Best of Austin 2006

Critics Picks

Kids

Best "Not Going Back to School Day": Austin Homeschoolers Park Day at Deep Eddy
On the first day of school, hundreds of lucky kids in Austin converge on Deep Eddy pool to celebrate "Not Going Back to School" Day! These are our legal outlaws: homeschoolers, those charmed children and teens who learn from the living world, the out of doors, their iconoclastic parents, and a variety of hands-on activities. The community has a grand throwdown to celebrate not going back to school: no rulers, no books, no teachers' dirty looks. Just the organic process of learning in one's own way, day by day – and this kickoff gives a hint as to just how grand it is.
401 Deep Eddy Dr., 472-8546 www.deepeddy.org

Best Education Money Can't Buy: Breakthrough Austin
Breakthrough is a great Austin feedback loop: free summer education for kiddos that also creates an army of passionate teachers. Seventh graders from families with a variety of risk factors (like poverty or single parenting) come to learn math, writing, art history, Swahili, physics, theatre, and to acquire an unabashed love of learning. Their teachers are college students at UT, or high school students who apply from around the country. Breakthrough is a national program, but Austin does it in special style. The program includes summer sessions at UT, school-year mentoring, and a six-year committment to students. How many of us make a six-year committment to anything, much less to making sure that kids who might otherwise be forgotten instead are challenged to develop their intellectual gifts? And, this program is free, yo!
University of Texas at Austin, GGB 1.308, 1 University Station G-6000, 692-9444 www.breakthroughaustin.org

Best Half Pipe and More: Skate Park Reopens in Mabel Davis Park
Mabel Davis Park finally reopened last December after five years of toxic-waste abatement and new construction. The site of a landfill that closed in 1955, the centerpiece of the park is Austin’s first city-provided skateboarding bowl that looks like an empty swimming pool. Skateboarding should not be a crime, and here, among the stairs, railings, and benches built especially for the sport, it is OK for ‘boarders to work out their acrobatic skills. The 50-acre park also has an Olympic-size swimming pool, playscapes, hiking trail, open space, and a basketball court.
Mabel Davis Park, 3427 Parker, 974-6700; Austin Public Skatepark Action Committee, 4908 Duval, 458-6676 www.ci.austin.tx.us/parks/mabeldavis.htm; www.austinpublicskatepark.org

Best Healthy, Fun Bonding Activity for Parents and Children: GeoCaching
Looking for a fun activity to share with children young and old that combines adventure, exercise, high tech gadgets, the Internet, and old-fashioned backwoods know-how? Look no further than GeoCaching. Part hobby, part sport, GeoCaching is a worldwide, high tech treasure-hunting game. Using a GPS receiver (starting at less than $100), GeoCachers search for cleverly hidden caches (usually small containers containing little trinkets) placed on public property at specific latitude and longitude coordinates. Caches are listed on the Internet by ZIP code, and the Austin-area GeoCaching community has placed more than 1,500 caches. Take a trinket/leave a trinket while enjoying the search. www.geocaching.com

Best Holistic Approach to Education: The Khabele School
So many kids graduate high school with the grades, the award certificates, the extracurricular experience, the friends – all the indicators of a successful, fulfilling life to come. Yet none of these guarantee healthy self-esteem, and without it, those indicators eventually prove meaningless. That's where the Khabele School comes in. Parents of Khabele students marvel at the difference just a semester makes in their children's confidence, leadership abilities, and self-awareness, feats Khabele accomplishes through, among other things, prioritizing individualized attention, empowering students with responsibility and leadership roles, and initiating intensive parent involvement. They understand the importance of ensuring a solid foundation of inner strength in which academics can take root, and as Austin begins to fill with Khabele's self-assured, creatively fulfilled, action-oriented alumni, we think we'll all feel the benefits.
801 Rio Grande, 480-8142 www.khabele.org

Best Kite Selection in Austin: Earth Art
More than 300 different Balinese kites await the connoisseur in an attic room atop a long, turning staircase at Earth Art. When the shopkeeper switches on the light, you are in an aviary of fabric magic: grasshoppers, dragons, monkeys, spiders, and macaws peer down from the eaves, each a handpainted, handcrafted work of art ready to ride the wind on the end of a string.
632-B N. Lamar, 693-9400

Best Musical Opportunity: Anthropos Arts
Anthropos Arts has been bringing music workshops and lessons to Austin students for seven years, free of change. Each $300 donation pays for one student's lessons for the whole year. As an end cap to the experience, students give a live performance at Stubb's.
PO Box 685000 www.anthropos.org

Best One-on-One Indoor Swimming Lessons: Tom's Dive & Swim
Ensuring your child knows how to swim is one of the most important responsibilities you will ever face as a parent. Some kids take to group classes at city pools and health/social clubs like fish. Others need one-on-one attention, and unfortunately, it can be hard to find a reliable, private teacher. Tom's Dive & Swim offers group classes and top-notch private lessons for ages 6 months and older. Their teachers are superpatient and can help your children overcome their fears. Because the pool is indoors, lessons are available year-round. Look no further – just go to Tom’s.
5909 Burnet, 451-3425 www.austinswim.com

