Special Observances: April 3 - April 9

April 3: Find a Rainbow Day

This special day was created to celebrate the beauty and wonder of the natural world. It's a chance to get outside, explore nature, and look for those colorful arcs in the sky.

April 3: International Carrot Day

The first annual celebration of this vibrant root occurred in the year 2003 with the pure intention of celebrating the staple salad ingredient. As of now, celebrations have been reported to occur in France, Italy, Sweden, Russia, Australia, Japan, and the U.K. Carrots are a rather hearty plant that can grow in many diverse conditions, though they typically come into harvest in the summer and fall. Be the first one on your floor to have a Carrot Party! (Hint for next year: National Carrot Cake Day is February 3.)

April 5: National Dandelion Day

On April 5, Dandelion Day, celebrate the benefits and beauty of this perennial plant many consider a weed. These beautiful flowers have not only been used as bouquets for mom and crowns for children, but have a long medicinal and edible history. In the early springtime, pollinators thrive on dandelions. The name dandelion comes from the French “dent de lion” meaning lion’s tooth, referring to the leaves with their jagged tooth-like edges.

April 6: National Teflon Day

National Teflon Day on April 6 each year honors the accidental invention of Teflon on April 6, 1938, by Dr. Roy Plunkett. While working in the E. I. du Pont de Nemours lab that April day, Plunkett and his assistant accidentally discovered polytetrafluoroethylene. Chemours registered the Teflon trademark in 1945. In 1985, the Inventors’ Hall of Fame inducted Dr. Plunkett into its numbers. 

April 7: International Snailpapers Day

International Snailpapers Day is celebrated on April 7. Snailpapers are newspapers. The term stems from a post that is written on a piece of paper and carried from one location to another as snail mail. International Snailpapers Day honors the good old days when printed newspapers were important before they were surpassed by internet editions. 

April 8: Draw a Bird Day

Draw Bird Day originated in 1943. It is said that 7-year-old Dorie Cooper visited her uncle at the hospital in the U.K. He had been wounded in the war. When Dorie came to the hospital, she asked her uncle to draw a bird to cheer him up. After seeing her uncle’s picture, she started laughing and exclaimed that he was not a good artist. Although the picture of her uncle was not very good, she hung it in her room, which lifted her uncle’s spirits mightily. Every time Dorie came to visit her uncle thereafter, other wounded soldiers also had their day brightened by the event and held drawing contests to see who could produce the best bird pictures. The entire ward’s walls were decorated with bird drawings within several months.

 

Three years later, Dorie was killed in a car accident. Her coffin was full of bird drawings made by soldiers, nurses, and doctors from the war. Draw a Bird Day is celebrated to express joy in the simplest of things in life and as a way to help soldiers to forget the war at least for a short time. Dorie helped her uncle to forget the war by something as simple as drawing birds.

April 9: National Name Yourself Day

National Name Yourself Day on April 9 each year proposes one day a year to reinvent our names. If you have ever wondered what it would be like to have a different name, this would be the day to find out. Whether you like your name or not, this day is about having fun with a different name. So, ignore your Kendal name tag. Slap a new name on your chest and wear it with pride.