Sunnyside Family Swap Shop and Play Space » Post Tag: swap shop

Know Your Neighbor – Reunion Apparel

Karen Hery — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 19:33:35 +0000

When I last wrote about Reunion Apparel Resale in November, Tara and Will were just getting started as young business owners taking on the Portland clothing scene. I’m grateful for their sponsorship of our Roost program and more than happy to spread the word every few months about their hidden little gem of a place near Buckman School.

As you travel down Belmont and it splits in to two one way streets, keep an eye out as you pass 18th street towards downtown. If you blink, you’ll miss the simple black and white sign one shop in from the corner of Morrison on 18th.

If you do find your way there, you’ll be walking into a sweet and eclectic collection of clothing treasures at great prices. When a shop is this small, every piece counts and it’s all about really unique, comfortable and vintage bits of bygone eras.

We may all have to work to find them, but that also means that the rent is low and the prices affordable (while they can still afford to make a living). Every item I’ve fallen in love with so far was less than $20 for great quality clothing that I really love.

Everything started on ETSY for them before they opened a retail shop and you can still read this post at midnight, hop on their ETSY shop www.etsy.com/shop/ReunionShop or the shop-on-line section of their web site and live local on your own schedule.

I have to confess, I’m no good at shopping on line. Gotta see it to really want it.

Truth be told, Will and Tara know they can make more profit just selling on ETSY alone without a storefront, but seeing people get all jazzed about the clothing they are recirculating is half the fun and the most gratifying part of what they do.

If the most gratifying piece for you – when you part with your hard earned dollars – is knowing that you’re helping the fabric of our local economy go full circle . . . please add Reunion Apparel to your circle of clothing resources.

Will does the clothes sourcing too so it’s not just a women’s boutique. If you’ve got a style of guy wear that really suits you, let him know what it is and he’ll probably be able to keep you in great threads all year long.

Brings new meaning to the idea of personal shopper, now doesn’t it?

Know Your Neighbor – Hankins True Value Hardware

Karen Hery — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 17:46:55 +0000

Too late to run to the hardware store tonight, but if something started dripping, seeping or leaking around your house during this last bout of snow and rain, you may be happy to know what I found out from Lois Hankins (long time owner of Hankins True Value Hardware store on Hawthorne and MLK) this week. . .

Yes, it is a lot easier to stop a leak before it starts but once it starts, it’s good to know I won’t always have to wait until everything dries out to address the new, fantastically inconvenient problem that greets me when I come home from a long day or wake up to when I have plenty of other plans for my morning.

Believe it or not, there is a sealing paint to apply while those walls are actively seeping moisture and a hydraulic cement that you can push right into an active, even gushing, wet spot.

I’m not really sure who thought building so many houses with basements was such a good idea in this climate, but Lois also has all sorts of solutions for bringing rain gutter water much farther from your house before it starts seeking a way underground (and the patience to walk around with you picking out the things that will work best for what you need to do).

I don’t know how your place is faring but this is the rain storm that helped Scott and I discover that the “drain” at the bottom of our cement steps leading down to our outside basement door isn’t really a drain connected to the sewer system. Most likely it’s a very short pipe leading to a drain field that has gotten plenty overwhelmed and it’s only January. It’s not just refusing to drain but has become a really effective conduit for water to come back up and seek a level field in among the stuff stacked in our basement.

Sigh.

If you, like us, are seeking a wet/dry shop vac, call Lois and her staff before you come over. True Value put the $120 model on special for less than $50. She has sold them all and is back ordered until later this week but what she gets in soon will still be a great bargain if you can wait.

The real bargain is people that answer the phone and give great advice, a quick stop close by for most of the things we might need and an order and pick up (with no shipping cost) for the big stuff.

Thank you, Lois, for being a Roost sponsor (she has a soft spot for our teens having helped two grand kids through Sunnyside Environmental School) and a big thank you to all our swap shop members for giving support to great local businesses.

Lots of great, local, community businesses on our web site www.sunnysideswapshop.org and our favorite hardware store at:

Hankins True Value Hardware Store

1720 SE Hawthorne Blvd

M-F: 8:00 AM – 6:00 PM; Sat: 8:30 AM – 6:00 PM; Sun: 10:00 AM – 4:00 PM

Second location: 3942 NE M L King Blvd

To call ahead and see if they have what you need: 503-236-2372

On line ordering: http://ww3.truevalue.com/hankinshawthorne/Home.aspx

FYI: When I checked on line, the print-out coupon was buy one get one free deal for getting keys made.

