It's All Happening!

We are so thrilled to announce that our daughter, Hazel, joined our family on May 6th! She is doing quite well, as are the rest of us. You won't see her in the shop for another few weeks (and you may only catch glimpses of us,) but after that she may be my little companion there while I get some work done.

Also, the bike rack is bolted to the ground in back of the shop by the deck! For real. It has finally been installed. We take forever to do things sometimes.

The shop has also recently started to serve a new organic/Fair Trade coffee from The Roasterie. It is from Peru, and is a delicious, light roast that we are pleased to add to our rotation of coffees.

You have only about a week left to catch the photography work of Joan Calkins. After that...I have no one. I'm just hanging up some favorite Nikki McClure prints for the summer, unless I get some interested artists! If you know anyone who would like a chance to hang some of their work in our shop for a month, send them my way.

That's all for now! Take care.

Shake, Rattle, and Roll

Hello!

Less than two weeks from the due date of our daughter, so I figured I should get an update in now.

We had a great birthday celebration towards the end of February. Thank you to everyone who made it out, and continues to support us on other days too! We can't believe how quickly this next year is already passing by.

We have some new items added to the menu, some of which are permanent, and others that are seasonal. As far as seasonal goes...hot apple cider is no longer available, but we have lemonade once again. Try a "tee time" (our silly take on an "Arnold Palmer") which is half lemonade and half iced tea. It is quite refreshing. Also available for the spring/summer months are frozen Snickers bars. No, these are not organic, ice cream bars, or anything besides a Snickers bar frozen into delectable, hard chewiness. They simply remind me of summers spent at the pool, and I like them! So, enjoy one for a buck. Root beer floats have also returned - vanilla ice cream and a Lost Trail root beer. Yum. We can also blend one up for you!

Speaking of blending...that is our biggest change. We now have a very small selection of shakes available! Last summer we noticed some demand for frozen, blended drinks. We were resistant for a couple of reasons. One of the primary reasons is that many of the frozen drinks shops offer come from powdered mixes. Some of these mixes are not terrible, but many of them contain some pretty nasty ingredients. You would think creating a blended coffee drink would be as easy as blending espresso, ice, and milk together, but that just doesn't work well. The texture/consistency is all off.

Our solution? Shakes made with as few ingredients as possible. Healthy? Not quite, but WAY better than powdered mix! There are 3 vanilla ice cream based ones (a surprisingly-few- ingredient vanilla ice cream...hormone-free too!) and one vegan one.

Toddy - vanilla ice cream, toddy concentrate, Shatto milk

Chai - vanilla ice cream, black or green chai

Berry - vanilla ice cream, frozen berries (blueberries, raspberries, blackberries), Shatto milk

Vegan - frozen banana, frozen berries (same as above), soy milk

They come in one size (16 oz. for $4.25) and are a rich, flavorful treat! We are not a shake or smoothie emporium...no endless choices, but we have created a small, yummy selection that we hope you enjoy. The toddy one is pretty out-of-control! So is the vegan.

Okay, I know that I have been promising this for almost a year, but remember the bike rack we purchased, but never installed? One of our baristas has an incredibly handy father who will be pouring a concrete slab and installing the rack on it within the next couple weeks for sure! It has been a long wait, but will be here this summer. It will be located off the deck that is out in back of the shop.

We have also done some other improvements recently. No more ratty screen door in back! We have a nice, shiny storm door there now. Also, we replaced some of our fridges with a larger, more energy efficient one and a bigger, energy-efficient freezer. There is a glass fronted fridge out front too so you can grab your own bottled drink or sandwich. We feel pretty fancy.

Otherwise, we have to give it up to our wonderful employees. Some have been with us from the start, and have been such a great help and support during a crazy first year. Others are newer, but equally valuable to us. All of them have been so great while we have been getting closer to having a baby. We truly appreciate them all, and we hope that you do too! Sadly we have a barista leaving for Australia next week (happy for her, sad for us!) but we found another great person to step into her shifts. It is hard letting people you like go, but that is the nature of the beast.

That is it for now! Be well, and take care.

In Hibernation

Oh my...I feel like a stranger here. I've been all around town both physically and on the web for the last couple of months, but have neglected this small piece of internet real estate. What can I say other than life gets busy.

The shop rolled it's way through the holidays, weathered some snow at the new year that caused us to close early some days, and wish we were closed others, but we have emerged in 2010 into a sweet spot. We are very excited for the year ahead.

To kick it off, we will be one-year-old on Feb. 26! There will be some sort of minor celebration on Saturday, February 27. We don't have all the details hammered out, but there will likely be drink specials, giveaways (probably through facebook,) and buy a drink get a free cookie! If you have not tried one of our cookies (made in house) this is the perfect opportunity to. Simple and delicious.

Thinking of baked goods, one of the changes over the last couple months has been a switch in our in-house baker. Jolinda left us in December, and we were joined by Rachel. In addition to baking some of the items we had been offering, Rachel has begun making vegan options, muffins, and some interesting new cookies.

The composting efforts have been going really well. The main challenge has been letting customers know about it, and learn how quick and easy it is to separate their trash. We have plenty of signage (I like signs...) and always look for an opportunity to chat with people about it. We have even had some local groups and other businesses take an interest in it, and want to learn more! That is so great!

The eggnog drinks came and went over the holidays, and the last couple weeks have been lower production milk weeks for the cows. Unfortunately that has meant very limited flavored milk. Apparently though, those issues should be over, so we are hoping to get all flavors of milk back in stock soon! We've missed them. As of this post we have chocolate and root beer milk from Shatto, and we always have flavored syrups.

On a personal note, for any of you who haven't spied me at the shop recently, we are expecting a baby girl to join our family this spring! We couldn't be more delighted to add another member to our family. We might not be around much for a month or so around her birth, but we love our staff, and they keep things running very well when we can't be there. Once she's past a month old, I'm sure she will be my tiny companion while I take care of business...just no hot drinks around her!

That's it for now. I will try to keep up on letting everyone know what is happening in our world a little bit better this year. I mainly update our Facebook fan page, because it is such an easy way to get the word out about most things.

Hope you all have been well.