Food Allergy Inc. First Halloween Party October 23rd

As Halloween draws near, kids dream of dressing up in costumes and collecting lots of candy. For families with children with food allergies, it is an event that can cause anxiety and stress as parents help their kids celebrate the holiday while worry about keeping them safe.

The new nonprofit, Food Allergy Kids of Atlanta, Inc. has joined forces with Sandy Springs Fire Station #2 and they are throwing a free allergy friendly Halloween party for local families to have a fun, safe and stress free Halloween.

 

Join them for a day of not so spooky fun during our first annual Halloween Party, which will be held this year at the Sandy Springs #2 Fire Station Department. A safety demonstration will be presented & children will have the opportunity to get up close with the firemen & their trucks. Games, prizes, & crafts will be held inside, and all children will receive a special non-food treat bag & gifts from the fire department!

FA Kids of Atlanta’s Allergy Friendly Halloween Party
A Free Event! Saturday, October 23rd, 2010
2PM - 4PM

Fire Station #2, Sandy Springs, GA
135 Johnson Ferry Road
Sandy Springs, Georgia 30328

Bottled water will be available. Please note ** one game will consist of a Dum Dum tree, however, the Dum Dum can be traded in for a prize or Yummy Earth lollipop.

Photo ops will be available for $5, a fundraiser to support FA Kids of Atlanta.

RSVP for this event by sending an email with number of children attending to confirm@fakidsatl.org or by calling 404-512-7983. There is a limit to number of attendees.

Happiness is attending the Gala for Hope and Healing on October 23rd

You are cordially invited to "The Gala for Hope and Healing"

benefiting Children's Center for Hope and Healing. This

fund-raising event, will be held on October 23. This is the 

3rd year the Children's Center for Hope and Healing 

have hosted this event to raise funds for the services they 

provide.

The Gala for Hope and Healing is a black-tie optional party 

that includes savory hors d'oeuvres from Scott's on the Square, 

wine, and the live musical entertainment of nationally

renowned jazz pianist Larry Barker and ensemble, including 

female vocalist, Lisa Balkwill, who has been compared with 

Norah Jones. 

The event also includes a silent auction. It will be held at the 

Quinlan Visual Arts Center in Gainesville, Georgia. It will be 

held from 7 pm – 11 pm. Tickets are $75 per person, or $125 

per couple. For more information or to purchase tickets, 

call 770-532-6530 or visit the gala website: http://tiny.cc/eirf2

The App That Maps Happiness

The iPhone app "Mappiness" gathers information about when its users tend to be the happiest. According to the data, Saturday at 8 p.m. is one happy time. Reuters' Matt Cowan reports.

How does it work?

•You get mappiness from the App Store, open it, and sign up
•We beep you once (or more) a day to ask how you're feeling, and a few basic things to control for: who you're with, where you are, what you're doing (if you're outdoors, you can also take a photo)
•The data gets sent back — anonymously and securely — to our data store, along with your approximate location from the iPhone's GPS, and a noise-level measure

What's in it for you?

•Interesting information about your own happiness, which is charted inside the app — including when, where and with whom you're happiest
•The warm glow of helping increase the sum of human knowledge

Happiness project of the month is Trick-O-Treating for Charity - Non-Profits Halloween Events in Metro Atlanta

Halloween is what people decide to make of it.

 

 

 

"Trick or treat. Smell my feet. Give me something

good to eat. If you don't, I don't care, but I'll be safe 

from here to there".

Ghosts and goblins, witches on broomsticks, pumpkins, candy and spiderwebs…it’s that time of year again.. Halloween—probably every child’s favorite holiday, combining the irresistible attractions of dressing up in costume and gorging on candy. But there’s a deeper spiritual meaning that underlies this holiday. 

Halloween in reality is the harvest season between summer and winter and has long been the holiday meant to be scary.  This is the season of reflection, gathering in and enjoying the fruits of your labor. 

This Halloween I challenge you to give back to your community by supporting a local charity. Think of it as your happiness project of the month. Remember you get more happiness out of giving joy to others so please consider creating a  new Halloween tradition with your family by giving back to your community. 

Here's a list to get you started.

Masque-Fur-Aid Gala: PAWS Atlanta Fundraiser

Saturday, Oct 30 7:00p
Hotel Palomar Atlanta Midtown, Atlanta
Join PAWS Atlanta for their largest fundraiser of the year, the Masque-Fur-Aid Gala on Saturday, October 30.

Howl-ween

Saturday, Oct 23 11:00a
Hotel Palomar Atlanta Midtown, Atlanta
The streets of Atlanta will be overrun with four-legged ghouls, furry-tailed jack-o-lanterns and wet-nosed superheroes during Howl-Ween.

