Thursday's Celebrations

April 21st has a bunch of celebrations to consider:

National Chocolate-Covered Cashews Day

Chocolate Covered Cashew Truffle Day

National High Five Day (3rd Thursday of April): The gesture started during a sport game in the 1970s and began as a holiday at the University of Virginia in 2002

National Teach Children to Save Day

School Librarian Day

Kindergarten Day, in honor of Friedrich Froebel (born today, 1782) who started the first Kindergarten in Germany in 1837 which later became a worldwide institution. The first kindergarten focused on the curiosity and interests of children using music, play and other artistic activities to stimulate learning, with close contacts with the natural world (many of the kindergartens actually had real gardens attached to them for children to cultivate their inner lives). The first kindergarten in the US opened in Watertown, Wisconsin, 1856

World Creativity and Innovation Day (Celebrations begin April 15th, Leonardo da Vinci's birthday)

Naturalist John Muir is born, 1838 (famous Scottish-born American naturalist, author, and early advocate of preservation of wilderness in the US, and founder of the Sierra Club)

"Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Old Oak Tree" tops the U.S. pop charts and creates a cultural phenomenon, 1973; later became symbolic of remembering soldiers who have gone to war, especially by their loved ones

Maundy Thursday/Holy Thursday-is the Christian holy day falling on the Thursday before Easter that commemorates the Last Supper of Jesus Christ with the Apostles where Jesus washes their feet, participates in the Seder feast with his disciples and introduces what later becomes Communion 

Christian Feast Day: Abdecalas, Anastasius Sinaita, Anselm of Canterbury, Beuno, Conrad of Parzham, Holy Infant of Good Health, Shemon Bar Sabbae, Wolbodo

Festival of Ridvan (Baha'i Faith)

Third Day of Passover

Grounation Day (Rastafari movement)

Heroic Defense of Veracruz (Mexico)

Brasília Day (Distrito Federal, Brazil)

Kartini Day (Indonesia)

National Tree Planting Day (Kenya)

Birthday of Rome, 753 (Italy)

Parilia, in honor of the Pales (Roman Empire)

Tiradentes (Brazil)

Birthday of Ch'un T'i (China)

San Jacinto Day (TX)

(Photo credits: Chocolate-Covered Cashews, raw-cashew.com; Cashew truffles, learninghowtocook.com; The kindergarten by Hans Thoma was a German painte, artexpertswebsite.com; the Vitruvian Man (c. 1485) Accademia, Venice; John Muir in 1907, Wikipedia; Yellow Ribbon around a tree, endtimepilgrim.org; washing feet, turnbacktogod.com; Communion, greenopolis.com; tree planting in Kenya, kenyanclimateyouth.blogspot.com)