Home Care In Northford, CT

Patch and T-Mobile are partnering to shine a light on awesome moms in the North Branford area. Meet Shannon Mickelson!

NORTH BRANFORD, CT— Moms do so much for everyone around them. We try to celebrate them all year long, but Mother's Day is a perfect opportunity to shout it from the rooftops and post it on Patch: Mom rocks!

Here at Patch we've launched an initiative to help recognize the awesome moms and mom figures in communities like yours.

This submission comes from Payton who nominated Shannon Mickelson of North Branford.

What makes your Mom extra special?

I am writing this on behalf of my best friend as her two babies are still under 2. She goes above and beyond to make sure both her babies do everything possible between museums, and playgrounds, getting help with birth to 3, and planning every day to be fun but also educational. She fought hard for her infant son Wesley to get everything he needed even when multiple specialists couldn’t figure out what was wrong. She also still works, she’s a new modern mom, a stay-at-home working mom. She works while the kids sleep so she doesn’t take away from them. She goes above and beyond and will still help anyone including myself. She moved to Northford 9 months pregnant and got a house ready with a 1-year-old. She’s the best mom I have ever watched. I am a mom myself and have learned from her.

Why do you feel your Mom deserves the spotlight?

Shannon will do anything for anyone. She is always my go-to phone call when I need anything or just someone to talk to. Her kids have always been put first and she never gives up when it comes to getting them anything they need or really just want.

Happy Mother's Day to Shannon Mickelson, and thank you for all you do!

This content is brought to our community in partnership with T-Mobile.

Know an amazing mom? Nominate them here.

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Here are some pumpkin patches nearby to check out, and an easy how-to carve a jack-o'-lantern guide.

NORTH BRANFORD, CT —Signs of fall are everywhere, from cooler nights and turning leaves, to pumpkin spice lattes and other products, and a sea of orange pumpkins in front of the grocery store.

But maybe you want the real deal — an actual pumpkin — in your home this season. Whether you’re planning to bake a pie, carve a jack-o’-lantern or just add some festive flair to your stoop, there are plenty of places to pick up a pumpkin near North Branford.

Here are a few suggestions:

Find out what's happening in North Branfordwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Pumpkin. Unless you have a pumpkin-growing operation in the backyard, you'll need to pick out one you like from your local pumpkin patch or a store. Make sure it looks sturdy and clean. Remember, this is the pumpkin that will be front and center on the porch for the Halloween season.Curved boning knife, or serrated knife from the kitchen.Ice cream scooper or scraperPaperPencil or penCandle or battery-operated lightLighter

Steps

Cut it: If cutting from the top of the pumpkin, make sure to do it on an inward angle, so the top won't drop inside the pumpkin when you put it back on. Michael Natiello, creative director for The Great Jack-o'-Lantern Blaze, said it's better to cut the pumpkin from the bottom, in a series of pumpkin carving tips from Good Housekeeping. That helps prevent the sides from caving in later.

Gut it: Use the ice cream scoop, or your hands, to remove all the seeds and other debris from inside the pumpkin. Do a thorough cleaning and make sure nothing is left sticking to the sides.

Trace it: Draw your design on a piece of paper before putting it on the pumpkin itself. That way, it is easier to trace the design onto the pumpkin.

Make the cuts: Cut out the design. Natiello said to use a fork or pencil to poke holes around the lines. When cutting, get the big pieces of pumpkin out first and clean up the edges later.

Light it: Light the pumpkin with a battery-operated light or candle in a holder, place it in the pumpkin then admire your work.

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The company released details this week on which of its pharmacies would close following its Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing.

NORTH BRANFORD, CT — In the immediate aftermath of Rite Aid's Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing, the pharmacy giant announced it will not close its North Branford location.

The only Connecticut store that will close is in Bethel. The remainder of the chain's stores in Connecticut appears to have dodged a bullet, for the time being at least, including the North Branford store at 280 Branford Road.

