Moondance

Well it’s a marvelous night for a moondance…
With the stars up above in your eyes..
(Van Morrison-Moondance)

I was driving home, tonight, after having closed our little local market of love, a quick stop, and a quick chat with an old friend, and while my little VW was driving through the country roads, the moon was so beautiful, huge, glowing, and amazing!

I groove to the moon…so lovely, so peaceful, so available for glances, so mysterious in her appearances.

I love an amazing moon drenched night. It moves me, it grooves me, it mesmerizes me. Much like this little market.

Tonight, as each customer came to the market counter, I loved seeing and chatting with each one. Some, I missed out on because I was busy with other customers, but then your assistant manager would take on the other customers, making sure all was right in their world, and sending them on their way with their market orders. Kim, the amazing YMCA staff member, even made me, and your assistant manager, a pot of coffee when we begged!

The ebb and flow, the yin and the yang, the good and the bad…it all balances us. Life, the little moondances we all do, the little balances that take place to make sure we are all getting through each day, this thing we call life.

I would like to think of this market as the little moondance in each of our lives. The balance, the stability, the good, the one thing that can make life a whole lot easier.

It is now open, it will remain open for our first time, ever, during a holiday week/weeks!!

Go look at the moon, do your own little moondance, and then order…

XOXO,
Cosmic Pam

Last Call!

You know what to do!!

We close at 10pm!

XOXO,
Cosmic Pam

Hazy Shade Of Winter

Seasons change with their scenery
Weaving time in a tapestry
Won’t you stop and remember me
Look around
Leaves are brown
And the sky
Is a Hazy Shade of Winter…
(Hazy Shade of Winter-currently listening to the Bangles version)

The song that could really reflect all of the seasons of the soul. For me, it will always be a wintery song, that used to blast out of my little car, as I sped into the night, down/up/all around Mulholland Drive, back in my Los Angeles days.

Looking out my windows, this morning, I am seeing our own hazy shade of winter, the beauty to some, the dreary to others.

On days like this, who wants to even think about bundling up to trudge out the grocery. Stay cozy, enjoy the glow of the Christmas lights if you are decorated for the holiday, grab a cup of hotness, and pull up our market site. Order all that you may need, this week, for your upcoming days of cooking, dining, or gifting…we can totally help you out!

Let us take care of these hazy shades of winter kind of days…you, just order, and take it easy…

XOXO,
Cosmic Pam
PS…for real fun, dig out your old Bangles music, put it on, dance it out…a real 80s groove!

2000 Miles

And these frozen and silent nights
Sometimes in a dream
You appear
Outside under the purple sky
Diamonds in the snow
Sparkle
(2000 Miles…The Pretenders/Coldplay also covered my favorite version)

So, it’s pushing toward mid December, we now have the first snow of the season, and once again, I sit on the sidelines of everyone doing their shopping, seeking the other meaning of Christmas. The love, the kindness, the compassion.

Yes, I will soon have to join the masses to buy things. But, it’s something I just do not enjoy. I don’t enjoy someone handing me a list and telling me to get what’s on the gift list. I love meandering around, drifting in and out of little out of the way places, and falling on something that may catch my eye, and immediately makes me smile, because it is perfect for someone in my life.

I hate the commercial Christmas. I love the love of the season, the peacefulness. Which brings me to this post, today. I know that this sounds like I have my resting Grinch face on, but I do not. Christmas is beautiful, and lovely, and brings back so many memories of the West End, my grandparents, and it brings back memories of cold days in college, racing through winter finals, to hit the roads to home. To my old room, to my friends, to my Christmas job at the local mall, the community spirit, back then.

Last night, I was playing a Christmas playlist while I was busy in the kitchen. This song popped on, and to me, it is my favorite Christmas song. It spoke to me in college, it spoke to me when I was a flight attendant, and couldn’t get out of LA to get home for the holidays. To me, it’s the most beautiful expression of the season.

I went to sleep with this song in my head, and woke at 3am. I wake at 3am, every night. I wake, I think, and I go back to sleep. Last night, I couldn’t get back to sleep, so I started to read through my Facebook newsfeed, and ran across a story from my alma mater, Eastern Kentucky University. It was a story about students who began a service. A service that is run only on donations, and the story was sent to the alum pages of Facebook. In case the alum wanted to help. They were appealing to the alum because they knew that many of us, if not all of us, would know what they were doing, and why it was so important to the students who needed this service.

