We had great success at the Fall Fair this year! Skookum made over $900 selling freshly pressed apple cider, and we gained new 5 memberships over the weekend, and we continued to promote our Co-op to many interested individuals.
A HUGE THANK YOU goes out to our dedicated volunteers who helped in many ways. We could do this event without you! Most of you were choppers, and we chopped and chopped and chopped until ALL of our apples were chopped at about 1:30 on Sunday! At that point, we had about 40 jars of cider just sitting, waiting to be sold for the rest of the afternoon. We were able to pass along of all the mash (what is left after all the juice is pressed out) to local farmers to feed their various livestock.
THIS is really what Skookum is all about. Taking excess food from the waste stream, and making good use of it!
As we approach 350 members, we are really starting to make an impact in the community. Please continue to tell your friends all about us, and encourage them to become members as well. Together, we really CAN make a difference!
THANK YOU once again to all of you who contributed to such a successful weekend!
September 19/20th is the weekend for the smaller version of the regular Fall Fair (renamed FALL afFAIR), up at the Farmer’s Market grounds. While the hours will be shorter, we will still be there in full form with our Cider Press. This event is a chance for us to press apples to cider, show people how to do it, and raise funds for your cooperative.
If you volunteered last year, fear not! We have your contact info and will be in touch soon. If you would like to volunteer, and did not do so last year, please reply to Jill at funktifyd(at)gmail(dot)com
Many thanks to our Treasurer, Jill Amatt, for taking on the rather large job of wrangling the gear & volunteers needed to press cider at the Fall afFair this year, which is happening from 12:00 noon to 3:00 PMSaturday September 19 & Sunday September 20.
We still need a volunteer or two for the following times:
If you’re not volunteering, come on by the press and get yourself a delicious cup or bottle of fresh apple cider.
We will also require the usual list of items that we have needed to borrow from members in the past. If we have borrowed anything from you for this event in the past, please let me know what the item is, and if you are willing to lend it to us again. We do have a list and contact info for this as well, so we may start hounding you down soon also!
We are looking forward to another successful weekend of Apple-y goodness!
Remember to refill your Townsite Growlers all Sept. long with $1 each going to Skookum!
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Members’ deadline for submitting their Rancho Vignola orders is Friday September 25bynoon. You have until that time to get your order to us with payment either by cheque, direct deposit, or e-transfer. You can drop off a cheque at Kingfisher Used Books (4486 Marine Ave., under the bowling alley).
If you want to learn about the products on offer, check out http://www.ranchovignola.com/products.html. As always, there are some new products this time around (organic pine nuts, reg. hemp seeds, organic apple rings, organic diced dried mangoes, organic sun-dried tomatoes, etc.)
Pete and ‘the son of Spiderman’, with requisite admirers
Whew! Some 20+ Skookum members and friends were on hand this past weekend for year 2 of our Fall Fair cider-pressing/processing/vending presence, and we provided a very good show indeed! Not to mention delicious fresh, lightly spiced hot and cool cider, sold by the mug ($1) and by the 32-oz bottle ($5).
This Skookum fundraiser raised somewhere in the neighbourhood of $500 after expenses. We would like to thank all the apple donors as well as those folks and organizations (CJMP springs to mind) who let us use their materials and equipment. Very special thanks to Board member/taskmaster David (who organized the whole shebang this year, taking cues/tips from Jax), our president and chief im/presser Pete, Jacqueline herself, Jan (and husband Gary, both working behind the scenes to make sure we had the press, bottles and materials we needed), and former director Sharon!
Members Stacy, Annabelle, Connie, Patricia (and her husband John), Melissa (and her daughter Chelsea), Emma, Lyn, Dan, and many others I met for the first time worked so hard (many on both days of the fair!) and were so generous with their apples and materials/equipment to make the event a success. You can spot some of them on our Facebook page photo gallery (plus videos).
Remember that the press belongs to Skookum members, and as a member you can rent it for just $20/day (see details here).
Skookum is all about projects that serve our cooperative, and that benefit the co-op as well as the wider community, too. It’s members helping members to grow, pick, prepare, preserve, store, and share in the bounty of food.
The accent these early autumn days is on ‘store’ and ‘preserve’. With a mega-load bulk purchase of Tattler BPA-free reusable lids (drop by our table at the Fall Fair Sept 22-23, 2012 to buy a sample pack or extra rubber rings; help out with our apple cider pressing event there or donate apples to this Skookum fundraiser: Click here) and Excalibur dehydrators in, several small Skookum work parties where members processed, canned and dehydrated fruits and vegetables, and yet another Abundant Pantry bulk food purchase period under our belts, it’s time for the once-per-year order of this season’s freshest dried fruit, nuts, seeds, plus delicious and decadent confectionery from Rancho Vignola.
