New Artwork Up

Please come check out paintings by Jenni McSpadden that are hanging for the month of October. Jenni is a librarian for the Kansas City Art Institute, as well as a painter. If you are interested in purchasing any pieces, we can put you in touch with her directly. She has had this particular series of work around for awhile, and said that she is willing to give out some serious deals if anyone is interested!

September!

August escaped me, and now here we are right in the heart of September. That's fine with me as it is nearing my most favorite month, October!

We have been quietly making some small changes at the shop, but will now shout them from our blog.

First off...yesterday was the first day we offered sandwiches from the Nutty Girl! We often had folks ask if we had sandwiches, and we resisted for awhile. I just really did not want to get into making our own for a number of reasons. The Nutty Girl solves that. Delicious sandwiches delivered fresh every morning, Monday through Saturday. The are technically 1/2 sandwiches, but are really the size of sandwich I enjoy the most. Not too big, not too small. We sell them for $3.50, and they come in the following varieties: tuna (in a tasty balsamic dressing,) free-range egg salad, hummus, veggie, turkey (with a really tasty sun-dried tomato cream cheese,) and the nutty girl (cashew butter, apple slices, and cheddar!) They are available each day until they sell out.

We chatted with Missouri Organic last week, and at some point in the next few weeks, they will begin picking up almost all of our waste. I'm kind of geeking out over the fact that they will be able to take our hot cups, cold cups, straws, disposable cutlery (all of those are plant based and compostable,) plus all paper, deli tissue, food waste, coffee grounds, filters, and paper towels! Basically they can take anything except plastic, metal, and styrofoam. All of it will get turned into rich compost that you can purchase for your garden. I've used it in my garden at home, and it is great! They are going to be able to take about 98% of our waste, and much of the rest will be recycled. Really all that we will have left to toss will be food-handling gloves, our hot cup lids, bottle caps, and whatever trash people happen to bring with them from elsewhere!

Our September artist's work was up for about a week, but then some of the pieces fell due to needing better hooks on the back. We felt sad having her take them down, but luckily she is going to re-frame, and hang in November! The wall looks so bare now. I'm taking it as an opportunity to put up a notice that we want more artists to contact us about the possibility of showing their work.

Popsicles went away with Labor Day. They are definitely more of a summer treat. Iced drinks are available year round. I'm pretty sure there are going to be many people who can't give up toddy for the winter months!

We had a really nice piece written about us in the September issue (print edition) of tastebud magazine! The main article was about how great the local coffee scene is, and mentioned Broadway, Latteland, and The Roasterie. We had our own little box with a photo and everything! We feel pretty honored to be mentioned alongside those three, as they are truly some of K.C.'s best. We really love lots of the coffee shops in Kansas City. Each has it's own feel and style. Plus everyone does things a little differently. We are a little partial to our shop, though.

And now for the bike rack. Our beautiful, green, wave rack. We are still at the mercy of our very busy and ambitious friend who is installing it for free. Apparently where we want to put it cannot support it without having concrete poured. He is a very busy fellow, and we really want it installed. We may just have to hire someone handier than us to do it. We'll see.

I think that is about all for now. I'm still meeting lots of new customers, and getting to know regulars better. Thank you all for making my day a little brighter, and bringing me out of the haze of day-to-day operations, bills, fixing things, etc.

artwork for the month of August

                                          image property of Michael Wolfe

For the month of August, we have the photography of Michael "Wolfie" Wolfe.  

"Wolfie's Ru4Real Photography is located in the West Plaza area of Kansas City, MO.  Ru4Real is Fine Art Photography for young people of all ages."

Come in some time during August to check out Wolfie's unique images of Kansas City!  If you find that you would like to own one of his photos, you just need to contact Michael directly through his website or we have some of his cards available in the shop.

happy times

     This week started off with being closed for a day, which is always a little sad, but now we have a new air conditioner/furnace!  I don't think my eyeballs will pop out of my head again at our energy bill like they did last month after summer truly kicked in, and we ran the AC a bunch.  Neal Harris is a really great heating/cooling company.  That's who we have been using at the shop, and who we have always used in our home.  They are nice, thorough, and usually have coupons or discounts running.  

     While we were closed, we took the opportunity to add a couple new things.  One is not too major.  We now offer organic lemonade as a drinking option.  It is seriously just organic lemon juice, organic sugar, and water.  Tasty.  You can get it mixed with iced tea as well...usually known as an "Arnold Palmer," we weren't sure if we could use that name or not, so we went with "Tee Time."  Cheesy, perhaps, but we are like that.  The other change is starting a daily happy hour!  There are some pretty good deals on there.  I think Saturday should be a blast.  Potentially frightening for folks without kids, but maybe not!  Fun!

     Otherwise...

This Friday we will hang new artwork, and begin our journey of switching out which artists are showing every month.  I will definitely post info on each artist here each time we change.  I'm looking forward to it.  

We, and our neighbors, received nice little write-ups on The Ink's website, and in the print edition that hit the news stands today!  Thanks, Sarah.  We certainly appreciate the interest.

Jolinda is back from vacation, and back to baking for us.  I really enjoyed my stint as baker, and wouldn't mind doing it again, but have to say I am thankful for her return.  A lot of my other duties fell to the side while I took over.

That's it for now.  The bike rack will get installed soon...we are waiting for Jo's husband to have some spare moments to do it.  He has many tools, and can drill into asphalt which is what we need!  Have good days...

vacation all i ever wanted, vacation had to get away

Our employees are all taking turns taking vacations.  Alas,no vacation for us.  That is okay.  We love traveling, but having the coffee shop is pretty damn fun!  The last couple weeks have just been extra-hectic, so I have travel on the brain.

