outdoor activities

Out and About with Fermentation Fest

News flash!

Fermentation Fest event guides are hot off the press and heading out to exciting venues throughout Wisconsin. This 24-pg, can’t-miss guide is bubbling with interesting articles, art, class listings and city map—all the ingredients necessary for two weekends of culture convergence at Fermentation Fest. You don’t want to miss the Fest or the guide!

I’ve got to say helping promote Fermentation Fest is one of my favorite projects of the year. It’s a melding of interests, from food and art, to agriculture and travel. This means artists, chefs, poets, foodies, farmers, cheesemakers, brewers, musicians, performers, and so many more people all come together for an autumnal celebration of good life. I’m very proud to design for it, very honored to be part of it.

In the weeks ahead I’ll be delivering guides to various venues (I love promoting my clients!). Check back to this page often for an updated listing of where you can find them. And don’t forget my social media because I’m also big on featuring interesting venues.

Here’s where I’ve been so far. Yep, all the way to northern Wisconsin!

#GetYourFermFestGuide2019Here

Listed in order of cities are venues where you can find Fermentation Fest guides. If you’re not in these areas, check out the Fermentation Fest website or join the mailing list.

Stevens Point Area Co-op, Stevens Point
Cafe Coco, Washburn
South Shore Brewery, Washburn
Downtown Grocery, Wausau

See you at Fermentation Fest in October!

Earth Day and Double Duty Composting

Today, on Earth Day 2019, I’m thinking back to the roundtable discussion I was honored to lead at the MOSES Organic Conference. It was on marketing and it overflowed with interesting conversation. Today though, two particular points come to mind: composting and responsibility.

As we discussed innovative ideas to promote our farms, a woman whose name I missed (someone help me, please, I’d love to contact her) mentioned the composting campaign they’re doing for their CSA farm. They give buckets to their members and encourage them to bring food scrap compost to the farm each week where it will help to create fertile ground for next years’ crops. And I, whose marketing brain spins 24/7, suggested she be sure to put her farm name and website on the buckets.

Seriously though, isn’t a composting campaign a great idea in so many ways?

Full Circle of Sustainability

This year’s Earth Day theme is Protect Our Species and from bees to trees, good soil is vital for sustaining all of God’s creation. Composting is a small way to make a big impact on the enrichment of our soil. When we return scraps of food to the very soil from which it was taken, we complete a full circle of sustainability.

How cool is that for CSA members to participate in this full circle!

Responsibility + Ownership = Good Marketing

Marketing gurus tell us that allowing customers a sense of “ownership” is proven for building customer loyalty. We discussed this in our roundtable and how responsibility enables that sense of ownership.

The CSA farm’s composting campaign allows members to share in the responsibility of improving its soil for more nutrient-based produce. The result? These members become proud owners of the vegetables they helped to grow and they talk about them with their friends. Word of mouth marketing at its best!

What About You?

I’ve been composting for years and, gee, it’s such an easy way to put food waste to good use. Now, after touring the facilities of my newest customer, The Farmory, I’m inspired even further—maybe composting with worms?

What about you? Are you a business looking to heat up your environmental stewardship? Or a gardener wanting healthier soil? Earth Day is a great time to start composting—actually Earth Day celebrations last all week so you have time to find yourself a bucket.

So let’s get going and may the joyous rotting begin!

Want to learn more?
Soil health is a big conversation these days. Two recent and interesting articles are Compost, like the Earth Depends On It, from the Willy Street Co-op Reader and the Dirt Issue (Spring 2019) of Yes!

Wednesday Webs: Changing Seasons

Giardiniera

Believe it or not, I’m still canning garden produce. This tasty Giardiniera has been fermenting for a few weeks and is now ready to be sealed in jars. It will be my last batch and as I pack away the kettles, I’ll say adiós and gracias for a bountiful year!

So, winter, bring it on! I’m ready and waiting!

Dinner on the Farm!

Soil Sisters ad in Edible Madison Magazine, by Adunate Word & Design

Earlier this year I was honored to design promotional pieces for Soil Sisters, an event celebrating Wisconsin family farms and rural life. Well, here it is August and this past weekend was the big occasion. It was divine!

