The Friends of Tietze Park Foundation received an undisclosed donation from Nerf after it shot a national television commercials at the park. The money will help pay for upcoming projects, including the installation of pet waste bags, shading on the playground and a new flagpole.

Actor Mario Lopez visited the Boys & Girls Club of Greater East Dallas in December to talk about the importance of health and fitness.

Many Dallas cyclists stick to the trail system, which has both advantages and challenges. In this video, Hollywood Heights resident and Pulitzer Prize winning photojournalist David Leeson takes us on a bicycle ride through the newest stretch, the Santa Fe Trail, which connects at the southern tip of White Rock Lake. The cover story of our March 2012 issue looks at new developments in our neighborhood’s bicycle culture.

Only 50 tickets are being sold for Promise of Peace Community Garden’s farm-to-table brunch March 4 at Sundown at Granada.

Chefs Rolo Cantu, Marc Cassel, Billy Cooper, Suzanne Fries and Patrick Stark will prepare a five-course meal. A silent auction starts at 10:30 a.m., and brunch is from 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Greenling is donating local produce.

Tickets are still available. They cost $60 each and include brunch, a cocktail and gratuity.

Promise of Peace, at 7446 East Grand, invites students from Mata Elementary and other neighborhood schools to learn about gardening, cooking and healthy eating.

Johnny Cash, Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins are the dream team in Million Dollar Quartet at Music Hall at Fair Park.

Ladies, if you’ve always regretted your lack of a pageant crown, know this — as long as you’re alive and able to perform on stage (sing, dance, tell jokes…), it’s not too late.

The Ms. Texas Senior America Pageant is accepting applications for the August 11 2012 Ms. Texas Senior competition.

The pageant will be held in Frisco, TX, but a couple of well-known Dallasites are involved. Rose-Mary Rumbley, who has written and spoken extensively about Dallas history, will emcee the event along with former sportscaster Scott Murray. Rumbly’s daughter, Jill Beam (who also works for the City of Dallas in the Park Department) is directing the show.

A few things about the pageant:

It’s not a beauty pageant, but an event to “champion the dignity, maturity and inner beauty of all senior women.”

The contestants are judged on:

Philosophy of life, interview with judges, evening-gown poise and grace, and talent.

For more information call Mary Francis Hansen at 972.334.0000.

That's not really him. Is it? Kind of looks like him.

We figured a beer company might come through, but in the end, it was Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban who saved the day. Cuban donated enough money to the Greenville Avenue Area Business Association to produce the St. Patrick’s Day Parade Saturday, March 17.

The association announced last week it was short about $40,000 and was asking the community for donations to produce the parade.

Cuban made an additional donation to the association’s scholarship fund. He did this on behalf of his company, filesanywhere.com.

We Advocate editors love nothing more than seeing people’s pets in clothes. For proof, look no further than the cover of our September pets issue at left.

The East Lake Pet Orphanage every year feeds our appetite for seeing helpless animals dressed up like awkward dolls. Its annual fundraiser, Wine on the Roof, features a pet fashion show. They even put cats in clothes and walk them down the runway. While we are drinking wine.

The nonprofit is looking for pets to torment for its annual pet fashion show in May. This model search is a fundraiser too. It costs $15 to register your pet for the casting call at 2 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 26. Email Jeannie at jeannie@chopf.com to reserve a spot. They will choose 19 pets for the fashion show.Winners also will receive professional pet portraits, and their owners are eligible for half-price tickets to Wine on the Roof.

Vapiano restaurant is hosting Pasta Helping People Thursday, but they’re flexible. They’ll let you order their delicious pizza, salads or panini and still help others in need. The Mockingbird Station restaurant is kicking back 10% of your total bill all day to support the Wesley-Rankin Community Center.

Wesley-Rankin serves the diverse West Dallas community, providing a wide variety of programming for children, youth, adults and families. For more than 75 years they’ve offered a loving, supportive alternative to a street-life of crime, poverty and despair.

Vapiano will host live music for the special event, and the offer is good for lunch or dinner from 10am to 10pm. You can dine on the bright, airy restaurant side with big picture windows allowing a view of progress on the Bush Library, or you can lounge in the hip bar area on cushy red couches while watching sports on the big screen. Either way, be sure to mention Wesley-Rankin when you pay.

A production company made a donation to the Friends of Tietze Park Foundation because it filmed some Nerf commercials in the park. The group’s president, Lisa Marshall, declined to say how much the park received, but she said it will help pay for planned projects, such as installing pet waste bags at the park entrance, shade structures for the playground and a new flag pole.

Here is one of the spots:

The future of the Tietze Park pool is something to keep on our radars over the next few months.

The park board is considering a new aquatics plan that would add pools on the outskirts of the city but close some existing pools in the inner city. That plan could be unlikely to pass all on its own, however, because it has a $44 million price tag.