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Know Your Neighbor – Cold weather car care with Hawthorne Auto Clinic

Karen Hery — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 21:05:19 +0000

What better day to be talking about cold weather car care than the first snowy morning of the season.

Liz and Jim at Hawthorne Auto Clinic are two of my favorite role models for how to run a business and how to take care of a car. I’ll brag about how well they take care of their employees and their shop and their little part of Hawthorne in the 40′s at the end of this email but first and foremost . . . let’s get everybody in and out of our cars in great working order in a cold snap.

If the prudent advice to just stay home (or where ever you are) and enjoy the snow flakes that have already fallen isn’t practical for you, there are a few things to do to save yourself from breaking a key in a lock, wrecking the motor for your windshield wipers or lurching down the road with half frosted windows and flapping chains.

Liz’s first piece of advice seemed so nice and logical but it’s exactly the kind of thing I would do without thinking . . . when the air gets below freezing, she just wants to remind everyone not to hop in the car and turn the windshield wipers on to clear the frost off.

She and Jim like seeing us all of us in their shop but not just because the linkage has broken in our wipers or we’ve burned the wiper motor out. A gentle pull from the blades from outside before you get in will let you know if they are frozen in place or ready to slide.

Her second tip is to be proactive about the chances of car locks getting water in them in Portland rainy weather and then freezing so the key won’t go in or won’t turn.

You can always heat up the key some how with the hope that it will melt through the ice or you could get a long extension cord on that blow dryer and hover it over the lock. Even better to go out to an auto store or well stocked general store and get a little tube of lock de-icer. That way you can put some liquid in on a good day so that it doesn’t freeze up as easily to help keep the water out that could cause a bunch of grief later. Liz keeps tubes of the de-icer for sale if you ask at their counter since she recommended it so much in years past to stranded customers.

And then there’s the simple fact that our cars do a whole lot better with the right kind of engine coolant and windshield washer fluid with some antifreeze built in. Motor oil thickens up in the cold so having the right (ideally synthetic) motor oil is more important for those really cold starts too.

A lot of cars, especially if you plan to do some ski trips or snow trips this year, can benefit from a set of winter wiper blades that are sealed off with rubberized material where regular blades have exposed arched metal that catches too much snow to operate well.

So, if you are due for an oil change anyway, you may want to join me in skipping the quick stop oil change place and make yourself an appointment at Hawthorne Auto Clinic or another full service shop instead.

There won’t be anyone standing outside waving a $10 off today sign in the bitter cold, but the extra money we each spend could find and fix a few weak spots we all want to plan ahead for instead of live through on the way to Mt Hood or grandma’s house.

Oil changes with a full car inspection at Hawthorne Auto Clinic are $65 to $125 depending on the model of car and quarts of oil needed.

Last year I drove my Toyota Sienna into their parking lot right before a big road trip for that oil change, all the right winter coolants, a pre-road trip inspection and a touch of the de-icer in my locks and went on to have a great season of cold weather driving.

If you manage to avoid driving in this storm, Liz highly, highly recommends picking a reasonably warm, sunny afternoon for some practice runs with your car chains before attempting to keep a few kids happy in the back seat and your adult partnership intact while installing them for the first time on the side of a busy road.

One of our members wrote in last year to share some East Coast cold weather survival tips.   When you have the chance to plan ahead, put a sunshade, piece of cardboard or old comforter on the outside of your windshield then simply remove the ice or snow with the covering in the morning- no scraping necessary. And for your locks, cover one lock with duck tape and simply remove it and your key should work, if there was no water to freeze.

The folks at Hawthorne Auto Clinic tried to explain to me the difference between defrosting and de fogging and when to use outside air and when to use recirculated air to help clear windows when a warm car full of people meets a cold car on the move. But, I must confess, I still don’t get it.   So, if anyone reading this has a good way to remember which is needed when, please let the rest of us know.

The bottom line is . . . if your car is a 1990 or newer model and you appreciate a clean, well run shop with staff more interested in knowing you for years than squeezing every dime out of you today, give Liz and Jim a call. They’ll be happy to hear from you. If you need a list of other places you can trust for body work, tire alignment, etc, they’ll share the names with you of all the places they do business with when they send out work to other shops.

