had no intentions of leaving that night with a puppet rack, just looking at one. But now my puppets have a new home — one where I can see each of them and continue plotting their next appearance in a story performance. Thanks David and ECRC for giving me more than I bargained for on my last visit!

Below are some additional photos of my performance of “The Magic Pumpkin Seed Bird” at ECRC in early October.