Kids don’t have a lot to laugh about these days. And — let’s face it — Harvard and MIT scientists are not usual much for giggles.
But Westport mom Alli DiVincenzo — an accomplished entrepreneurial designer — has joined forced with those university researchers. They’ve created playful personal care products for kids, turning “ordinary tasks into extraordinary experiences.”
The first product from One Fun Company is a hand soap called Splatz. A gentle squeeze makes a “splat.” Each Splatz soap bubble “turns this essential, often tedious task into good clean fun,” Alli says.
She should know. Her son did not like washing his hands. But he enjoyed playing with slime, and anything else tactile.
She tracked down those scientists, and pitched them the idea for a popping hand soap. They loved it. For a couple of years they all tinkered in their kitchens.
When Alli dropped off 100 samples with friends, kids used up the entire test bottles in a day. She and the scientists knew they were on to something.
For the holidays, One Fun has teamed up with WestportMoms’ Local Love initiative, and Westport elementary schools’ Pay It Forward campaign. And in conjunction with the upcoming Small Business Saturday, One Fun offers 10% off Splatz all weekend long. Just click here, and use the code WOOG10.
PS: Keeping it local, Splatz’s packaging and distribution comes courtesy of Randy Herbertson’s The Visual Brand.
How’s this for a provocative title: The Guarded Gate: Bigotry, Eugenics, and the Law That Kept Two Generations of Jews, Italians, and Other European Immigrants Out of America.
That’s Daniel Okrent’s latest book. The insightful observer of American politics and history — and the first New York Times public editor — will be featured in a virtual talk December 2 (7 p.m.).
He’ll discuss his new work. It’s a chilling tale of how anti-immigration activists of the early 20th century — most of them well-born, many of them progressives –used the bogus science of eugenics to justify closing the immigration door in 1924.
Okrent’s appearance is sponsored by the Westport Library and Silvermine Arts Center. The center’s current exhibit, “The Golden Door” — an exploration of the complex histories and cultural identities that define and enrich contemporary America — runs through January 16.
Click here to register for Okrent’s free virtual talk.
Daniel Okrent
In other Library news:
The Westport Book Sale is temporarily suspending book donations effective today, until further notice. The decision is a result of rising COVID cases, and concern for volunteers who stand in the cold for hours accepting donations.
They invite everyone — in Westport and beyond — to shop the Online Holiday and Winter Book Sale.
I don’t know if Winslow Park Animal Hospital treats turkeys, as well as dogs.
But the Post Road East veterinary clinic always manages to mark holidays well.
(Photo/Rowene Weems)
And finally … on this day in 1859, Charles Darwin published On the Origin of Species.