Rancho Vignola makes their product list available only once per year, when the nuts and fruit are at their freshest;
The final deadline for our order to go in is September 27, BUT the final deadline for members to get their order and payment to us will be 12:00 noon on Monday September 24;
They will ship to us in November or thereabouts;
We need to make a minimum order of $500; Shipping is free
Skookum will be adding 11.11% to each member’s order, so that of each dollar spent, 5¢ goes to the coordinator, 2.5¢ to Skookum, and another 2.5¢ to the benefit of the community.
What you need to do:
Take a look at Rancho Vignola’s price list click here.
If you have questions, please contact David as soon as possible at skookum@skookumfood.ca;
Otherwise:
print out the attached price list
mark the products you wish to order, and
calculate the total price. Don’t forget to add 11.11% at the very end (i.e., not for each item individually, but on the final total; If you prefer, you may simply email David with the list of products you want and a final tally. He’ll verify the total amount and get back to you);
Get the order form and payment (cash or cheque only) to Kingfisher Books at 4468 Marine Ave. in Powell River no later than 12:00 noon on Monday September 24. No money means no order!
We have a a splits page (click here), as we do for The Abundant Pantry Bulk-Buying Club. [For example, a member might want to order almonds but might not want the whole ten pound case (which has a better price than smaller units)]. If someone else wants to split that amount, then one of them can order it and then the two members can arrange to split it between them later.
To be clear: The coordinator WILL NOT MANAGE YOUR SPLITS; allsplits will be between members, with one member ordering and paying for the entire item to be split.
Our days are growing increasingly darker and the weather cycling into cooler temperatures. The world’s systems are straining from our (collective) disregard for the limits of our ecosystem to meet the demands made by our adherence to growth as a model for humanity’s betterment. We all know that the systems we have designed are in need of review at the very least and most likely need to be scrapped entirely. These will have to be replaced with sustainable ones which will keep our planet and communities healthy and happy. These changes are likely to be challenging and disruptive at the very least, however I believe that whatever steps we take now to address these issues and to build resilience will minimize the impacts on our community.
I thank you all for being a part of the solution. Take a look at this, released a few days ago:
UN General Assembly to launch International Year of Co-operatives today
New York, October 31, 2011 — Today is a historic day in the history of the United Nations and the global co-operative movement, as the UN General Assembly officially launches the 2012 International Year of Co-operatives.
In December 2009, the General Assembly adopted a resolution proclaiming 2012 the International Year of Co-operatives, in recognition of the contribution co-operatives make to the social and economic development of communities around the world. The theme of the International Year is Co-operative Enterprises Build a Better World.
I invite you all, individually and collectively to apply yourselves to discussion at the very least and creation of events that our co-operative can undertake to help lead the way towards a sustainable future. Find ways to share both skills and knowledge which will build resilience within the community and which will help us transition into a sustainable future. We have to do it simply because there is no one else.
The Fall Fair was a success this year. A wonderful turnout where the Skookum cider press was found to be producing fresh cider. It was produced by our volunteers and met all requirements of the health act to boot, while providing the co-op with some income. Thanks to the efforts of those who took time to organize and manage the event.
Progress is being made with The Abundant Pantry bulk buying club. Software is being written as I type which will enable products to be listed to the ordering pages of our site in ways which will enable easy searching and sorting. It’s time consuming, painstaking work and my thanks to Barry Bookout for his voluntary diligence. The wait for this is worthwhile and I’m sure you’ll find the ease of use of the ordering system beneficial. When this work is complete and we’re ready for a trial run I’ll gladly announce the news.
Jacqueline Morales is holding a dehydration workshop watch for the posters). This is one NOT to miss as it is both very affordable and the knowledge she will be sharing is extensive. There will a maximum attendance of twenty people so don’t take too long to decide to go! It will take place in Wildwood on Dec. 10 and Dec. 12 (allowing a day in between for the dehydrators to do their work) and costs $30 for Skookum Co-op members, $45 for non-members. The sign up deadline is Nov. 20.
I have a request for at least one volunteer to help set up a computerized catalogue for our community library located at Kingfisher Books. I am told that the task is to enter book names into an existing database and will not need the expertise of a librarian. Please let me know if you are willing.
The Skookum board has been discussing holding a get-together event in January. Some thoughts have been a potluck supper, a movie night /or a speaker. Perhaps a combination of them. What ideas do you have? Please share your thoughts and comments.
I will be away on an extended trip and will be available via e-mail (peteteb@gmail.com) and the board can be reached at board@skookumfood.ca. Please keep your ideas coming and bring your enthusiasm forward, for the betterment of us all.