Dinner on the Farm, Inn Serendipity, Browntown, WISoil Sisters filled the weekend with five fun components from farm tours to hands-on workshops. My husband and I went to the Dinner on the Farm at Inn Serendipity, a B&B and 5-acre organic farm. You see a lot of these farm-to-table meals happening lately and I’d been wanting to try one. I wasn’t disappointed. It was a warm, old-fashioned gathering of people and food…

Dinner on the Farm, Inn Serendipity, Browntown, WI

…with tours of the farm and games for the kids…

Moo Grass Band at Dinner on the Farm, Inn Serendipity, Browntown, WI…and fun-loving bluegrass music by the Moo Grass Band.

Solar-heated straw bale greenhouse at Inn Serendipity, Browntown, WI

Our fascinating hosts, John Ivanko and Lisa Kivirist, describe their Inn Serendipity as an “incubator for land stewardship, ecologically-based design and living.” The inn is fully powered by renewable energy and what once was a grainery barn has now been renovated into this solar-heated straw bale greenhouse. John and Lisa use this building to germinate seedlings, dry garlic and store the many books they’ve authored.

Dinner on the Farm, Inn Serendipity, Browntown, WI

Monica Walch, left, talking with John and Lisa, coordinated the dinner. Monica founded her Dinner on the Farm business on the ideal of connecting “people back to the land and to the farmers and artisans who are making our communities a better place to live.”

I love this. We simply must support entrepreneurs dedicated to producing good, sustainable food!

Underground Food at Dinner on the Farm, Inn Serendipity, Browntown, WI

Speaking of dedicated entrepreneurs, look at the work and equipment that goes into preparing such a meal. Our chefs for the day were the Underground Food Collective, of Madison, often featured on public television’s Wisconsin Foodie.

Dinner on the Farm menu by Underground Food Collective, Madison, WI

Here was their menu.

Buffet by Underground Food Collective, Madison, WI

And here was their magnificent spread. Oh, it was so-o-o-o good!

Giardiniera by Underground Food Collective, Madison, WI

My favorite was this slow-pickled Giardiniera, with its hint of spicy pepper and heaps of flavorful vegetables. I took this picture knowing I’d never remember the name or yummy ingredients.

New Glarus Beer at Dinner on the Farm, Inn Serendipity, Browntown, WI

Top all of this off with a New Glarus Beer and our first dinner on the farm couldn’t have been any better.

Where’s that schedule of events—I want to do this again!

Tolerating Ambiguity for National Entrepreneurship Week

snowshoeing with friends

This week is National Entrepreneurship Week and one of these 20 questions for entrepreneurial literacy is “What is ‘tolerance of ambiguity’ and why is it important to an entrepreneur?”

I admit I wasn’t sure what was meant by tolerance of ambiguity so I researched the phrase here, here, and here. Basically, as entrepreneurs we must be Walt Whitman-ish enough to go “conquering, holding, daring, venturing, as we go, the unknown ways.”

Kind of like my friends and me when we snowshoe. Or not.

Okay, so you can see by our tracks, we trudge these trails quite regularly. We’re routine walking partners and we know exactly where we’re going. This may be the antithesis of ambiguity, but if you bear with me, I’ll eventually get to my point (which, my friends, is a tolerance of ambiguity).

mouse trail in the snow

My so-called exercise regiment reminds me of ten years ago when I contemplated the leap into self-employment. I specifically remember lunching with a veteran freelancer and asking her to describe a typical day in her life of self-employment.

Typical? Really, was I that naive?

Google “day in the life of a freelancer” and you’ll come up with hundreds of entrepreneurs sharing their day in hour-by-hour increments (mine isn’t that exciting, I’ll spare you). Let’s just say that generally an entrepreneur’s day is a lot like this path voles left in the snow. Unpredictable. Atypical. Seemingly without direction. There may be an element of routine, but more often than not something unexpected causes a deviation.

My pinch of routine comes early in the morning: Walking (or these days, snowshoeing), yoga or swimming. The woman above on the right? That’s Deb. She picks me up at 6:15 and we persevere into town to swim laps (our hair freezes afterward while we walk to the car). The woman on the left? Chris. She’s like a Bible concordance as we encourage one another in our faith.

And then there are my yoga peeps: Authentic, caring, energetic, with a positive zest for life. They have inquisitive minds and are receptive to new ideas. They’re physically strong, not by a stroke of luck, but because they take care of themselves. Together we share healthy food recipes and a confidence in our growing abilities.

So what do these people of my routine have to do with a tolerance of ambiguity?

Attitude, that’s what.

Go back to the words I use to describe my friends: Persevering, encouraging, energetic, positive, inquisitive, receptive, healthy, strong, confident, growing. These are qualities that enable us to deal with the daily unpredictable, to go forth in the great unknown, to tolerate the ambiguity.