One of these days, when I don’t have so many cold car tips to share, I’ll write about the start of their shop which is a really dear story. For now I’ll just say it comes as no surprise to me that they recently were named Civics Rights Champions of the year by the Labor Commission.

Jim and Liz know in their heart of hearts that well treated, well paid employees actually cost a company less (and earn it more) than any short cuts we could all take in the ways we treat each other.

Since we are a co-op full of families that live out the fact that the way we treat each other makes our lives and the lives of our children all that much better, I am proud to count these great business owners as co-workers in our community building efforts.

Hawthorne Auto Clinic is at 4307 SE Hawthorne Blvd open Mon-Fri, 7:30 AM to 6 PM (Early drop-off & after-hours pickup available)   Call (503)234-2119 to make an appointment.

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Know Your Neighbor – Good health with a little help from my friends

scott — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 05:31:28 +0000

I don’t know which is more common: making New Year’s resolutions or breaking them. When I look back at the major changes I’ve been able to make over the years, every success I’ve had has been with some really key support along the way.

Let’s face it, if we could easily make the change we need all on our own . . . we already would have done it.

So I rely on friends to see me through. I think most of you reading this could agree that I have a very broad definition of friend which has served me well and I hope, by the end of this email, will be serving you well too.

In the eat better, exercise more, hurt less and enjoy our lives to the fullest effort, there are no shortage of ways to get there . . . just a shortage of hours in the day and dollars in the bank to help get us there.

Whether you need an affordable place to work out, massage, accupuncture and medical care that is as effective as it is frugal, a great source for healthy food that stretches your food budget, or even a path to fertility that doesn’t match up with college tuitions . . . this is a well rounded list of Roost Sponsors who have become great friends along the way for many of us.

I’ve enjoyed celebrating the one year anniversary with Dan Caplan, the man behind our super local health club, the Green Micro Gym. Tucked between the Side Street Tavern and a little clothing store just off Belmont on 34th, his main floor of weight machines and loft full of cardio equipment is in it’s second winter. Everything’s going great and, thankfully, still not crowded even in the peak of the January exercise fever.

There is no slick advertising campaign going on to drive up the cost for those of us already lifting, spinning and treading. Sponsoring teens at The Roost and good old fashion word of mouth is all Dan has used to fill this “club for the rest of us” as he likes to call it. This is a get right to business gym. He knows we don’t have all afternoon or evening to socialize at our health club like we maybe used to B.K. (before kids). This is the kind of place you can come and go at your own pace with great support from him as the owner and a long time personal trainer.

Want to see a certain piece of equipment added to the mix . . . ask. Need to adjust your workout to some new needs you didn’t used to have, he’ll understand and have suggestions. If you need a personal trainer to stay motivated- there are five great ones to chose from and surely one who is going to be a good match for you.

The $100 joining fee can be shared by two people (paying on the same card) and monthly contributions are $36 for one person, $66 for two. Tread around long enough on the cardio equipment (most of which feeds electricity back into the grid) and you can earn some of that back in $10 gift certificates (no additional purchase necessary) for some great businesses on or near Belmont.

My only request is that you stay off the rowing machine while I’m there because our Roost sponsor masseuse, Dana Buhl, and I fight over it every time we get there at the same time. But the nice thing about our tug-of-war is . . . when Dan isn’t there to show me how to best row . . . Dana is. She’s been my “body mechanic” for several years now. If you need someone to really listen to what hurts and gently get you back to a better place, I can’t think of a better person to recommend. She has discounted rates for Swap Shop families and for anyone who walks or rides to her top of the Victorian house studio on 30th between Belmont and Hawthorne. If our current weather pattern holds, you might even get some vitamin D on the way.

If you time it all just right, you can get out of your massage appointment and just keep walking to Brion Oliver’s front porch on Salmon and 24th to pick up your monthly assortment of well sourced organic food at better than grocery store prices. Anybody reading this who is guilty of bad snacking habits (like me) may find that Our Community Pantry food orders are a great cure for bad calories. Brion takes the time to figure out where the freshest organic nuts, dried fruits, easy grains, quick snacks of seaweed and more are all around the planet and goes out of his way to support local providers and vendors. The locally made ready-to-eat beans are my favorite – heated up faster than kids can start whining and one of the quickest, healthiest lunches I eat. They are available weekly and the rest once a month in quantities you can munch on all month long and still have a few bites left by the time his next email comes in to remind you it’s order time again.

