🌴 Getting Outdoors

It’s been another great week in Summerville with our family!

A highlight of the week was going to Third Thursday and seeing “mister petals” hand out flowers all around the festival.

We also got to check out the new Simple Treasures location. They recently merged with the Nailed It DIY Studio, so now there’s fresh ice cream in the heart of Hutchinson Square! My dairy-free son and I thoroughly enjoyed their apple pie sorbet while Daniel downed his favorite peanut butter chocolate milkshake (he literally drank it so fast his stomach hurt, and he will do it again).

Coming up in this week’s newsletter:

• free bowling for kids this summer

• a special event with a nationally recognized nonprofit

• and a one of a kind hot dog joint

Also, congrats to Summerville’s very own Emily Wood Popielarz for winning the 2024 Global Recognition Award! 🎉 

Under the leadership of Emily Wood Popielarz, Summerville’s Ace Hardware was recently recognized by Business Insider for their tremendous success. This award comes from Emily’s entrepreneurial spirit to add things like the Bolts & Brews Beer Garden to the hardware store (which we featured last week).

Check out this article from Business Insider to read more about Popielarz’s achievements with Ace Hardware, located on Old Trolley Road.

To Do: Kid’s Bowl Free at Stars and Strikes

We know during the hot Summerville summers there’s only so much you can do outside everyday. Cue some of the best news about some cool, screen-free, indoor family fun you can have on the hot or rainy days ahead.

From April 22nd-August 25th, kids bowl free at Stars and Strikes! 

Kids between the ages of 2-15 can enjoy up to two free games of bowling each day (Monday-Friday between 10am-5pm and Saturday 9am-12pm).

How do you access their free games? Click here to register your children for the Summerville location, which is located at 4570 Ladson Rd.

Be sure to check out the family passes they have available to access free games for adults, too. If your family’s not into bowling they also offer other activities like laser tag, bumper cars, and arcade games for some family fun.

An Event: Katie’s Krops Springfest

Katie’s Krops is a remarkable, nation-wide nonprofit rooted in the heart of Summerville, and the special event is this Saturday at Crossroads Community Church from 9:30am - 12:30pm.

Katie’s Krops mission is to “empower youth to start and maintain vegetable gardens and donate the harvest to those in need, as well as assist and inspire others to do the same.” Her organization serves our community by providing biweekly dinners at Summerville Baptist Church from locally grown food sources.

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Katie started this organization alongside her mom at the age of 9 in 2009. She grew a exceptionally large, 40 pound cabbage in her backyard from a small seed and her first instinct was to see how they could share it with others and feed those in need. From that 40 pound cabbage, a local soup kitchen teamed up with her to make a soup with rice and ham and they fed 275 people. Since this time, Katie’s Krops has transpired into over a hundred youth-led gardens in 30 different states and has served over 105,000 meals from these gardens.

The free event runs from 9:30am-12:30pm on Saturday at Crossroads Community Church. There will be a food and dessert truck, music, and time for kids to explore their garden with activities.

Check out Katie’s Krops website to learn more about the organization, their ongoing outdoor classroom experiences for kids and adults, and how to support their mission.

Restaurant: Puma’s Italian Ice & Hot Dog Shack

Hey, Daniel here.

Courtney usually writes the newsletter, and I usually edit. Not this time. I’m the resident Hot Dog Guy, and so there’s no better person to tell you about Puma’s Italian Ice & Hot Dog Shack than me.

To elaborate: I love golf. It’s one of my favorite things to do. But the reason I love golf? It’s the hot dogs I get to eat at the turn. Even 9 triple bogies in a row can’t ruin a double dog before the 10th hole.

I’m only kiiiind of kidding. 🌭 

If you’re a hot dog person and you haven’t been to Puma’s, you’re missing out. If you’re not a hot dog person and you haven’t been to Puma’s, then you might enjoy their Italian Ice options too. There’s something for (almost) everyone.

Pictured above are the three dogs I got for dinner the other day. One has an entire egg and cheese omelette on it. You can build your own dog or pick from their incredible menu (seriously, look at the full menu in that link. It’s wild).

Just as I was walking out the door I found out they have a French Toast Dog, which is a French Toast bun with bacon, syrup, and powered sugar. I’m on a mission to go back and eat 1,000 of those as soon as possible.

If you love Hot Dogs and/or Italian Ice, you will love this place. Plus the location is impossible to beat. It’s a stone’s throw from Hutchinson Square in downtown Summerville, so you can grab your dogs and ice, and walk around Summerville on a beautiful spring day as a family.

Palmetto Piece: Getting Outdoors

When kids are home with us all day long (like for the upcoming summer break), filling the days can feel exhausting.

I often feel a lot of pressure to come up with structured playtime activities or excursions outside the home to keep my son entertained. Sometimes I can forget that there’s a beauty in just sending him outside to play and explore on his own. Not only does it give me a break from being the event coordinator for the day, there’s actually a lot of research supporting the fact that kids need to spend way more time doing unstructured play outdoors. According to this Spectrum News Article, some benefits of being outdoors include:

1. A strengthened immune system and happier mood

2. Longer attention spans

3. Increased confidence and creativity

Mom of three Ginny Yurich created a challenge for families to increase outdoor time called 1000 Hours Outside, a goal to spend 1000 hours outside during the year.

Depending on weather some days you can be outside more than others, but the idea is to get your kids outside as much as possible and reap the many benefits of unstructured outdoor time. Yurich noticed that her kids were happier, sleeping better, and had increased coordination and confidence once she prioritized outdoor play. You can visit the 1000 Hours Outside site to learn more about the challenge, track your time outside, and access her books and podcasts.

I am inspired to prioritize outdoor play — even with one toddler and a baby on the way — and will try to be mindful about how much time my son gets to spend outside on his own.

We just need to stock up on the bug spray…

Until next time!

Love,

The Berks 👨‍👩‍👦 

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