Numbers Too Big to Ignore Luncheon, Supporting The Atlanta Women's Foundation

Thursday, Oct 28 12:00p
Georgia World Congress Center, Atlanta
The Atlanta Women’s Foundation’s upcoming fundraising luncheon takes place on October 28th at the Georgia World Congress Center.

W Atlanta - Midtown to Host ThinksPINK Event, Pups In Pink, to Benefit Young Survival Coalition

 Wednesday, Oct 20 8:00p

W Atlanta Midtown, Atlanta
W Atlanta – Midtown will host a Pups In Pink patio event on October 20th with special guests from davefm, V103 and NBC’s “Atlanta & Co.

Expedition Give 2010

Saturday, Oct 30 12:00p
Technology Square, Atlanta
Think of Expedition Give as The Amazing Race with a philanthropic twist. In this charity scavenger hunt, teams of two will race all over Atlanta on October 30, 2010 collecting items, taking

Atlanta Parade of Apartment Homes

Saturday, Oct 16 9:00a
Alexan 360, Atlanta
Riverstone Residential Group, one of the largest privately-owned, third-party multifamily property management companies in the United States, will host the “Atlanta Parade of Apartment Homes”

Ink 4 Pink: "Knockouts for Knockers"

Thursday, Oct 14 8:00p
Graveyard Tavern, Atlanta
Fundraiser on Thursday, October 14th. All designated event proceeds go to Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation.

Northside UMC/North Atlanta High School Pumpkin Patch

Wednesday, Oct 13 9:00a
Northside United Methodist Church, Atlanta
The North Atlanta Athletic Booster Club will be using their proceeds from the patch to hire an Athletic trainer; this will help insure the quality and safety of their Athletic programs.

Dude it’s Only a Mile!

Sunday, Oct 24 12:00p
Doc Chey's Asian Kitchen, Atlanta
Put on your running shoes and join us at noon on Sunday, October 24 for Atlanta’s Morningside Mile Race and Block Party to benefit the restoration of Virginia Highland firehouse 19. 

Halloween is a the perfect holiday to start giving back to our communities.

 Don't forget to  Take part in Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF. Since 1950, families across America have raised over $144 million for UNICEF by collecting money on Halloween. You can order an orange box to collect money through October 30 or make your own collection box.

Study: Tuesday is the Unhappiest Day of the Week

London, England, United Kingdom (AHN) - A two-month study of mood swings of 22,000 people showed that Tuesday is the unhappiest day of the week, or when people are at a low point.

The study, made using an iPhone application called Mappiness, sets aside the commonly held belief that Monday – which is the day when most people go back to work or school after two days of rest – is the worst day.

George MacKerron, lead researcher of the London School of Economic’s Department of Geography and Environment, explained the choice of Tuesday as the worst day to the possibility that for many people by Monday the weekend has not quite worn off. However, by Tuesday, they are into the working week and the next weekend is still a few days away.

Read the full post here.

"Weekend at Gilmer County, Georgia's Apple Capital"

 

This past weekend we headed off to Ellijay, GA. The city holds an annual Apple Festival and Gilmer County is known as the 'Apple Capital of Georgia'. The Apple Festival is held on Saturday, October 09, 2010- 9:00am - 6:00pm, Sunday, October 10, 2010- 9:00am - 5:00pm, Saturday, October 16, 2010- 9:00am - 6:00pm, Sunday, October 17, 2010- 9:00am - 5:00pm at Ellijay Lions Club Fairgrounds. I have to say that if you are planning a visit you must take Hwy 52 (also known as the "Apple Alley") and visit the local orchards and farm stands to buy fresh crisp Georgia apples.

 

 

I HIGHLY recommend to buy a gallon of apple cider, apple donuts and those delicious apple pies you see in every orchard. They are simple AMAZING. It's truly a magnificent road trip. There is also many antique shops around Ellijay that are worth the visit. I stopped at Mountainside Antiques on our way back and found a great antique to take home.

 

 

 

Reconsider Columbus Day

Happiness Tips From Cats (video)

30 tips for living a fulfilling and happy life. Each one is illustrated by a picture of a cat. Simply adorable!

Celebrity Twitter messages 'show happiness'

Researchers at the University of Edinburgh have been analysing celebrity Twitter messages in a bid to find out how happy the senders are.

They believe the study could provide insights into the emotional well-being of the general population.

The researchers looked at word patterns in the tweets of 13 celebrities. Basketball player Shaquille O'Neale was said to be the happiest tweeter, followed by cyclist Lance Armstrong and television presenter Jonathan Ross. 

