The Weblog
The local foods movement is alive and well in Champaign County! Here are some updates on other projects while we finalize our virtual market:
Local Producers Map:
Our local producers map is ready for publication and you will soon be able to find it on gochampaign.com. Copies will be distributed around the community, in the local telephone book, and other “hangouts”. The guide lists the location and contact information for nearly 50 local producers within our county. The map was a project of the Local Food Council and printed with the help of some local sponsors including the Monument Square District, Champaign Bank, the Community Improvement Corporation, the Chamber of Commerce, the Farm Bureau and others. It is a great start to finding a local source for Champaign County’s finest!
You Say Goodbye, And I Say Hello..
I don’t know why you say goodbye
I say hello
(Beatles – Hello Goodbye)
…My best friend, in high school, and I were huge music fans. Big surprise. We just felt music and lyrics and beats. We are still mega close, we are still huge music fans, and we are both turning 50 within a month of each other. Back in our days of teen angst, teen heartbreak, teen girlhood, we could put a lyric with anything happening in life, and make it all better.
We always felt that music made the world go round. Just like I think the change of seasons helps to make us go round, just like I think all things local, make us more aware of our immediate surroundings, just like the hello and goodbye of life…we need to bid one goodbye so that we can welcome the next stage, age, situation. We just said goodbye to winter, so that we could say hello, to spring!! Growth, moving on, understanding, is all due to saying a fond goodbye.
So, as I stand on the brink of stepping into my next 50 years, I give a very, very fond farewell to my first 50 years. How much fun and friends could a girl have packed into her first 50? How many stepping stones, along the way, how many learning experiences, how many milestones? I love life, I love people, I love the passion of what each person brings to my life.
I have this same passion for local…again, no surprise. I love this little community I fell into, 15 years ago. I love my friendships, my fellow vendors, my local markets. It is all exciting. I intend to make the next step just as exciting as these last steps have been!!
Learning, shopping and living local is on the same excitement level!! Give it a chance…make the leap…find your local passion. You won’t be sorry!! Say hello to us….your online LOCAL market. We are your new HELLO…make a milestone step, with me, and let your step be into all things LOCAL, with us!!