We have Brion’s passion for well sourced food to thank for the fact that our money is going more directly to small growers and producers, less to buidings, overhead and food conglomerates so you can get better food from well treated people at lower costs. If you are ready to give something new a try, On-line orders for this month are due by noon this upcoming Friday. Whether you delight in good food stewardship or just need to get business done . . .it’s shopping you can do from your computer late at night and a bag of groceries you can pick up with your kids still in the car.

Sometimes a good workout, a paid or gifted massage and some healthy food just aren’t enough. The fear of a down-the-road trip to the ER or even the cost of a basic doctor’s visit to sort it all out is financially daunting. The most accessible and flexible option I’ve found for everything from that issue that just cropped up to the really chronic stuff is the combination of services at The Herb Shoppe on Hawthorne. If this is the year that you are determined to grow your own knowledge of herbs for you and your family, hop on line to find out about their free evening lectures that go on almost every week in the back of the shop.

For what ever ails you, just 5 minutes talking to their staff in person or on the phone and you can have options for all sorts of medicinal teas, tinctures, salves and capsules patiently prepared - not only for your unique symptoms but also for the most likely ways for you to take your medicine. Dr. JJ Purcell and our own co-op member Dr. Jeniffer Curtiss are full service medical providers with traditional and alternative forms of treatment to offer in full hour appointments (not 15 minute fly bys) for very reasonable rates.

Sometimes we need something so unique, we don’t even know where to start looking. Whether the word fertility inspires you to read on or makes you think the next paragraph coming up is not for you . . . there is one thing for all of us in the description below for co-op member Reyni Racklin’s upcoming fertility yoga series. Just take the words yoga, fertility and reproduction out of her class description, insert you most pressing life issue instead and ask yourself how many of the things being offered would make a difference in your life. In our most trying times we aren’t so sure someone else will really understand and we can’t always see how a journal page or a bit of seaweed or that weird funky stretch or a room full of other people chatting is going make it all better. The best thing I’ve learned to do is try something new each year long enough for it to sink in and shift my life around.

So here is is . . . the fertility yoga class description for a March – April class. May you find your next life step in it. . .

Yoga can be a powerful and transformative practice. Whether you are trying to conceive naturally, through Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART), or with the assistance of third party reproduction, this six week series will support you physically, emotionally, and spiritually along your path. The benefits of yoga for fertility include: stress reduction, increased blood flow to the reproductive organs; energy, hormone, and mood balancing; release of emotional tensions and toxins, and social support. We will come together using asanas (poses), breath work, meditation, journaling, and art to create a safe and nurturing space for healing and fertility enhancement. Please bring a journal or notebook to the first class. Art supplies will be provided.

If you are curious about fertility yoga, you can find Reyni to ask her about it at our monthly general co-op yoga class this Friday 11:15-12:15 in the parlor room down the hall from the swap shop or read about registration at PureHeart Yoga. All our other health enhancing sponsors are listed below and on our web site: www.sunnysideswapshop.org

May 2012 be a year of health and balance and (for the sustainability of our co-op) lots of fertility.

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The Herb Shoppe:
3327 SE Hawthorne Blvd. Portland, OR 97214
503-234-7801
theherbshoppe©gmail•com (theherbshoppe©gmail•com)

Shop hours:
Monday-Friday 11-7pm, Saturday 10-6pm
Sunday 12-5pmDoctor’s visits by appointment.

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Our Community Pantry
Real Food Purchased Together
www.ourcommunitypantry.com for orders by this Friday at noon
brion©ourcommunitypantry•com (brion©ourcommunitypantry•com) for getting on the email newsletter list

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Dana Buhl, LMT
1128 SE 30th Ave. (just 5 blocks from the Swap Shop)

(503) 807 6697

danabuhl©gmail•com (danabuhl©gmail•com)

Dana has afternoon and evening appointments on Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays.
Morning and afternoon appointments are available on Fridays.

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The Green Microgym
Daniel Caplan
828 SE 34th Avenue, Suite B

http://belmontpdx.thegreenmicrogym.com
dan©thegreenmicrogym•com (dan©thegreenmicrogym•com)
(503) 313-6216

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Know Your Neighbors – Schools and Classes

Karen Hery — Sun, 31 Jul 2011 19:13:44 +0000

Whether you have a one year old or a fourteen year old, like the idea of circus skills for fun or Saturday school for better academics, this swap shop post about schools and classes connects you with our neighbors that make it their passion to steward our kids in a lifetime love of learning.

