Sheri and Eli Gurock, intrepid proprietors of Magic Beans, keep planting more seeds and making their toy store business grow. It started in 2004, with a single store in Coolidge Corner. Eight years and 5 stores later, their latest beanstalk has sprung up in The Shops at Prudential Center.

The new Magic Beans store in the Prudential Center quietly opened for business in November and made a splash in January with a grand-opening Kazoo Flash Mob – Skip to My Lou through the Pru with kazoos – led by the incomparable children’s songstress, Vanessa Trien. It was quite a celebration, complete with a visit from Elmo and giveaways galore. For those of us who missed it, we can have our own micro celebrations by taking our little ones to the new store to check out the selection of gear, gadgets, gifts and games.

My kids taught me everything there is to know about frogs, fiddler crabs, horseshoe crabs, tidal pools, the marshes, and shorebirds. And they learned everything there is to know about these important things at Mass Audubon’s Wellfleet Bay Natural History Day Camp. For three years, they happily spent hot summer days mucking in the marshes, digging at the sandy shore, and skimming bugs from a fresh water pond—and loved every minute of it.

Mass Audubon offers camps across the state, from the Berkshires to the Cape and Islands. The organization has been running summer camps for over 60 years, and if our experience in Wellfleet is any indication, the quality of its programs is hard to beat. 

So... have you looked up your kid's teacher's rating yet? It feels like that's all public school parents and teachers and principals and newspapers are talking about these days. (All kids are talking about is having to go back to school after break. Perspective is everything.)

In addition to lots of links with different takes on the release of the teacher rankings, we've got info on a new elementary school in Williamsburg, a downtown school supply drive, a fresh debate over teacher evaluations (different than ratings, stick with me here) and a handy solution for the city's out-of-date school zoning maps.

Update: In lieu of a parade in 2013, Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey is hosting an Elephant Dance Party in Dumbo, Brooklyn on Wednesday, March 20. Find the info here. We also have the scoop on eight circus shows playing NYC this spring.

A lot of readers have been asking when Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus plans to parade its elephants across the Queens-Midtown Tunnel and through the streets of Manhattan this year. But for the second year in a row, the Greatest Show on Earth is skipping the city, which means no elephant parade in 2012.

However, Ringling Bros. will be bringing its brand-new spectacle Dragons to nearby suburban stadiums throughout March, and the circus is also hosting a cute promotional event in Grand Central next week to kick off its tri-state area run.

Of course Ringling isn't the only act in town. Read on for other circus performances in New York City, two with elephants (sorry PETA), but many with humans-only casts.

Unless you and your kids have been living under a plastic rock, you know that the animated film Dr. Seuss' The Lorax opens this Friday, March 2. What you may not realize is that Friday is also the late Dr. Seuss' 108th birthday and the annual launch of the National Education Association's Read Across America campaign.

Unlike the 2011 edition of Read Across America, this year's kickoff at the central branch of the New York Public Library isn't open to the public. However, there are still many ways your little Cat in the Hat fanatic can celebrate Seuss’ birthday in New York City. Read on for special storytimes, a super-cool Seuss art exhibit and ideas for marking the doc's big day on your own.

We've had a really busy February break, although it wasn't all work. Yes, we wrote new posts about comedy classes and shows for kids and how to find accurate NYC school zone maps (that second one took us a half a day to research!). But we also spent a lot of time having fun with our kids. Stephanie took her son snow tubing, Anna went on a behind-the-scenes tour of Radio City Music Hall and I sent my daughter to a half-day camp... and she demanded to stay the entire day because apparently the counselors are more fun than I am. (Maybe she was just sick of walking the dogs.)

Our sites outside of NYC have been busy, too. If you're thinking of taking a day trip this weekend, how about visiting one of the many indoor miniature golf courses in New Jersey? Meanwhile, hot on the heels of NYC's Summer Camp Guide come roundups of Long Island summer camps in Suffolk and Nassau Counties, and performing arts camps in Connecticut's Hartford County.

If you want to stay on top of everything that's going on in New Jersey, Long Island, Connecticut, Boston or Los Angeles, you can subscribe to our free newsletters. Read on for everything we covered on Mommy Poppins NYC this week.

You and your family are probably beat from all the winter break fun you had this past week, but this weekend is no time to kick back and relax: There's still so much to do! This weekend will afford us still more opportunities to get out and enjoy this beautiful winter weather we've been having, with lots of outdoor activities. There are also a few events for your budding reader. (Don't forget about Target's Read Across America event celebrating Dr. Seuss's birthday, with readings of The Lorax at all of its local stores.) Believe it or not, it's Maple Sugaring Day and Waffle Day (there's gotta be a way to combine the two!) Also, newsletter subscribers, be on the lookout for a giveaway coming up soon, exclusively for newsletter subscribers. If you haven't subscribed yet, now's the time....

New York City got an F in geography this month as news got around that 311 (the official New York City info line) has been giving out inaccurate information about elementary school zones. Over the past few years, there has been an unprecedented amount of school rezoning due to the introduction of several new schools to help ease overcrowding. Apparently even the DOE and NYC.gov can't keep up with the changes, so what are parents supposed to do—especially with the deadline for kindergarten applications looming?

I spent several hours sussing out where NYC parents can find accurate school zoning maps. It was not an easy task as there literally is no one place to find accurate school zoning maps for NYC... until now. Read on to see how you can get the right information when looking up your zoned schools.