Want to keep your imagination fired up throughout February? Don’t miss this year’s Totsapalooza: Mouse-City Calling and workshops with such celebrated authors as Mahtab Narismhan and Dennis Lee.
We’re building a whole new city just to house all of the crafts, indie bands and storytellers coming to our fourth annual celebration of the D.I.Y. spirit in kid-friendly culture, Totsapalooza: Mouse-City Calling
Urban planners between 2-8 years old will create a model city for storybook mice out of recycled materials, with the help of Councillor Adam Vaughan, Lisa Kelly of The Centre For Art & Soul, Matthew Blackett of Spacing Magazine, Josh Fullan of Maximum City at UTS and Rani Sanderson of Jane’s Walk.
To mark the 45th anniversary of Frederick by Leo Lionni, we’re staging an all-star tribute to the renowned artist, featuring readings of his classic mouse-themed books by Councillor Mike Layton, poet Damian Rogers, CBC host and author Kevin Sylvester, and novelist Vikki VanSickle.
Siânteuse & The Mouse-City Rebels (featuring such veterans of Toronto’s indie music scene as, Emily Blitz, Joel Debois, Siân Llewlyn & Dave Tyson) and Bellwoods Trinity will play original renditions of songs from The Clash’s landmark album London Calling.
Get ready to shake your tail along with Unfinished Business (formerly Food Fight), a trio of eleven year old graduates from Girls Rock Camp.
For details, click here
The dabbawallas of Mumbai deliver box lunches - called tiffins - to white collar workers all over the vast city. They’re legendary for their near-perfect service; for every six million lunches sent, only one will fail to reach its intended destination.
Mahtab Narsimhan’s acclaimed new novel The Tiffin is about that one time in millions when a box goes astray. When a note in a tiffin gets lost, a newborn – Kunal – is separated from his mother. Twelve years later, Kunal turns to the dabbawallas to help him reconnect with her.
Mahtab will discuss how she developed this remarkable premise and lead scribes between 8-12 through an exercise in creating an evocative opening paragraph to a story. And she will award the author of the most alluring piece with an authentic tifflin container, at her Volume One Project on Sunday, February 5th at Mabel’s Fables.
For details, click here
We’re delighted to announce the debut of “Children’s Story Jam”, a new workshop series hosted by noted novelist Vikki VanSickle, in which picture book creators and middle grade authors get feedback on yet-to-be-published work from their most discerning critics: young readers.
Renowned poet and writer Dennis Lee kicks off the Children’s Story Jam series. Lee will work with poetry connoisseurs between 4-6 years old on pieces from his forthcoming collection Melvis & Elvis (HarperCollins) on Saturday February 11th, at The Academy of The Impossible.
For details, click here
COMING SOON
DIY COMIC BOOK LAB
Want to create your own graphic novels? Celebrated author and illustrator Evan Munday (Dead Kid Detective Agency) give aspiring artists between 8-and-14 a crash course in how to translate stories into storybook panels at the DIY Comic Book Lab in March.
ORIGAMI FOR PIRATES – A WORKSHOP
After they master the arts of sailing and plundering, aspiring pirates need to learn…origami.
To celebrate the launch of their picture book The Pirate Girl’s Treasure: An Origami Adventure, Peyton Leung and Hilary Leung will conduct an origami workshop for young swashbucklers in March.
Every neighbourhood has a story, and everyone who lives there has their own tales to tell.
What are the defining features that make your neighbourhood unique? And how do they compare to those of other points on a map of Toronto? What secrets do you know about your neighbourhood that an outsider would never know?
Urban cartographers between 8-12 years old will address such classic urban concerns in stories, photos and drawings as part of The Four Points Project, a social mapping experience that Rani Sanderson will conduct in April. We will collect their findings in a chapbook.
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