Recap: Be My Neighbor Day
It was a beautiful day in the neighborhood with gorgeous weather welcoming more than 1,000 participants to our Be My Neighbor Day. The event, inspired by Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood and made possible by a grant from Fred Rogers Productions, was a free community event all about spreading kindness, building connections and celebrating what makes our neighborhoods special.
The love for Daniel Tiger was felt throughout the day and we received so many wonderful compliments from some of Iowa's biggest fans of Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood, including from one mom who even delayed a vacation so her family could attend: "Also I just want to say that we so very appreciated the event. We actually postponed a trip out to CO because our daughter loves Daniel Tiger (as do we…the whole family now has all the songs memorized 😂) and it was totally worth it. She was thrilled with the character meet and greets, all the fun craft/activities and the theater performances kept her attention too. Thanks so much for putting on such a wonderful family event!!"
Being a Good Neighbor
With kindness at the center of the day's festivities, we were overjoyed to bring families together to focus on ways we can spread positivity to others. Our awesome event attendees blew us away by contributing over 200 lbs. of food for the Food Bank of Iowa, approximately 650 kindness rocks to be spread throughout our communities and nearly 170 neighborly notes to benefit WesleyLife's Meals on Wheels. Thank you to everyone who took a few minutes to be kind to your neighbors!
Meeting Some Sweet Friends
Live-action Daniel Tiger and Katerina Kittycat were at the station ready to greet all the sweet faces with a high five and a smile for the camera. For those little ones who found the interactive animated characters a little overwhelming, character and trolley standees were set up around our studios for another photo opportunity.
Going on Neighborhood Adventures
An adorable trolley was made available by Charters on Vine and the short rides offered were certainly one of the most popular elements of a day filled to the brim with activities. We topped off the day with a final trolley ride with Daniel Tiger and Katerina Kittycat hopping aboard to wave goodbye to the families remaining.
Being Part of a Community
The families in attendance on Sunday joined us in being part of a bigger community with local organizations on hand to show them everything from folk dances to fire trucks. Thank you to all our amazing partners who brought smiles to the kids all afternoon: ChildServe, the Des Moines Public Library, the Food Bank of Iowa, the Johnston Police Department, the Johnston Fire Department and CultureALL.
Learning Along the Way
Between educational activities brought in by our partners and the Iowa PBS Education STEAM trailer with hands-on activities, the afternoon was filled with great opportunities to get little minds thinking about big ideas.