The service is delivering boxes of food to students in need. Yes, there are students who are in need. Not every student has unlimited money, debit cards, credit cards, parents who can fund their every need or desire. These are the students who are in college, but after the needed expenses are paid, have no leftover funds for food. A real struggle. They are not the students who need money for Chipotle and Uber. So, a group of students have come to the alum because back in the day, we pretty much were ALL the struggling college kids. I know I was. My tuition was paid for but any extras, any food that wasn’t on the tuition food plan, any books, all on me. My mother was able to send me 50.00 every two weeks. I know it was the early 80s, blah, blah, blah…but I worked two and three jobs, each summer, to fund the coming year of what I would need. But, I was still very fortunate. I had a way to support my college self.

But, with money tight for most of us, back then, there were students who were way more in dire straits than we were. And, this is where my blog is going…

The story that I was reading, told of the kids getting their inspiration for the service from a legend from our college days. She was a little woman known as Ma Kelly. Ma Kelly opened up her big, old, rambling house, cleared out most of the furniture, crammed tables and chairs, everywhere, and took everything off the walls. She opened up a haven for the EKU college kids. She brought communal dining to a new level. She cooked, she served hot lunches, sometimes a Sunday breakfast, but always for the cheapest of money. I think for like 2.00 you got a huge meal, and a drink. She had chipped plates and glasses, and she allowed us to all sign the walls of the house, write messages, etc. You never knew who you would find at Ma Kelly’s. She served all kinds of southern yumminess, no frills kind of food. She made the best stuffed peppers, and she was only open to college students. If you couldn’t afford her charge for lunch, she let you eat for free. No student left her house hungry. She was a legend in that town.

Eventually, she passed away, and then later, her house was torn down, and the legend was over.

This new group of students are taking the essence of her years, her memory, her kindness, and doing it, dorm to dorm room, free to the students in need, operating on donations from everyone.

I started thinking about our own little market of love, and how we could make that work with people who may need a little extra help, extra love, extra kindness. What if we each thought about a neighbor, a family member, a friend, a co-worker, who may need the extra help of food. What if, when each of us order during any given week, we each order items for a family who may need the gift of food? It doesn’t need to be an elaborate gift basket, or a whole la di da issue. If you know someone who could use the help, buy some items, even the most basic, put them in a box or a bag, and either gift the people or do it on the sly, giver unknown.

Let’s all search our hearts, let’s all be the Ma Kelly of our community…

I don’t know, just a weblog from the heart, from a girl who believes that the magic of Christmas doesn’t have to come from an elaborate store. She believes in Christmas miracles, she believes in love, and she believes that kindness will always win.

Locally grown with local love…go shine your love light on someone…

XOXO,
Cosmic Pam

Blowin' In The Wind

The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind…
The answer is blowin’ in the wind…
(Blowin’ In The Wind-Bob Dylan)

I am in a soul searching, Bob Dylan crooning kind of evening state of mind, tonight…

We are early into the month of December, but this is the time of the year that your market manager begins to look back on the year, look back at the paths and directions that I have taken. I put so much into my everyday life, the people that make up my circle, my businesses, this market, you, the market customers, and everyone who I have encountered along the way.

Each year, I begin to form the theme for the year to come. I have decided on my first theme for the coming year, but after listening to this song, tonight, over and over, brings me to my other theme of the coming year. The answer, always, always, is out there, blowing in the wind.

The coming year will usher in many changes in my life. And, instead of worry or doubt or fear, I am looking to the answers that will come to me, in the wind, in a sign, in just throwing all caution to the wind, and letting the chips fall where they may.

This market always is my anchor in a sea of questions. I love this market, deeper than you all can know. I believe in it, I believe in you, and I believe that our mission is still on a winding path. Some weeks, our path seems so straight forward, and solid. Some weeks, we get thrown a curve ball, that sends us asking a million questions. But, even on those weeks, I know that the answer to anything that market gets thrown, is just to keep searching, keep the faith, and know that we are loved, that our market continues it’s quiet chug down the tracks, and that you, the customers and vendors, are the answers that always exist at this little market of love…

So, tonight, I open the market for the week!! Get your shopping lists, your grocery lists, your to do lists ready!! Our market is all about making your life easier, while putting that local flair to it all…

Go ahead…find your answers, and then find your way to us…

XOXO,
Cosmic Pam

Don't be left out in the cold

Pam said I should know some song lyrics to put here,but this is Mark your assistant manager. I can’t think of any right now. You can think about what song I should have chosen while you place your orders and let me know at pick-up on Thursday.

Christmas Is All Around

You gave your presents to me, and I gave mine to you…
(Theme song from, Love, Actually)

Hello, little local market of love customers!!

