Gingerbread Exhibit & Contest

The Erie Canal Museum is offering some sweet real estate. There are over 30 home made gingerbread houses on display at the Museum for the 24th Annual Gingerbread gallery. The museum transforms the gallery into an 1800's street scene with the gingerbread houses in storefront windows.

In order to participate, bakers must create the houses with edible food. The museum hosts two competitions, the People's Choice Award where visitors can vote on their favorite house and a confectionary competition. With a $25 entry fee, competitors can enter the confectionary contest and have the chance to win $150-500 prize money. Judges critique the houses on originality and creativity and vote by the first week of December.

Expect to see the winners announced on the Erie Canal Museum's website The gingerbread gallery ends January 3rd and houses will then be donated to local libraries or nursing homes.

Gingerbread Exhibit Brings Holiday Cheer

The 24th Annual Gingerbread Exhibit at the Erie Canal Museum in Downtown Syracuse is now on display. The creations create a boom in business for the museum, who sees 5000 visitors including 20-25 school groups in the month of December.

There are multiple categories of gingerbread creations and designers don't have to stick to just house-like structures. Some of the pieces exhibited include Santa Claus, carousels, the Wizard of Oz, Rapunzel and Noah's Ark.

Yesterday a 24-year veteran of the exhibit named Margaret Solomon was at the museum. She votes for her favorite creation every year and told me that each season the exhibit gets more and more impressive. This year, as in some years past, she voted for a white church.

Anyone can enter a gingerbread creation in the contest. Solomon said she always thinks about it but becomes intimidated by what she calls the "fabulous" decorations. Voting takes place through this week and winners have ribbons placed in their cases for the remaining duration of the exhibit.

MacPherson talks about Hall of Fame

Former Syracuse University Head Coach Dick MacPherson is headed to the Hall of Fame. MacPherson will be inducted in New York this Tuesday, and he spoke in Syracuse today.

"There are less than 1,000 players in the college football Hall of Fame and less than 100 coaches," MacPherson said. "So to say that I'm overwhelmed...believe me, I'm overwhelmed."

MacPherson coached for both Syracuse and the University of Massachusetts, compiling a 111-73-5 record at the helms. 66 of those wins came in Orange, including 11 in the 1987 undefeated campaign.

""[I left] a better program here then when I came and I think that’s what people kinda like about me,"MacPherson notes.

Coach Mac left Syracuse after the 1990 season to coach the New England Patriots for two years. He returned to the hill ten years later to start working as an analyst on the Syracuse radio network.

"His influence and presence around is phenomenal. Its like having an emeritus professor," said Syracuse Athletic Director Daryl Gross. "To have Coach Mac there for the broadcasts, to have him around the team, around our coaches, to have him around our administration has been outstanding for us."

The former College Football Coach of the Year will become the 17th person with Syracuse ties to make the Hall. He follows one year after his former quarterback Don McPherson was enshrined last fall.

CNY Residents Enjoy Warm Weather Late in 2009

Syracuse has broken it's own record for snow--but not because of how much snow has fallen. The city has not received a full inch of snow in 281 days. That breaks the record set back in 1946 of 276 days. Snow is expected later this week around Central New York, but the warm weather today encouraged residents to get out and be active.

At Onondaga Lake Park, there were joggers, walkers, bikers, rollerbladers and even a few boaters out on the water. One couple came to walk because of, "The sunshine. Whenever it gets sunny out, I want to take the opportunity to go for a walk. It doesn't happen often."

Other walkers out on the Lakeside Trail said they just like to come out for exercise and to enjoy the scenery. 

Although the warm weather may not last too much longer, some say they stay closer to their houses once the snow starts to fall, or head indoors to places like the Carousel Mall to be able to get in a walk during the day.

Even the Canadian Geese were still hanging around, just waiting for the time when they'll make their trip South. The snow is coming, it just seems to be a matter of when.

