Halloween Stories

OVIDEO, Fla. – A gaggle of children gather around a man named Ty Karnitz with a book called “Big Green Monster” waiting for him to begin. 

“I enjoy making the children laugh and I love seeing them get involved with reading,” said Karnitz.

Karnitz is the story time reader at the Barns and Noble in the Ovideo shopping market on Oct. 21.This was his first story time and the store plans to keep it going every Thursday morning. 

He had the kids pretending to see ghosts and monsters and themed his stories with the upcoming holiday, Halloween.  The children were screaming for the monsters to go away, and making hiccup noises as Karnitz read another story called “Skeleton Hiccups.”

“My daughter seemed to have a lot of fun,” said Samantha Gasch, “I wouldn’t mind bringing her again.”

The turnout for this story time was not very large.  There were about 4 kids ranging from the ages of 3 and 5.

“I’m going to tell my friends to bring their children next time. It’s a good activity for the kids,” said Diane Kersey.

Karnitz continued his story time by having the children go on a ghost hunt, telling them to yell every time they saw one.  For the next 5 minutes all you heard were kids yelling “ghost!” over and over again.

Children left with smiles on their faces, wanting to hear more stories from Karnitz.

Getting Into Cooking with Meghan Murphy Van Camp

ORLANDO, Fla. – University of Central Florida offers cooking demos with Meghan Murphy Van Camp once of month open to the public.

“I try to make things simple and inexpensive for college students,” said Van Camp

Inexpensive and simple is exactly what she did on September 20^th when she showed college students how to make a Thai Green Curry Chicken dinner. 

“I like coming to her demos because she doesn’t teach you to make just one meal, you can switch things out to make variety,” said an onlooker Brittany Zimmerman.

While cooking, Van Camp explained to students what they could substitute while handing out a paper with directions on exactly how to make the meal and what was needed for the meal.

Not only does she do cooking demos, but she also does a class called Lunch and Learn twice a month.  Here she teaches you so create healthy salads and wraps that are easy and fast to make.

Van Camp said she tries to teach college kids healthy meals because she knows college students don’t know much about protein and nutrients. 

“This is my second time going to her demo and I really enjoy learning new things to cook,” said Rebecca Simon, another student at Van Camp’s demo.

For more information on Van Camp and recipes visit www.hs.ucf.edu