Rite Aid has signaled no disruptions, closures or otherwise, for their 26 remaining Connecticut pharmacies located in Ansonia, Bridgeport, Brookfield, Cheshire, Danbury, East Haven, Fairfield, Milford, Monroe, Naugatuck, New Haven, North Branford, Northford, Norwalk, Ridgefield, Stamford, Stratford, Wallingford, Waterbury, West Haven and Wolcott.

Just about 7 percent of Rite Aid's 2,100-plus are being shuttered nationwide. People who work at the stores will also be transferred to other Rite Aid locations where possible, the company said. Another 210 sites went dark between January and the end of September.

Closures are concentrated in the Northeast and California, but can be found throughout the U.S. No exact closing dates have been made available.

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The company said it was making "very effort to ensure customers of impacted stores have access to health services, whether at another Rite Aid or a nearby pharmacy." Prescriptions for customers of the affected stores will be transferred to a nearby Rite Aid or other drug store “so that there is no disruption of service,” the company said in a statement.

On Sunday, Rite Aid said it had received a commitment for $3.45 billion in new financing from certain of its lenders. "This financing is expected to provide sufficient liquidity to support the Company throughout this process," according to the chain's statement. The company also plans to sell off Elixir Solutions, its prescription benefit provider subsidiary.

Rite Aid’s bankruptcy comes amid slumping sales and heavy debt from an opioid lawsuit filed by the Justice Department in March that accuses the company of filling prescriptions for large quantities of opioids “that had obvious, and often multiple, red flags indicating misuse.”

Other drug store chains, including rivals CVS and Walgreens, have settled similar lawsuits, but were better positioned financially. But even they are struggling and closing in a tough environment for national drug store chains as Amazon and big-box retailers like Walmart, Target, Costco and others make it more convenient to have prescriptions filled, CNN reported.

Losses that quarter are expected to be significantly higher than in the previous quarter, the company said. That’s on top of losses of about three quarters of a billion dollars for the year ended March 2023, and losses of $307 million from March to May, CNN reported.

with Patch editors Rich Kirby and RJ Scofield

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Several people reported seeing fireballs soar across the sky from Connecticut early on Sept. 22, according to the American Meteor Society, a nonprofit that tracks meteor sightings.

According to the reports, people spotted fireballs from West Hartford, Pomfret, Derby, Northford and Branford at around 3 a.m. EST. One resident captured video footage of a fireball in Northford, according to AMS.

"I was driving north about 65 mph, saw flash to my right, lasted about one second," a report from Derby reads.

"It was amazing to see," another report, from Pomfret, said.

AMS received similar reports from Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont. At Mount Washington Observatory in New Hampshire, a fireball was caught on camera moving north at around 3 a.m. on Friday. Boston residents also spotted a fireball at the same hour.

Fireballs are bright meteors that explode when they hit the Earth's atmosphere at high speeds, emitting a stream of light brighter than Venus, according to a NASA description.

The average magnitude of a fireball is -4, but they must be brighter than -6 to visible from the sky, AMS reports. Several thousand fireballs hit the Earth’s atmosphere every day, but many of them are concealed by daylight or occur in inhabited areas, according to AMS.

Josh Lake, the head of the science department at the Pomfret School in eastern Connecticut and the director of the school's Olmsted Observatory, said a person who reported seeing the fireball in Pomfret consulted him about the sighting. They didn't get footage of the fireball, but the visuals and timing matched the one in the video from Mount Washington, he said.

Lake believes it was an iron-nickel meteorite, which means it likely originated from the core of a large asteroid. These objects are very dense and hit the atmosphere at "tens of thousands of miles per hour," he said.

"It's stuff left over from the beginning of the solar system," he said. "So, when these objects hit Earth and we find them, you can actually date it to older than the entire Earth, which is wild."

There was no active meteor shower over the Northern Hemisphere on Friday, but the Orionids begin Sept. 26 and are set to peak mid-October.