Wing Your Way to the Chattahoochee Nature Center

Hundreds of wings will be flying at the Chattahoochee Nature Center, this weekend. No, the birds at the Nature Center don’t have a lot of chicks ready to leave the nest. It’s not a convention of angels, either. It’s the 2011 Flying Colors Butterfly Festival!

Tickets are just $10 for the General Public ($8 if you’re a CNC Member) and children ages 2 and under are FREE.

Here’s a glimpse at what will be going on Saturday, July 16 and Sunday, July 17:

Butterfly Releases
Witness the thrill of a live butterfly release including swallowtail butterflies! Butterfly releases occur at 11 AM and 1:30 PM on Saturday and at 1:30 PM and 3:30 PM on Sunday.

Plant Sale
Find the perfect host plants and nectar plants to take home to your garden to attract butterflies to your backyard! CNC Horticulture volunteers will be on-hand at the plant sale and in the butterfly garden to answer your questions about how to attract butterflies and other pollinators to your yard!

Butterfly Crafts and Face Painting
We have crafts for everyone! Kids can make butterfly inspired sun catchers, butterfly antennae, silly straws, and bouncy caterpillars. Come visit us in Kingfisher Kids can get their faces painted with beautiful butterflies and creepy caterpillars!

Butterfly Sidewalk Art & Fairy House Construction
Butterflies provide the perfect inspiration for our on-going art project. Create a "butterfly path" from the Ben Brady Lakeside Pavilion all the way to the "fairy village!"
Fairies are among us. Stop by the free play area and build a fairy house or gnome home during the Butterfly Festival. Fairy houses and gnome homes are made from nature objects for real and imaginary creatures. Nature materials provided; bring your imagination. One house per family please.

Butterfly and Caterpillar Costume Parade
Come with your very best butterfly wings or your best caterpillar colors on and join us for our butterfly parade at the end of festival each day with grand marshal Ms. Chrysalis!

Entertainment for the Entire Family
Saturday and Sunday will bring out our friends from Atlanta Dance Central as they showcase some of their up and coming dancers!

On Saturday, Piccadilly Puppets will have you laughing and learning as they present Butterfly Ballad at 11:30am and 2:00pm.

Captain George will have us dancing and singing along to old favorites on Sunday with some help from YOU!

Exhibitors and Vendors
We will have groups with us that will help you learn about the importance of pollinators in our environment. We will also have some environmentally friendly vendors on hand to help you green your life!

Girl Scout Butterfly Badge
Junior Girl Scouts can work on the requirements for the Butterfly Badge on their own with self-guided activities on Saturday OR come on Sunday and complete the requirements through an interactive program with Cadette Scout Mary Ann H. from Troop 24324 as part of her Silver Award! If you would like to sign-up for the Sunday program please contact scouts@chattnaturecenter.org The program is included with admission to the festival!

For full details, just click on www.chattnaturecenter.org/flying-colors-butterfly-festival.html

Bike Ride Will Shut Down GA 400

Bicycles on Georgia 400? Isn’t that normally illegal? This coming Sunday, for the third year in a row, Georgia 400 will be shut down so that bicycles can ride in the “Hospitality Highway Century” to benefit the Georgia Transplant Foundation (GTF). It’s your chance to be one of the few folks who can say that they shut down Georgia 400 and did something good for someone else at the same time.

Registered riders will promptly start at 6:30 a.m. from the former Home Depot parking lot in Roswell, at the intersection of Holcomb Bridge Rd. and Market Blvd., and pedal their way down GA 400 from exit 7 to exit 6. Cyclists will then wind through the cities of Roswell, Sandy Springs, Milton, Johns Creek, Alpharetta, and other scenic areas of north Fulton, Forsyth, and Cherokee counties. The route includes rest stops, complete with bathrooms, full mechanical support, and a variety of snacks and drinks. Whether it’s the 9-mile “I Did It” ride or the 22-mile, 60-mile, and 100-mile options, this event promises to be filled with fun, excitement, and the opportunity to say, “I closed down 400!”

The start/ finish point is located in the former Home Depot parking lot, next to the Publix, in the Kings Market shopping center, in Roswell. The exact address is: 1425 Market Blvd. Roswell, GA 30076. All persons involved with the ride - cyclists, fans, volunteers, staff, etc. - should only park their vehicles in the former Home Depot parking lot, NOT in front of Publix. Additional parking will also be available in the former Comp. USA parking lot, located off of Market Blvd., in the same shopping center

Registration opens at 5:15 am. Only registered cyclists who arrive before 6 am will be able to ride on GA 400 during the specific window of time allotted by the Department of Transportation. Registration is $45, including the day of the event. Registration includes a t-shirt, food, water, and full mechanical support along the way. The ride is open to anyone 14-years-of- age or older. For details about the ride and to register for the “Hospitality Highway Century,” please visit www.400century.com

Need a place to spend the night so that all you have to do is fall out of bed and get to registration early, early, early? The host hotel for the event is the Courtyard by Marriott, Roswell. You can leave your car at the hotel and just pedal a few feet to the start of the race. Call them at 770-992-7200 to take advantage of their special $59.00 rate for the ride. But wait, there’s more! Check out the other Roswell hotels, many located right on Holcomb Bridge where the race starts: www.visitroswellga.com/lodging.html

Founded in Atlanta in 1992, the Georgia Transplant Foundation is a non-profit organization providing financial, educational, and emotional support to transplant candidates, recipients, living donors, and their families throughout the state of Georgia. GTF is funded through the generosity of the Carlos and Marguerite Mason Trust, corporations and individuals. Eighty-four percent of all funds raised directly support Georgia’s organ transplant community. For more information, please visit www.gatransplant.org