Test Post - 27Feb2019

created Dec 2, 2017

We started the morning at the Glass City Roasters coffee shop, which is now located on Elanor Ave in West Toledo. It's small, cozy, and well decorated. We ordered latte coffee drinks and their version of muesli, which contained warm milk.

After spending a little while at the coffee shop, we walked across the street to Glass City Treasures, which is an antique-like store, except it's well organized and neat inside. It was decorated for Christmas. Deb bought a small wire basket that was displayed outside.

Other small businesses existed in this neighborhood. The coffee shop should be a welcomed addition. We became aware of Glass City Treasures, thanks to the coffee shop.

We'll still patronize the Kathy's Confections coffee and doughnut shop, located within walking distance of our home. But we enjoy all of the small, locally-owned coffee shops that have opened in recent years in Toledo.

Next, we shopped at the Toledo Farmers Market, located near the Erie Street Market in the Warehouse District of downtown Toledo. We bought the usual items, such as produce (winter produce now), eggs, honey, etc. I bought a maple-bacon doughnut from the Holey Toledough doughnut truck, located next to the market. It tasted fantastic. A plain doughnut would be excellent.

From downtown Toledo, we drove to the Toledo Botanical Garden, located at the western edge of the city, next to Sylvania. The art and craft guilds sell their crafts and artwork on one weekend in December. It's called "Heralding the Holidays." It's one of our favorite art and craft events for the entire year in the Toledo area.

At the garden, we purchased a few items as gifts for others, and I bought fingerless gloves from a new fiber vendor, called Branching Out Studio, managed by Christie Clark. Her tag line states, "Nature-inspired art and fiber." We enjoyed this studio or setup a lot.

We like all the small buildings that exist at the Botanical Garden. Different building house the works of different guilds, such as glass, watercolor, weaving, photography, pottery, and more.

Branching Out offers classes in felting, crochet, paper, dyeing, and more.

We also visited with a local alpaca farmer who brought two of his alpacas to the garden for people to admire. They are fun, interesting critters. They make these low, grumbling noises or grunts. The farmer had a pen setup outside. His farm is located near Swanton. He has 20 alpacas. He sends the fleece off to be milled into yarn. He sells the yarn at his farm and maybe elsewhere.

From the alpaca farmer's business card:

Deb got inspired by the works of guild members, and we stopped at Jo Ann's on the way home. I went inside too and perused yarn. But we did not buy anything. They didn't have the fabric that Deb wanted, and the checkout line was amazingly long.

Last evening, Deb was a participating vendor in a small craft show, held at Elmhurst Elementary School, which is located two blocks from our home. The school can be seen from our front yard. Deb sold a few baby-related items, such as blankets and bib cloths. Deb needs to create new Punkin Pie Designs business cards with correct contact info. I should work on the website.

I went with Deb to the craft show, helping with loading and unloading, setup and take down. I hung out and crocheted a baby blanket. I enjoyed it.

The Elmhurst craft show contained a few dozen vendors. It ran from 6:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m., but little traffic passed through, during the final hour. It's always good to practice setting up and determining what we can haul in our Ford Fusion.

But back to Saturday, we went home after our Jo Ann's experience. We weren't home for long though. We met Chris at the Mason Jar around 6:00 p.m. for dinner. The Mason Jar is a mid-sized bar and restaurant, located along Secor Road, a few miles north of the Ohio-Michigan line. They offer interesting food options and good beer.

Deb and I enjoyed a fabulous-tasting brown ale from a Saugatuck, Michigan brewery. We ordered another, but the Mason Jar ran out. I ordered a cheeseburger, which was tasty. Shared a cheesey, artichoke or spinach dip appetizer that came with tortilla chips.

We took our time ordering and eating. We had not seen Chris for several weeks, therefore we caught up. We stayed at the Mason Jar for over 2.5 hours.

It was a fine day and evening, visiting small, local businesses, farmers, bakers, artists, and crafters and chatting with a good friend.

Published by Sora on .