Tis The Season

Many people begin to prepare for the Christmas season right after Thanksgiving, but for Critz Farm in Cazenovia, they prepare for the holiday all year round. The Christmas tree growing process is constant; Once a tree is cut, a seedling will be planted in the spring to make sure there will be just as many to sell next year. In order to do this, Critz Farms will harvest over 5,000 trees in one year.

Finding the perfect Christmas tree has become a holiday ritual and a tradition for many families.

"They always say beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and I truly believe it," says Patrick Allen, an employee. But the perfect tree, technically, he says, should have a full bottom, a cone shape, and a good top.

This year for Halloween, pumpkin sales were down from last year due to the economy. However, Critz Farms says they haven't experienced any lower sales as of yet, and they don't think they will. A Christmas tree is different than a pumpkin, according to Allen, "It really warms up the season, it is tradition."

Customers can cut down their own tree from one of the 45,000 they have to choose from in their fields. They can also choose to buy a pre-cut tree or a wreath. Critz Farms' business stretches much farther than Onondaga County. Not only do they sell their trees to other wholesalers locally, but also to cities as far away as New York and Boston.

On December 26th, when Christmas is over and no more trees are being sold, Critz will take the left over trees to local zoos in order to feed their animals.

Christmas trees are not the only thing Critz's grows. They have truly become an "agri-tourism business" says Allen. Their products include, fruit, vegetables, pumpkins, apples, cider. There is no time to wait after Christmas because every spring they make fresh maple syrup from their own sugarbush.

"We prepare for the best of days and hope for the best," says Allen. Critz Farm can have up to 8,000 visitors a weekend.

A Change to December Brings New Challenges for Local Charity Auction

The annual Syracuse University Sport Management Club Charity Sports Auction has raised $75,000 over the past four years, but, due to low attendance numbers over the years, the event is changing to a December date in order to combine with this Saturday's Syracuse men's basketball game against Maine.



The change hasn't been easy though.


According to the club's Auction Chair, Kate Futrell, who is also on the club's Board of Directors, Sport Management Club members and volunteers have had four less months to get auction items.



Little logistic issues including not having enough lanyards for event-day credentials and not having more than two typewriters to type up individual bid sheets for the more than 300 auctions items have slowed preparations down.



With four days to go until the auction, the main problem Futrell says is that there are still many auction items that need to be inventoried, labeled and packaged.



Futrell went on to discuss a bright side about this year's auction, that it has some "unmatched" items up for auction, including a Hank Aaron rookie card.



For more on the auction and what the change to a December date has brought to the auction's volunteers, watch the full story that NCC New's Devon Heinen filed.

SU Unveils Green Data Center

Syracuse University unveiled a new, state of the art, green data center today after only six months of construction. It's where the school houses all the servers that run its computer network. SU Vice Chancellor and Provost Eric Spina says the facility is "the most efficient data center in the world."
The center is the collaboration of SU, IBM and New York State. The plan was to minimize the energy consumption of data centers - something vital in today's computing world.

"So the national problem that we chose was the rocketing amount of heat and energy associated with running data centers, something that's crippling businesses today," said Vijay Lund VP Operations and Systems at IBM.
Server systems holding data for the entire SU campus not only use energy but give off heat. If that heat can be recycled the energy that creates it can be saved.
The event Wednesday gave IBM a chance to show off it's new, energy efficient servers and computer-cooling technology and system management software.
New York State poured $2 million into this green data center. One of the green features are these liquid cooled doors that basically act like a car radiator using water to take heat away from the servers inside.
"Data centers right now use approximately 1.5% of all the electricity generated in the United States. And in the current trends of energy use it's expected to double in the next three to five years," said Frank Murray, President and CEO New York State Energy Research and Development Agency (NYSERDA).
The center is set to be fully operational in January and IBM plans to use it as a model of the future data centers. Perhaps the most innovative design feature is how the facility uses excess heat to heat the building environment.
The place generates its own power and can even send unused energy to the grid. The total price tag for the facility was over 12 million dollars. The center will use half the energy of a typical data center but SU officials have not said how long the center must be in operation for the cost to be worth it.