If your first child isn’t out of diapers yet, dive in to the first few paragraphs below for opportunities you may not have realized existed for you and your little one. If preschool is on the horizon for you or the center of your world, skip down just a bit to hear about 3 and 4 year old programs.

And for everyone who cares about learning second (or third languages) or the fine art of juggling and trapeze, swing on down to the end of this post.

UNDER THREE AND HAPPY TO BE: It’s common to think of preschool starting at 3 years old but it starts even earlier than that at Wren’s Nest just three blocks from the Swap Shop. Not yet two year olds through 5 year olds thrive in the Montessori School Environment stewarded by Michelle La Follette. It’s a great break for parents and beautiful progression to healthy independence for the toddlers and preschoolers that weave their way through “work” time and play time indoors and out in a family home setting.

Programs like this including children under three are rare and all her spots for her youngest kids are full right now. Just check in with her now and then at 503-235-0093 or vassarlearningcenter©yahoo•com (vassarlearningcenter©yahoo•com) to see when a space opens up if you are interested and your child is under three. Spaces are available for the fall for 3-5 year olds.

PARENT AND ME CIRCUS ARTS CLASSES WITH DO JUMP: The fall schedule has been posted for Do Jump which includes a class I wish I could have taken with my children when they were babies and toddlers. You and your child get on the trapeze together (best swing in town) in baby circus classes for kids one and a half and older (up to 3 ½). There are morning classes on Wednesdays and weekend classes for working families too at their Echo Theater location off Hawthorne. Discounts available for active swap shop families.

EMILY ALEXANDER’S PRESCHOOL OF THE ARTS: You don’t have to wait until the fall to begin or add to your child’s preschool experiences. Both Wren’s Nest and Emily Alexander’s Preschool of the Arts (at 14^th and Hawthorne) run year round. Emily has a few spaces still open this summer. Signing up for a few days a week for the rest of the summer or one of her week long camps is a great way to ease the transition to school in the fall. She is already close to full for the fall so won’t be holding an open house but you can call for your own tour. Emily draws on all the great talent in Portland to bring performing arts and visual arts to her preschool space which looks just like an artist’s studio and can be rented for birthday parties (great for early elementary kids too.) This is the first year she will have both morning and afternoon preschool sessions available – you choose one or the other – it is not a full day program.

LANGUAGE IMMERSION OPPORTUNITIES: Young minds learn languages differently and more easily than teens or adults. If you have a second language already in your family you’d like to see supported or know that some exposure to at least one more language is valuable to you and your kids, we have many great opportunities in our connections as a co-op. The closure of a French Immersion school gave us a beautiful opportunity this summer to hear French spoken in part of June and all through July. The International Leadership Academy concluded their summer camp program last week and is concentrating on the opening of their school for preschoolers through elementary in Lake Oswego with information nights every Thursday 6:30-8:30 at their new school location.

A split in the German American Society has inspired the formation of a new German Saturday School that our Roost sponsor, Bea Weiss-Kruel, Attorney at Law, is involved in. For now, you’ll need to drive to Beaverton to participate in Sophie Scholl Schule but they are looking for a Southeast annex to their program. You can contact the director, Dr. Lynn Reis, email:SchollSchule©gmail•com (SchollSchule©gmail•com)
phone: 971-217-7212 if you are interested in seeing more German opportunities in and around the Swap Shop. I was impressed with how affordable the program is for all the time and attention your 3 year old or older student receives every Saturday – $495 for the year plus 5 parent hours helping out the school. A real bargain if you divide it into the weeks of the year. The school is set to start on October 1st. Classes are from 10:00am until 12:30pm.

Co-op member, Jasmeen Hanoosh, is ready to restart the Arabic classes she offered this summer as soon as there are a group of parents that can commit to a time for 4-7 year olds to gather and learn the Arabic alphabet and language sounds. If you are interested and haven’t already contacted her or have contacted her but want to let her know you are still interested: yasmeensh©yahoo•com (yasmeensh©yahoo•com) 971-270-6574.

