Around Town

Did You Hear … ?

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Jeff Immelt, chairman of the board at General Electric and the company’s CEO (through next month), sold his New Canaan home for $4 million, according to a property transfer logged Wednesday at the Town Clerk’s office. He had purchased a new 10,000-square-foot Colonial on West Road in 2001. ***

A little dog who resides on Old Stamford Road got off-property when someone left a gate open and he found his way to Waveny Pool on a hot and humid day this week. The Havanese mix called ‘Pepe,’ approximately four years old, turned up at the town facility around 11:08 a.m. on Monday, June 19. The pool supervisor contacted police and an owner was located.

Around Town

New Canaan Women Launch, Expand Weekend Food Program for Kids

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New Canaan’s Shawnee Knight and Tina Kramer had been packing food for needy Stamford kids for some six months before they had a chance to meet, in person, the children and teens they’d been helping. The moment came during a special Christmas delivery. Knight and Kramer the summer prior had developed their model of giving under the national Blessings in a Backpack program. At Christmas, the pair arranged to deliver, themselves, special holiday backpacks for the 100 kids they served at Stamford’s Domus—kids on free or reduced lunch at a school that serves some of the city’s most at-risk youth. In those backpacks—themselves new and donated—the kids found not just food but also socks, ear buds, candy, nail polish and shampoo for the girls, Skittles, shampoo and conditioner, pancake mix and syrup.

Around Town

Q&A on Young Women’s League Annual Easter Egg Hunt

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Here’s something that doesn’t matter when you’re a kid looking for candy-filled Easter eggs: It’s raining outside. The Young Women’s League of New Canaan made accommodations for this icky weather by holding the Annual Easter Egg Hunt, at New Canaan High School. The event starts at 9:30 a.m today—Saturday, April 5—and benefits the Young Women’s League Giving Fund. NewCanaanite.com caught up with the organization’s president, Nicole Cribbins, to talk about the community event, the league’s work and the Giving Fund, specifically, and the critical importance of participation from our businesses. Sponsors for the Annual Easter Egg Hunt are Playland, Cobble Court Interiors, Bankwell, New Canaan Cleaners, Pepé Motors, Zumbach’s Gourmet Coffee and New Canaan Toy Store.

Business

New Canaan Teacher Turns Independent Style Consultant

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New Canaan resident Elizabeth Blanchard had been teaching professionally—at St. Luke’s School, Saxe Middle School, in Italy and finally at Stamford’s King Low Heywood Thomas—for more than a dozen years when she decided to make a career change for herself and her family. By January 2013, Blanchard already had spent a few years exploring a lifelong interest in style and fashion by hooking up with Stella and Dot accessories line. Doing trunk shows at private parties on the side while teaching middle school English at KLHT, Blanchard was surprised to find she had a knack for selling without pushing. Blanchard and her husband, Erick Galarreta, a personal banker at JP Morgan Chase in Stamford, were seeking some supplemental income, having recently moved out of her mother’s and on their own in New Canaan with one young son, and they wanted a second child.

Faces of New Canaan

Faces of New Canaan: Fatou Niang

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Since moving to New Canaan a decade ago, France native Fatou Niang has immersed herself in civic work through church and charitable organzations here, learned the nuances of American football— and learned to love it, though she worries about on-field collisions for her son, a New Canaan High School sophomore who plays JV and varsity—and started working as a Realtor, while finding an area nonprofit to which she feels deeply connected. During the 30 minutes or so that we talked at Dunkin Donuts on Elm Street (our interview is transcribed in full below), at least four passersby stopped to greet Niang and say hello. That makes her a wonderful candidate for this debut installment of “Faces of New Canaan.” In the feature, we talk to New Canaanites that—through often quiet or unnoticed work or other ways—make up the fabric of our town. Though they may look familiar to fellow New Canaanites, the individuals we profile in this feature are not known because they’re famous beyond New Canaan or prominent through high-profile jobs or elected office. It’s also a timely interview for Niang with respect to her involvement in a cherished nonprofit, Carver Center.