Beat the mid-winter blues with some friendly competition! Teams of 1-5 will race to complete their 500-piece puzzle first and win awesome prizes, courtesy of The Friendly Toast. Puzzles provided.

Registration required. All ages. Children under the age of 9 must be accompanied by caregiver aged 16 or older.

Registration opens 12/21/23 at 10:00 am. Click here to register: https://fletcherfree.org/puzzle-palooza-2024-registration

Celebrating The Nib
5:00pm - 6:00pm // Fletcher Room
Panelists: Matt Bors, Shay Mirk

Resiliency Narratives
2:30pm - 3:30pm // Local History Room
Instructor: Natalie Norris

In this workshop we gather to learn techniques for approaching memoir stories that we find difficult to tell but feel compelled to share. We’ll focus on the resiliency that grows out of personal stories about adversity, illness, and survival and how you can harness your strength to face these kinds of memoirs. This workshop will include discussion and a drawing activity. All skill levels are welcome.

Build a World! ALL AGES
1:15pm - 2:15pm // Local History
Instructor: Daryl Seitchik

In this all-ages workshop, we will draw inspiration from literature, comics, and film, to create our own fantastical worlds.  We will design our own imaginary maps, populate them with strange creatures, and consider what it would be like to inhabit these worlds, in the form of a comic. 

Join us, and create a place that hasn't existed before!

Telling Other People’s Stories
3:45pm - 4:45pm // Pickering Room
Panelists: Marek Bennett, Janet Biehl, Bill Tulp, JT Yost
Moderator: Jason Lutes

Graphic Explorations of Adolescence
2:45pm - 3:30pm // Fletcher Room
Panelists: Jarad Greene, Tillie Walden, Coco Fox, Isabella Rotman
Moderator: Sally Pirie

What draws so many cartoonists toward exploring adolescent experience? And what is it about adolescence that readers find so compelling? In this panel Jarad Greene, Coco Fox, Isabella Rotman and Tillie Walden talk about representing adolescent lives and the significance this phase of life holds for them and their audiences.

Let’s Make Zines!
Comics-Based Research - Using Art to Analyze Qualitative Data
2:00pm - 4:00pm // Fletcher Room
Instructor: Sally Pirie

Description:

This workshop explores the role of the visual arts in qualitative research. Using strategies from creative nonfiction writing and arts-based research, we will get hands-on practice using drawings to work with our data.

Drawing Comics From Primary Sources
11:00 - 1:00pm // Fletcher Room
Instructor: Marek Bennett

Join award-winning cartoonist Marek Bennett for a hands-on look at creating comics from primary sources -- texts, images, & otherwise! Comics help us interpret existing texts in new ways, exploring sequence, voice, & point of view -- even synthesizing multiple sources into a single narrative. Marek will demonstrate some basic methods, and help you start your own original "non-fiction" comic!

Ring in the new year-at noon! Families are invited to usher in 2024 at the Noon Year’s Eve singalong and celebration. Live music with Linda Bassick, a kid-friendly countdown, and lots of merriment!

Sudoku fans are invited to solve their favorite puzzles when the numbers 1-9 are replaced by unfamiliar symbols from some of the world's minority alphabets. Contestants compete against the clock to solve 5 sudoku ranging from easy to fiendish. Prizes for the three most successful and quickest entrants! For an idea of what will be facing you, check out Endangered Alphabets Sudoku here