These are qualities we especially need for the ambiguity of entrepreneurship.

Have a great National Entrepreneurship Week!

Meadow mouse trail in snow

 

 

Overhead Coverage of Fun in the Sun

Commercial Recreation Specialists, Verona, WIOne of the things I love most about my job is its diversity. For example, here it is the middle of February and I get to write about inflated fun in the sun and adventurously wild water recreation. My client is Commercial Recreation Specialists (CRS), of Verona, Wis., and it recently put out its new Waterfront Product Guide.

Here is the press release I wrote for the occasion.

Commercial Recreation Specialists, Verona, WICRS is an exciting company that focuses on fun. In fact, it’s serious about fun, as the CRS team likes to say. This is obvious, literally, as you page through the new catalog filled with action, color and, of course, lots of fun.

“Fun” is a word CRS splashes liberally throughout its content, yet not overly so. It’s part of the CRS voice and it’s one I embrace as I write the company’s press releases.

Commercial Recreation Specialists, CRS, Verona, WI

CRS is always coming out with new and innovative products. Interestingly, this leading-edge thinking comes through in their marketing as well. A majority of the product photos were taken with drone photography—how cool is that? These are great arial shots. Viewers get an overhead look at the product, yet not from such heights that they feel removed from the action. The drones also capture more of the landscape, which is one of the advantages of high perspective photography and something CRS needs to successfully showcase its line.

Want some water play on your next vacation? Make sure your resort peruses a CRS Waterfront Product Guide!

 

Making Better Use of the First Hour of the Day

An early morning view from my porch

My husband is out of the house by 5:15 each morning. And because I’m such a sweet wife, I get up with him, make his lunch and kiss him goodbye (it’s the least I can do since his working and benefits do, after all, make my self-employment a much more feasible thing).

So anyway, at this hour I’m rather lethargic and not quite ready to start my day. It’s way too easy to plop down on the couch and open up a laptop. You know how that goes…I think I’ll just do a quick post to my Facebook business page, check my email, read the news, and then I’ll get going. Of course, two hours later, I’m still sitting there on the couch. What a waste of the most beautiful time of day!

Thankfully, I don’t always do that.

In his Work Smart article, writer Kevin Purdy describes what successful people do with the first hour of their workday. They don’t check their email. Seriously, he says. Stop that.

Maybe Facebook should be banned as well.

Think about it. Facebook has become such a black hole of critical opinions, arguments and TMI that quite often all it does is stew a heartburn of negativity for the rest of the day. Ditto for the world’s news (and don’t even mention talk radio).

What total day-downers these are!

In Ed Gandia’s Effortless Productivity seminar, he describes his early morning routine. Each day he does a gratitude exercise, where he writes in longhand a full page of things for which he’s thankful. This, he says, sets the tone for the rest of his day. A happier tone.

I started doing this too. I use it as my thank-you list to God. Interestingly, the more I write, the more ideas of thankfulness come to my mind. Doing this makes me realize how blessed I really am.

Furthermore, recognizing these blessings motivates me to get off my butt. This summer I’ve gardened almost every morning—yes, that’s my early riser’s view, isn’t it beautiful? I’ve also kept up with swimming laps, yoga in the park, and walking with my neighbor (not all on the same day, of course…I’m not that energetic:-). By time I sit down to start my workday, I feel upbeat and full of creativity.

I’ve gotta say, it’s been a great summer.

Market Now for Business Ahead

cuttingWood

Here in Wisconsin winter is finally loosening its hold on us. See there in the right corner of my picture, there’s even a tinge of green poking through the ground.

That’s my husband cutting wood. We burn wood for nearly all our heat so he spends many weekends sawing away. I know, with spring around the corner you wouldn’t think he’d need to do this, but the guy just never sits still. He’s also the epitome of planning ahead. Our wood storage is always filled and what he’s cutting now won’t be used until next year, or maybe even the year after.

I posted this picture because Earth Day is coming up in two weeks. It also reminds me that I need to keep up with my marketing.

I’ve noticed an interesting pattern in the eight years I’ve been in business for myself. It seems to take a good 6-12 months to see results on my marketing efforts. This means the projects I’m working on right now are a result of the marketing I did last summer. And whether or not I have projects in my pipeline next winter depends on how much marketing I do now. Obviously, I need to keep my saws sharpened and running!

What do you think? Have any of you noticed this in your business?