 The study, which was carried out in partnership with a technology firm, found that the majority of celebrity messages were happy and positive.

Read the full article at BBC News.

Technology linked to happiness, study claims

There are positive links between access to technology and feelings of well-being, a study claims.

BCS, the Chartered Institute for IT, analysed the results of a survey of 35,000 people around the world.

Access to communication devices was found to be the most valued.

It found that women in developing countries, and people of both sexes with low incomes or poor education, were most influenced emotionally by their access to technology.

It is partly because women tend to have a more central role in family and other social networks, said researcher Paul Flatters of Trajectory Partnership, which conducted the research on behalf of the BCS.

"Our hypothesis is that women in developing countries benefit more because they are more socially constrained in society," he added.

Read the full article at BBC News.

Happiness is... by Kenson Lai

Happiness.. from Kenson Lai on Vimeo.

Funny, cute and happy animals

Is This What Happiness Looks Like?

An increasingly popular group of interior decorators relies on 

the mood-alteringpower of color. Left, a room designed by

Diamond Baratta Design; right, a room by Jamie Drake.

In the last decade the social sciences have become increasingly focused on happiness and what accounts for it, and over the past several months the rest of the culture has been catching up. The best-attended course at Harvard last semester was Positive Psych, an introduction to a new field of psychology that eschews the traditional approach of focusing on pathologies in favor of studying the sources of happiness — “a class whose content resembles that of many a self-help book,” as The Boston Globe reported. Last month New York magazine published a cover story on the amount of interest in the subject, citing a spate of new books, the six-year-old Journal of Happiness Studies and courses at more than 100 colleges, all of which address the question of what makes people happy.

And in the fall “The Architecture of Happiness,” by the philosopher Alain de Botton, who lives in England, will be published in the United States. In it he argues that physical environment is a crucial contributor to well-being. Like it or not, he suggests, the spaces we live in shape our sense of happiness and of self, so we had better choose them carefully.

Even before this vogue took hold in America, however, a number of influential East Coast decorators were exploring the same issues, and advancing a theory of their own: that a maximalist, color-saturated approach to interiors is a secret to happiness — maybe even the secret.

Dennis Rolland’s bedroom for the 2006 Hampton Designer Showhouse 

in Bridgehampton, N.Y., reflects an affinity for exuberant colors.

 A room by Miles Redd.

Jamie Drake, left, photographed in his Fifth Avenue apartment, has a 

reputation for creating vibrant interiors, like the dining room, right, he 

designed for a residence in Manhattan.

Miles Redd makes use of a slightly muted color palette in his 

Manhattan living room, which incorporates touches of black and white.

Christina Juarez and her daughter, Sofia, right, live in an 

Upper East Side apartment that combines warm pinks

with chocolate brown.

 

May Baratta, below, is happy with the candy colors of her

Boca Raton, Fla., apartment, decorated by her son’s firm, 

Diamond Baratta Design.

Read the full article at The New York Times

Keys to happiness: Altruism and a non-neurotic spouse

Want to be happy? 

A 26-year study of Germans suggests it's not that hard.

• Marry someone who's not neurotic.
• Focus more on friends and family, less on material goods.
• Get involved in making the world a better place.
• Have a job but also enough time for leisure.
• Stay physically active.
• For men, don't be underweight. For women, don't be obese.

Other interesting findings:

-- Finding a partner who is similar to oneself doesn't seem to be linked to long-term happiness, despite some research suggesting that partners with similar personalities are likely to be happier.

-- Being neurotic oneself makes one even more unhappy, but being with someone who is neurotic has a substantial effect on life satisfaction and doesn't get better no matter how long one is married.

-- "Women whose partners give high priority to family goals are significantly happier than women whose partners give family matters low priority."

-- Being involved in religion (in the German study either Christianity or Islam) correlated with spending more time on volunteer activities, and higher priority to altruistic and family goals and therefore higher levels of happiness

-- "The evidence indicates that people who consistently prioritize non zero-sum altruistic goals or family goals are more satisfied with life than people who prioritize goals relating to their own career and material success. Giving priority to altruistic goals is strongly association with higher life satisfaction." In fact, "prioritizing success and material goals is actually harmful to life satisfaction."

-- Working too little is worse than working too much (presumably because you don't have enough money), but not having work at all is worst of all.

-- For men, being underweight is associated with lower life satisfaction. Obese women (a body mass index of over 30) were relatively unhappy, but women who were overweight (BMI of between 25–29.9) has average levels of life satisfaction.


Read the full article at USA today