Your market manager is spinning the tunes of her favorite eclectic Christmas songs, and, right now, it’s Christmas Is All Around Me…and, the lyric that I chose IS all about presents, and well, presents for those special people are not going to just happen all by themselves…

That’s where our market can help!! Think about giving local goodness to those people on your gift list!! Think about ordering from our market for gifts, AND, for the items that you might need to get you through the holiday craze!!

Are you baking? Cooking? Grilling? Treating your pets? Stuffing stockings with fun, unique items? Looking for a gift certificate that can be used at this market? We have it all!!

All you have to do is sit down, in the comfort of wherever you are, and get to ordering!! It’s THAT easy!!

It’s Monday evening, and you have until tomorrow evening, at 10pm to get your gift lists ready!! Get your shopping list ready, get your grocery lists ready!! We even have new product from vendors!! We have Christmas specials!! We have boxed specials!!

Go ahead…Christmas is all around me, let the feeling show…(song implant, AND the thought for the day…)

XOXO,
Cosmic Pam

Christmas with Swisher Hill Herbs

It is hard to believe that there are only 3 more shopping Thursdays on the Virtual Market before Christmas. Swisher Hill herbs have a large selection of salt free herbs and herb blends, spices, teas, essential oils, sachets, and Herb gift Sets ready for that special Christmas gift. We also do special order gift sets you order the products and we will gift wrap it for you at no charge! For more information call us at 937-653-8418. Take Thyme, Joe and Charlene Stapleton

Our Shangri- La

Get that fire burning strong right here and right now…
It’s here and then it’s gone there’s, no secret anyhow…
We may never love again to the music of guitars in our Shangri-La…
(Our Shangri-La- Mark Knopfler and Emmylou Harris)

So, thank you, once again, for the amazing, incredible market!! You customers, totally rock us, love us, and support us!!

I was sitting, and checking in vendors, checking out customers, with your assistant market manager, Mark, and chattering away with the Y staff, and then you, the customers. Everywhere, you could feel the electricity, the fire that sparks this market.

We watched so many customers meet up and chat. Some of them neighbors to each other, some of them friends who had not seen each other for some time, or, customers who were coming through for the very first time…the love, the amazing chatter, the compliments…the market was on fire!!

Our own little Shangri-La…our own little paradise, our own little mystical, harmonious place. The little local market of love, the best kept little secret around.

I thank you all for chatting about my life changes, my new hair (quite the chatter on that subject), and the chatter to both Mark and me on a well run market, a market that is fun, a market that is always evolving.

We couldn’t do it without you. We couldn’t make it what it is, we couldn’t show you so much love, if you were not there, giving it right back…

So, tonight, in our little Shangri-La, I reopen the market…

Let’s keep this momentum going! Let’s remember that we are groovin’ into Christmas, and that means local gifts are perfect for everyone on your list.

Look to see what our vendors are all up to for the holidays. What specials, gift sets, and gift certificates are they offering!!

I will be sending out Weblogs, from our various vendors as to what they are bringing you, this holiday season…

Once again, we know that you can put your money and your trust, anywhere. Thank you, from the bottom of our hearts, for putting both with us…

Enjoy your evening…and get ready to order…

XOXO,
Cosmic Pam

Just A Word

Just a word from your market manager…and a HUGE thank you, and dose of LOVE…

This market soared to new heights, this time, and it’s all because of your love!! We saw new customers, we saw the return of old customers, and we saw the always loyal weekly customers!!

The past few months have watched this market just sort of float along…not really a whole lot of sales, not a whole lot of interest.

I began to research, and think, and wonder if we were about to be a thing of the past.

I know that when we began work on this market, almost 6 years ago, we were SO cutting edge, the only game on the scene, like this, the hippest kids on the block.

Over the years, we have seen big box stores add tons of organic, tons of what they term local, and while they have gotten really good at stocking real local, there is still a whole lot of local out there, that comes from way the heck away local.

We have seen the onset of groceries who now offer curbside services. We have seen the explosion of home deliveries of food, CSA boxes, and we have seen a physical farmers market pop up in every city, in every state, on just about every corner. We get it…we are not even the only online farmers market in Ohio, these days.

We know that you are offered choices, we know that we are elated that you still put your trust in us, we know that you work hard for your money, and just about everything out there, is begging for you to spend that money, elsewhere.

We even get that this market is even as easy as driving up to a curb, and getting your products delivered. We get that we cannot ship to you, or deliver to your doorstep.

BUT…what we do have to offer is a whole lot of local hear and soul. Vendors, managers, the staff of the YMCA who care about you, love you, and want to always be able to give you the very best.

Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for giving life back to this market!!

You are amazing, and we are here for you, always…

XOXO,
Cosmic Pam