Best Place for Before-Meal Prayer: Luby's
Some of us were raised to think Jesus isn't all that impressed with public displays of devotion outside of the church hour. On the other hand, what harm is it doing the Lord or anyone else? None. More than any other Austin eating establishment we can think of, the place to spot hands-around-the-table, heads bowed, is Luby's. Admittedly, Southern cafeteria cuisine is probably something you have to grow up on to appreciate. Fewer of our mothers and grandmothers tackle the once-typical family meal, and demand for a lunch of meat, two vegetables, and a white roll is declining. Aware of this trend, Luby's has been cooking to keep its praying customers loyal as it tries to reel in Yankees and food snobs. More offerings of baked fish, fresh vegetables not cooked to a paste, and salads are evidence of the company's attempts to bridge the gap. Grace is optional, as always.
1410 E. Anderson, 835-9454; 5200 Brodie, 892-0297; 1616 E. Oltorf, 442-3785; Barton Creek Square Mall, 306-0696; 8176 N. MoPac, 346-6040; Sky Ridge Plaza, Round Rock, 388-4068; 13817 N. Hwy. 183, 335-6646 www.lubys.com

Best Place to Jump Around: Pump It Up
Jump around, jump around, jump up, jump up, and get down… Inflatable chutes, slides, ladders, and rooms filled with jumpy castles sound like a dream come true and the perfect place to plan a party. The friendly Pump It Up crew does almost all of the work for you; just let them know what you want, and voilà. With locations in Austin and Round Rock, this "inflatable party zone" is a fun-filled adventure, not to mention good exercise for kids of all ages.
9330 United, #180, 989-PUMP (7867) www.pumpitupparty.com/austin.html

Best Place to Take the Kiddos Out to Dinner: Kids' Nights at Nutty Brown Cafe
The Nutty Brown Cafe has rockin' events most nights of the week, but Tuesday nights are specifically for kids. A kid-centric super fan-damily nutty haven, it's the local version that many a chain wishes it could emulate. Limpy the Clown is on hand to keep the kids' attention rapt in another direction while you steal a long-belated kiss or squeeze from the spouse in your wooden booth. Kids entrées like Lil' Nutty Burger are a mere 99 cents. There's a sandbox and music so you and your honey, tired out from the constancy of parenting, can relax with some good down-home cooking and watch the kids laugh. The night is designed to create world peace and domestic harmony.
12225 Hwy. 290 W., 301-4648 www.nuttybrown.com

Best Toy Library: Family Connections
Anyone with a child from 0 to 6 should make a stop at Family Connections, a toy library where you can check out toys, instruments, books, and art. For a $5 annual donation, you can get art to put on walls, prints, tambourines, drums, huge wooden trucks, dolls, and parenting advice to go along with it. Parent educators are available Monday-Friday to answer questions on child development or to listen and assist with the most challenging job in the known universe.
825 E. 53 1/2 #E-101, 478-5725 www.familyconnectionsonline.org

Best Way to Get Kids Pumped About Bikes: Austin's Yellow Bike Project
YBP's all-volunteer staff donated nearly 100 bikes last year to Winn, Andrews, Blanton, and Harris elementary schools, located in the vicinity of its main shop. This year, with the help of an REI grant, volunteers are providing area students with free reconditioned bikes, along with lights and helmets, as part of the Bikes to Schools program. YBP is also teaching kids at Bedichek Middle School the nuts and bolts of bicycle repair and maintenance as part of the Citizen Schools program. In the ongoing aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, volunteers donated 62 kids' bikes to refugees living at East Austin's Huntington Meadows apartments – just a small part of larger citywide efforts that provided more than 300 bikes to Katrina victims.
2013 E. 51st, 457-9880 www.austinyellowbike.org

Best Way to Help Kids Help Themselves: American YouthWorks
American YouthWorks has been transforming the lives of at-risk Austin youth for 30 years. Their holistic approach to education and community service has enabled thousands of would-be dropouts to complete high school, find employment that supports them and their families, build life skills that last a lifetime, and gain the self-respect that comes with self-sufficiency and giving back to the community. Clifford Antone founded their Help Clifford Help Kids fundraiser, and through this dedicated support over the last few years, AYW has achieved a higher profile. With the passing of Austin's blues club legend, that torch has been picked up by Clifford's sister Susan, who is insuring that the good works will go on and that AYW will be able to serve generations of teens.
1900 E. Ben White, 744-1900; 216 E. Fourth, 236-6100 www.americanyouthworks.org

Birthday Party Entertainment: Penelope Foolish the Clown
If your kid won't stand for anything less than the party of the century, you'd better get some kick-butt entertainment. That means booking Penelope Foolish. Ms. Foolish is not only a pro at classic clownery like juggling and making balloon animals, but she's also a storyteller, magician, and a singer who just wants everyone there to have the best time ever. And with someone as talented and genuine as Penelope Foolish, fun is inevitable. Unless it's your son's 16th birthday. That might just be kind of awkward and embarrassing.
2503 Willow, 971-3311 www.penelopefoolish.com

Most Perfect Pandemonium: Austin’s Park ‘n Pizza
Although Austin is home to many wonderful things, it does not have an amusement park. Austin’s Park 'n Pizza has many of the great amusements without the whole amusement-park mayhem. There are go-carts, bumper boats, little-kid attractions like the tea cup rides and the Rio Grande train ride. Plus there are more active choices such as miniature golf, laser tag, baseball batting cages, a rock-climbing wall, and video games.
16231 N. I-35, 670-9600 www.austinspark.com