KIDS OF ALL AGES (and Adults too): If you are already a Do Jump fan, this is your reminder that the fall schedule is posted and registration has begun. If you have a little monkey who climbs the walls in even the best of weather or missed your own opportunity to run off with the circus before you had kids, now is your chance to sign everyone up to swing, juggle, flip and flop your way to creative expression. Do Jump teachers steward 1 year olds to 99 year olds through all sorts of interesting moves most every morning, afternoon and evening at the Echo Theatre off Hawthorne and in the same gym that we use above the swap shop (convenient for hanging out with the sibling not in class or just before or after class). There are class discounts for active swap shop members and occasions when the Do Jump administrative staff is able to provide partial scholarships for some class spots. Costs and registration information at www.dojump.org.

Your investment in the arts and in these schools does more than just help your child grow their mind and mind/body connection. Investing in community insures that our artists and teachers have a living wage and acknowledgement of their great work. Where would our village be without our artists and teachers? Be sure to thank them when you see them and tell them heard about them from the swap shop.

Know Your Neighbor – Our Community Pantry

Karen Hery — Sat, 02 Jul 2011 22:30:57 +0000

Happy Interdependence Day. Yep, that’s right . . . interdependence day.

I’ll be happily celebrating American Independence Day on Monday but today I’m grateful , not just for my independence, but for all the ways I am interdependent with so many great people in Portland.

Our newest Roost sponsor, Brion Oliver, in his own quiet way, has reminded me of why I wanted to start this thing called a swap shop in the first place . . . with two kids to raise up well in a changing world, I set out to create a place where life is easier and less expensive, healthier and more fun. Day to day, as I look at the re-circulated clothes we are wearing and the simple, easy ways we are amusing ourselves and connecting with friends, it seems to be going pretty well. Less bling and more belonging.

Just a little bit after the Swap Shop started, Brion Oliver, with a whole long list of interesting experiences in the Portland food scene, set out to create a resource for families wanting to eat healthy on a reasonable budget. He ended up, with the help of some great friends, starting Our Community Pantry in the fall of 2009.

It started simple and, lucky for all of us, has stayed that way.

Brion does the work most of us could only dream of having the time to do. He figures out who has the best tasting, most nutritional staple foods – as nearby as possible but also all around the planet – and then turns his front porch and a few other locations into monthly pick up spots for pantry items that can sustain us for weeks on end.

His front porch just happens to be a little ways from the Swap Shop at 25th and Salmon. His main pantry items:

Nuts, seeds, dried berries, sea weed, cacao, coconut, gluten free oats, maca powder, a really cool tri-color quinoa and some local artisan products like handmade chocolate bars (my kind of pantry!).

His prices for organic pantry items: less than non organic quinoa, brazil nuts and pistachios at Fred Meyer. He makes sure all the pantry’s prices are less than what you would pay for organic, well sourced food from any storefront in Portland with more of the profit going to the growers and producers even though less is coming out of your pocketbook since he has less overhead to cover.

The way nuts are most commonly shipped, stored and displayed leaves most of the nuts we have access to in a sub ideal condition for taste and nutrition. His passion for how nuts and seeds are harvested, transported and stored gets some really great food into our hands.

It’s going to be a delight to write about the pantry throughout the seasons and share some of his stories about wild crafted foods and his support of long time growers and new farmers of great nuts and seeds.

For now, I’m just going to share my delight at tasting wild crafted and well kept brazil nuts (they don’t even seem related to the chalky nuts I usually avoid) and confess to the new fetish I now have for dried cherries.

Conveniently, Brion’s next order cycle is underway with on line orders needing to be placed by Friday, July 15th for pick up the following week . . . plenty of time to peruse his lists of items and decide what your pantry needs.

If you pick up your first order from his front porch (which can be as simple as one little bag of nuts or dried cherries), you can meet him and start a great relationship. He has several other drop off spots already going on downtown and in the SW and NE. You can pay him to deliver to your house or, once you have five families willing to go in on a drop off location, he will deliver right to your front porch for free.

What I’m most excited about, aside from how much better my own little pantry is going to be, is the fact that Brion’s delivery system is a catalyst for some of our own co-op families efforts to get really good food out to more people. Brion actively looks for people interested in making a great product just once a month that he can help get out to appreciative families without the risk and hassle of hustling for shelf space every week at local stores or running a cart or farmers market table on your own.

I’m thinking of co-op member Danielle Cogan’s homemade granola and Hailey Cohn’s truffles. Brion misses the connection he had with a really great sauerkraut maker who has moved out of town and now he’s now hoping to find another kraut maker.

