JANE N. SLATER

508-645-3378

(slaterjn@comcast.net)

Chilmark is lush and green with lots of flowering shrubs both in gardens and in the wild along the roadsides. A real treat to our winter-tired eyes! And, I am sure, a challenge to all gardeners to get moving!

An early riser can overhear some interesting and colorful conversations among the bird life in our skies these days. Oh, to really know what they are saying!

JUNE MANNING

508-645-2574

(lthslnks@gis.net)

Congratulations to Aquinnah selectman Jim Newman who won reelection on Wednesday and will once again serve our community well. As of Wednesday evening, I did not have the exact figures but do know that the over-ride also passed. There will be a special town meeting on Tuesday evening, May 19 at 7 p.m. at the town hall.

KATHIE CASE

508-627-5349

(kathleencase@comcast.net)

Our lovely town has burst with all the greens and pinks a spring can give after a long rain and then the warm sun coming out. We went to Oak Bluffs and the water is beautiful and the beaches are welcoming. How could you not smile?

The annual Possible Dreams Auction, the Island’s signature summer charity event that has sustained Martha’s Vineyard Community Services for more than three decades, is heading back to the seaside and will take place this year in Ocean Park in Oak Bluffs, allowing the event to expand its capacity as the economy hammers philanthropy across the country.

Auction organizers will announce the venue change today.

Felix Neck needs birders and sponsors to participate in Mass Audubon’s 26th year of birding competition. Birders and donors raise money for Felix Neck Wildlife Sanctuary and our programs by getting pledges per number of bird species seen or making a donation to the Felix Neck team.

Dessert and Auction

Everyone is invited to a dessert and auction hosted by the Federated Church youth group on Sunday, May 17 from 6 to 8:30 p.m. in the parish house on South Sumemr street in Edgartown.

An auction will follow the dessert, with Pastor Jerry Fritz serving as auctioneer. Items include four tickets for the Shenandoah, an MP3 player, gift certificates, gift baskets, and, of course, much more. All proceeds go to support the youth group’s mission work.

For details, call 508-627-4421.

Arts Extravaganza

On Wednesday, May 20, the performing and visual arts students at Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School will present Evening of the Arts, an evening of art, music and drama. Doors open at 6 p.m. Admission is free.

The halls will be filled with student art work ranging from sculpture to photography to painting to architecture and more; meanwhile, the Performing Arts Center will be filled with song, dance and drama.

Over the past 15 years, Alison Berlow’s trajectory from stay-at-home mom to radio essayist, to founder and executive director of the Island Grown Initiative and, most recently, the editor of Edible Vineyard, has been inextricably tied with the rising fortunes of the local food movement.

West Tisbury author Cynthia Riggs will talk about her latest book Death and Honesty, the eighth in her Martha’s Vineyard mystery series, at the Chilmark Public Library on Wednesday, May 20, at 5:30 p.m.

The Vineyard Sinfonietta presents a spring concert Tuesday, May 26, from 3 to 4:30 p.m. at the Oak Bluffs Library.

Soloists Nan White (flute), Jan Hyer (cello) and Matt Pelikan (block flute) will perform in selections by Baroque composers such as Handel, Purcell and Bach all the way up in time through Mozart and Casals.

Encore selections will feature baritone Howie Marlin (and, in one piece. his daughter, Hannah) in three pop songs by Cole Porter, Jimmy VanHeusen and Matt Dennis, plus other songs made famous by Frank Sinatra.