Families can celebrate Halloween, Day of the Dead and the harvest season this weekend all over NYC. There are FREE activity-packed outdoor festivals in Brooklyn Bridge Park, Jefferson Market Garden in Greenwich Village, Queens' Socrates Sculpture Park and Madison Square Park, to name just a few. Plus it's prime pumpkin picking season in case you want to take a day trip to a nearby pumpkin patch.

If you're already suffering from Halloween fatigue (or just want to save those costumes for the 31st), there are some cool cultural events for kids as well, like family workshops at the New-York Historical Society's new Armory Show at 100 exhibit, the East meets West Marco Polo Festival and offbeat music fun at Kids Honk! at the Children's Museum of the Arts.

Plus, we are hosting two special Mommy Poppins events this weekend that you won't want to miss! On Saturday, set sail on our Haunted Halloween Family Cruise on New York Harbor featuring Dr. Blood and tons of seasonal fun. Then on Sunday evening, see Me and My Shadow and enjoy pre- and post-show activities at Mommy Poppins Night at the New Victory Theater. Tickets for both events are going fast so don't delay, book yours today.

All of our best bets for the weekend are below. You can find additional options in our Event Calendar and our Halloween Fun Guide.

The brisk chill in the air, the sounds of walking on crunchy leaves, homes decorated with pumpkins and mums...all signs point to the heart of fall!  And, that means for most of us Moms, we're in the midst of constructing crazy characters or making that last, mad dash for the department store to find our kiddo's favorite costume!  (While you're there, don't forget to pick up your goodies to hand out on Halloween!)  Want to supplement your neighborhood trick-or-treating experience or would you rather your kids attend a safe trick-or-treating event?  Southeastern Connecticut has lots of fun events coming up!

We continue our month-long focus on Sunnyside and Woodside with a look at the best stores for kids in the area. While you'll find lots of big-name national chains like Deals, Game Stop and crafts mecca Michaels, there are cute, small ma-and-pa shops, too, like children's clothing and toy boutique Tiny You, 99-cent spots stocked with inexpensive party favors and stocking stuffers, and a bunch of thrift shops that are fun to dig through.

The main shopping drags are Queens Boulevard, which turns into Roosevelt Avenue in Woodside, as well as Skillman and Greenpoint Avenues. In addition to our family shopping picks there are lots of wonderful old-world butchers and international food markets, so keep an eye out for those, too, if you want to cross items off your grocery list at the same time. Here are our top nine kids' stores in Sunnyside and Woodside.

If you’ve already done your share of traditional fall activities like pumpkin picking, how about checking out some fun & quirky pre-Halloween events like the Last Fling Pumpkin Sling at Millbrook Farm or Brite Nites at Wagner Farm Aboretum? And if you want to make the most of our state’s awesome fall foliage, get your fill of nature with a Leaf Peepers Boat Tour at Manasquan Reservoir or a Haunted Forest Hike at Tenafly Nature Center. And remember, you can find a full list of weekend activities in our Event Calendar.

So far this month, we've told you about Halloween events in Historic Hudson Valley, great haunted houses and fun ideas for Halloween crafts. And the month's only halfway done! There's still so much more fun in store this month, we can barely decide what to do next! One event we are particularly excited about is HarvestFest 2013 at Westchester's Ridge Hill. We mentioned this event in our October Go List but with so many fun activities (including a Mommy Poppins booth!), we thought it deserved a dedicated mention here as well.

HarvestFest is an all day event that will be filled with fun seasonal activities, shopping, great food, live music and more. Plus, Mommy Poppins will be on site with the official HarvestFest trick-or-treating bags and an arts and crafts table! You can also enter to win tickets to a show at NYC's New Victory Theater! Read on for everything you need to know about HarvestFest!

The first movie I saw in a movie theater? Pete’s Dragon.  Still one of my favorites, and why, yes, I can sing every note of it.  My first rated R movie?  Chevy Chase in Vacation.  My uncle took my brothers and me while he was babysitting us over a long weekend.  Needless to say, he was not asked to babysit again.  Ever.  My first date movie?  Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.  Can’t remember the boy, but the movie was fantastic!

My point – convoluted though it may be – is that movies hold an important place in our lives and memories.  I remember all of these movie outings – they were important milestones in my life, and I imagine that my kids will also have “movie memories” as they grow older.

Kids with conditions such as Aspergers or Autism, who can be very sensitive to sensory stimuli, are often denied the typical childhood movie experience.  But now, there are movies theaters in CT and across the nation that are offering sensory friendly viewings of specific children’s movies. 

Sensory friendly screenings are viewings in which the volume is greatly lowered, and the lights are dimmed but not turned out.  Patrons are allowed to bring their own snacks so that dietary restrictions can be easily maintained, there are no previews, and viewers are welcome to get up and move about and talk throughout the film.

Closings and openings and moves, oh my! We have a lot of notable changes on New York City's family scene to report this week, including the shuttering of two Upper East Side family favorites, a big move for Williamsburg's second-hand kids' store The Flying Squirrel and a brand-new offbeat play area in Prospect Park. Plus, help NYC's only Latino children's theater company bring free shows to low-income audiences, find no-cost tutoring for middle and high schoolers in Washington Heights, sign your kid up to be part of a Coney Island circus performance and more!

There's a much-anticipated expo hitting LA, and it's coming a whole lot sooner than the Expo Line. The Los Angeles Mom Expo runs October 25-26, 2013 with a full program of exhibitors catering to the entire gamut of needs of LA mothers - a trade show for those of us in the mom trade. And as one of the show's sponsors, Mommy Poppins is in a position to invite 250 of our readers for free!