Generally, I’m thinking we are all going to be glad we know each other.

You can email Brion to be on his mailing list, propose an artisan food product or find out how he got licensed by the Oregon Department of Agriculture as a domestic kitchen food processor and go on line to check out his pantry items.

Welcome to our community Brion! Thanks for becoming a Roost sponsor.

If you have read all the way through this email, you have my gratitude for taking the time to get to know Brion better and find out about Our Community Pantry.

To place orders or inquire for more info:

Brion Oliver
Our Community Pantry
Real Food Purchased Together

Our Community Pantry

brion©outcommunitypantry•com (brion©ourcommunitypantry•com)

Bowls, bunnies and song 5-7 Friday night

Karen Hery — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 16:58:13 +0000

We take a break from our regular Friday Family Nights in the summer but are more than happy to come together now and again to celebrate the beautiful web of connections that we’ve built all year long and to welcome our newest families just getting to know the Swap Shop and all our connections.

I hope you can come celebrate the summer tomorrow in our backyard space with our newest neighbors. The families of the International Leadership Academy are our newest swap shop members and this will be their first Friday Family Night with us after the first week of French Immersion summer camp.

Several members of Windward , our sponsoring non-profit, are traveling in from their sustainability research center in Washington with baby chicks, bunnies and their newest neighbors, two little guinea hogs they have just picked up in Portland, available for viewing and petting (as the sweet little creatures temperments allow) 5-7 in our back yard play area. If you haven’t been to our back yard yet, head down the center stairwell and through the mini garden to the larger back yard play area. We’ll also have the side gate through to the park by the storefront building proped open for folks with strollers.

If you have ambitions to bring chickens into your own back yard or are interested in attending the G Wiz Gathering at Windward over the 4th of July weekend, this is a great opportunity to ask Walt and Opalyn from Windward a few questions about the chicks that they will be offering for sale in the summer and fall and get a feel for what camping on the Washington plateau above the Klickitat River can be like.

All this festive gathering and networking can build up an appetite and Emi Soga doesn’t want anyone to go away hungry. Bring your own picnic blanket (for in our backyard space or out in the main school park) and a bowl, cup and utensil for each family member. Emi will fill your bowl from 5:30-7pm as many times as you like from her offering of:

Teriaki salmon and teriaki tempeh

A salad made with the greens from our backyard garden (and local farmer’s markets)

Rice or quinoa

Big slices of watermelon

$5 for adults, $3 for kids old enough for a bowl of their own

We’ll have bowls, cups and utensils for anyone who didn’t get a chance to grab some from home and a rinsing station for your own dishes so you don’t have to bring them home sticky (plus a good hand washing station so you can enjoy the animals and enjoy good sanitation before eating).

If we are really lucky, Alex will be bringing his Ukelele to serenade us all as we eat and play.

So find your fun, enjoy the sun, if it choses to grace us with it’s presence, and most of all, enjoy the presence of such a great group of people in support of sustainability and community.

Know your newest neighbor – International Leadership Academy

Karen Hery — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 18:14:49 +0000

I am happy to announce that we have brand new neighbors not just nearby the Swap Shop but actually right inside our space.

If you have been around the past few weeks you will have noticed a lot of French being spoken and you might have already met Massene, Patricia and Cary, two teachers and a teacher’s assistant from the Portland French School that closed down early for the school year.

It has been delightful to provide them and just a few of the more than 200 students they taught over the past 10+ years a place to be for the end of the school year.

They say one person’s loss is another person’s gain and this week’s know your neighbor post is a testimony to that truth.I won’t even try to do justice to the circumstances of the school’s closing in this email.You may have already followed the story in the news or you can read several articles on line.

The most important thing to know for our community is that some really dedicated and passionate teachers each with over 20 years experience working with preschoolers to middle schoolers and one of their most dedicated parent families, the Muros, have started theInternational Leadership Academy.Their first activity, before opening a French immersion school in the fall, will be offering French Immersion summer camp opportunities for the children they already know and our kids as well starting this upcoming week and all through the month of August using the Swap Shop and church gathering spaces at their home base.

Their immersion philosophy has made them great `house mates’ in our space.While they are in the swap shop or our back yard space this summer with their campers, your kids can join in with the activities they are doing and soak up some French (as long as you are hanging out nearby) and if you would like the ability to know that your kids are in great hands, learning some French and enjoying the run of the church building’s many fun spaces and the surrounding park areas, they would love to register your 3-11 year olds for one or more weeks of summer camp adventures in their care.