I've been having a good time playing baker for the last couple of weeks.  I put out many of the same things, but tried some different variations.  My favorite is the lemon bread that was out today.  There will be another loaf tomorrow.

In the midst of all the baking, schedule juggling, coffee slinging, and life living, we were broken into last weekend.  It certainly was not a pleasant call to receive from the alarm company at 3:30 am, but I would much rather deal with a night time break-in than a daytime hold-up!  We had a window totally smashed into tiny pieces, some stolen money, and a moment of feeling defeated.  Jeremy cleaned up most of the glass in the early morning hours, I came in to open, and it was business as usual Saturday with some tree trimming, and getting the window boarded up added in.  Thank you for every one's well wishes all week, and to The Light Shop for helping to trim up the bushes/tree.  Unfortunately we are not the only ones who this has happened to recently.  Many businesses in Waldo have been broken into over the course of the last few weeks, and I heard that houses in the area are starting to get hit too.  Sigh.  Everyone just check over your property for vulnerable spots, and be aware.  It may not stop it from happening, but it can't hurt.  But...our new window is installed, and we keep going, going, going.

The only other major piece of news I can think of is that we will be closed all day on Monday, July 27th.  Our air conditioner is a 25-year-old, energy-sucking, on-the-verge-of-total-collapse heap.  So, on that day, we are getting a new, energy-efficient unit installed!  They also will be putting vents in the kitchen so that it is not so hot back there. Hooray!  We are sad to close down for a day, and apologize for any inconvenience that might create, but we are terribly excited to replace that system.  We toyed with being open, but there will be no AC, and a good portion of the work they need to do is right in the path we have to walk about five-hundred times a day through the kitchen.  We will just play catch-up that day, and see everyone Tuesday.

and another thing

We have a profile on a new website Kansas City Made.  They are just getting the ball rolling, but I think will be a great resource for finding local business and products in the KC area.  Thank you KC Made!

finally...a moment

I've been hunkering down trying to finish tasks that should have been done ages ago.  That means my online time has been taking a hit.  That's probably not a bad thing, as I can easily get lost in the internet!  Anyway...

I just got our specialty drink menu board put up yesterday.  Definitely have some good drinks up there, and hopefully some unique ones...some are, some aren't.  Here is a brief rundown:

white mocha strawberry (espresso, Shatto strawberry milk, white choc. sauce) 

neapolitan (espresso, Shatto choc. milk, Shatto straw. milk, vanilla syrup) 

root beer chai (chai, Shatto root beer milk)

pomander (chai, Shatto orange milk)

coco loco (espresso, Shatto choc. milk, coconut syrup)

mocah toddy au lait (toddy, Shatto choc. milk)

curious george (espresso, Shatto choc. milk, Shatto banana milk)

We also added root beer floats (Lost Trail root beer and Shatto vanilla ice cream...both local and crazy good,) toddy floats, and simply 3 scoops of ice cream (Shatto chocolate or vanilla.)  We still have popsicles too.  Sorry, no smoothies, shakes, or blended drinks.  That's just not our style.

We also have started getting ham/cheese and egg/cheese croissants from City Bakery.  They are good for folks who want something a little hardier than sweet pastries.  For vegan folks, or others, there are Larabars.  They are crazy simple  - fruit and raw nuts in various combinations.  They seriously don't have anything else added, and are delicious!

Our bike rack has arrived!!  But, alas, we must wait for our friend with the tools to mount it to return from vacation.  That will be in about two weeks.  We also have a nice, new banner out on the deck, so you know who we are from behind!  It is done in about the same shade of green as the bike rack.

I picked up some new kid's books, and a couple new adult books from Half Price Books to add to the collection beginning at the shop.  I have a fairly serious book addiction, and am trying not to get too carried away at the shop.  I save it for our house.

I am finally trying to get in gear about finding artists to hang their work in the shop.  If you are interested or know someone whose stuff you think is great, please send a message our way at jdneff@onemorecupkc.com  We would like to switch the work out monthly.  All work must be able to be hanged (hung?) off of picture rail.  The spaces available are the following sizes: 23 feet x 3 1/2 feet and then 4 feet x 2 1/2 feet.   

As far as style goes...painting, drawing, photography, mixed media...whatever!  Unfortunately, we are unable to accommodate three-dimensional pieces.  Also, just because someone submits work for consideration, does not mean that we will hang your work.  No hard feelings, we all just like different things!  If you have a website of your work, that is the easiest for me to deal with.  Otherwise, we can arrange a time to look over some pieces.  I may not be able to get around to that as quickly.  I am hoping to fill up the months at least through the end of the year.  So far, I believe only October is spoken for.

If you happen to be in this Friday afternoon, you may get to witness a photo shoot!  Two of our customers approached us after we opened about doing some pro-bono advertising work.  Apparently it is not uncommon for advertising folk to do that so that they can stretch their creative legs a bit more than with their paying clients!  Anyway, Laura and Elena got back to us with some excellent ideas, and now our coffee and shop get to be stars in a shoot on Friday.  The end product gets to be used however we see fit...posters, fliers, ads, etc.  We just can't believe how lucky we are to have such different, and talented customers!  

I hope that everyone had an enjoyable 4th of July.  We certainly had fun relaxing with family and friends, and stuffing ourselves silly with grilled meat and summery side dishes!  Mmmm...now I'm hungry just thinking about it all.  See you all later...off to snack!