Imagination Bethesda Children's Festival - Saturday, June 1, 2013

Imagination Bethesda Celebrates Children and the Arts on June 1st

The 19th annual Imagination Bethesda, a children’s street festival celebrating children and the arts, is scheduled for Saturday, June 1, 2013 from 11am-4pm. Musical performances and professional children’s entertainers will light up the stage, while hands-on art & craft activities will line the streets along Auburn and Norfolk Avenues in downtown Bethesda.   

Organized and managed by the Bethesda Urban Partnership, the festival will host 25 local businesses and arts organizations that will provide a variety of hands-on art and craft activities to entertain and energize the 12-and-under crowd.  Additionally, the festival will feature face painters, balloonists, a stilt-walker, free giveaways and more.

Imagination Bethesda is a FREE event produced by the Bethesda Urban Partnership and is sponsored by MIX 107.3 FM, Washington Parent and Bethesda Magazine.

Event participants hosting hands-on activities for children include:

• Adventure Theatre MTC – Decorate a “dollipop”
• American Plant – Plant a flower pot
• Artworks Fine Art Studio – Pastel drawing
• Be With Me Playseum – Paint a ceramic tile magnet
• Beanstalk Montessori – Montessori activities
• Bethesda Green – Make a necklace with recycled paper & play an environmental trivia game
• Glen Echo Park Partnership for Arts & Culture – Make-your-own carousel
• Gymboree Play & Music – Movement to music, art project, bubbles
• Huntington Learning Center – Origami (paper folding)
• Imagination Stage – Create pirate or Peter Pan paper hats
• Iran Cultural and Educational Center – Make-your-own bookmark, face painting
• Joy of Motion Dance Center – Make recycled paper chains and lanterns
• Kidville – Decorate-your-own foam frame
• Language Fundamentals – Spanish story time and sing-along, make maracas
• Language Stars – Foreign language storytelling and coloring sheets
• Plaza Artist Materials – Decorate-your-own picture mat
• Round House Theatre – Create-your-own Imagination passport
• Strathmore – Create a sculpture
• Washington Conservatory of Music – Play with musical instruments

Performances on the stage include:

11am

The Funny Guy

12pm

Kidville’s Rockin’ Railroad

1pm

Silly Bus

2pm

The Culkin School of Traditional Irish Dance

2:45pm

Dansez! Dansez!

3pm

The Diggity Dudes

Participating food vendors include:

Haagen-Dazs, Smoothie King, Hard Times Café and M&N’s Pizza.

For more information, please call 301/215-6660 or visit www.bethesda.org.

The Bethesda Urban Partnership, a nonprofit organization, is the creator and producer of the Taste of Bethesda; Imagination Bethesda; a free Summer Concert Series, the Bethesda Literary Festival and Play In A Day.  The Bethesda Urban Partnership also manages the Bethesda Arts & Entertainment District and the beautification of downtown Bethesda’s parks, streets and sidewalks. 

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