Every camper will be a swap shop member for the months they are in an International Leadership Academy Camp and all our swap shop members receive a $30 discount on one camp registration per month.

Summer camp costs in Portland run all over the map from subsidized city programs that are less than $100 per week to full price all day programs that are over $300 a week.

International Leadership Academy (ILA) camps are 9-3:30 for $200 a week (with a few special activities costing extra).Early care from 7-9am is included if needed by your family and 3:30-6:30pm care is available for an extra cost.

If you are reading this with a young toddler on your hip and can’t imagine being away from your child for that long, trust me when I say, as a parent of 10 and 13 year old siblings, that that day may come (especially towards the end of a long summer) when a nice, healthy break from each other is the best thing ever.

Every week of summer camp has a different theme.Massene and the 5-7 year olds will be playing soccer together next week while kids of all ages explore an ocean theme in age appropriate ways.Through out the summer there are opportunities for everything from zoo trips to African drumming to pastry making all with an exposure to the French language side by side with fluent speakers from France and Senegal and the United States.

We’ll be a little United Nations this summer and I’m delighted to do my part to help babies, toddlers, preschoolers and school age kids mix often and mix well.ILA is looking at both the possibility of starting their full time French immersion school in Lake Oswego in the fall or, if our relationship with each other can really blossom and grow, continuing on in the fall inside the Sunnyside Methodist Church building.

However long we are neighbors, it is great to have a place in sunshine or rain for kids to play and communities to grow.

To find out more about ILA summer camp weekly themes and special activities and to register forcamps:

1)Pick up registration sheets from the community info table in the hallway outside the swap shop

Dena Wilder – Family Folk Music Night

Karen Hery — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 16:16:44 +0000

We’re not waiting for the weather to cooperate. . .

Summer officially starts tonight for the co-op with the return of Dena Wilder to the Swap Shop stage.

From 6-6:30 she’ll lead a circle time for kids and babes in parents laps (great for all ages) and then . . . the kids are off to play (or off to bed if you have little ones with early bedtimes) and Dena plays for all of us music loving adults until 7pm from the beautifulAmerican ballads that she performs professionally around Portland.

A few of us are sticking around afterwards to sing harmony if you would like to join in or listen in.

I’ll be dashing in from an appointment that ends at 6 across town (don’t want to miss the adult part of the performance) so please give Dena a warm welcome when she arrives back home at the circle she started for us almost 4 years ago.

I originally thought that this circle time would replace our Tuesday morning circle for the summer, but Johanna will be with us through June 9:30-10:30 on Tuesday mornings and, I am happy to report that Alex, who has been helping her out on his ukelele, will circle us all up through the month of July.

Looks like the summer is going to be a great time for live music at the Swap Shop. If you miss tonight’s show . . . they go on and on . . . every Wed through August.

Sprout Pediatric Dentistry

Karen Hery — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 18:53:58 +0000

Some of you may recall that our first pediatric dental sponsor was all the way up in Vancouver so you may be as happy as I am that, when Dr. Jenna Milot was deciding where to start her practice fresh out of residency at OHSU, she saw a gap in services in our part of town.

There were no dentists retiring in our area when she needed to make her choices so she has built Sprout Pediatric Dentistry from the ground up in a great little area at 14th and Morrison.

Believe it or not, before she went back to dental school she was an international studies major earning a living as a cabinet maker, a skill that came in handy when taking a shell space to dentist office.

Kid’s places often err on the side of over stimulating with videos blaring and a crop of popping, singing toys. Jenna’s simple but spacious lobby has lots of room to run around (and not run into anything) and a big kitchen play area that is soothing rather than jumpy.

She’s glad that the recommended age to start at the dentist is now when the first tooth erupts and not the magic age of three. As a parent of two young ones herself she laughs a bit when she tells me that they used to explain in dental school that a three year old was thought to be more cooperative than a baby. Like the rest of us she knows that what we get our kids used to at an early age (i.e. before they can talk and talk about it with us) goes a lot smoother over time. Those first visits are quick and cost less that the visits for children who have their full set of baby teeth.

If you have insurance that covers dentistry Dr Jenna Milot is probably a provider – just call and ask.