July 23, 2010
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| Community Garden |
I think most people are familiar with the concept of a community garden in urban areas. In a larger garden plot, individuals and families can rent/reserve a small plot for personal gardening. This can take many forms. Schools, neighborhoods, apartment buildings, and many other community groups can come together to build a garden for a shared purpose.
Where I live, almost everyone has a garden of their own; usually in their back yard. This usually means big black rectangles tilled up in our neighbor’s lawns every year. Each person plants their own supply of tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, and maybe even some sweet corn. What does this mean? When July comes around we have more tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and sweet corn than we know what to do with. We pawn it off on our neighbors or ask around desperately trying to find someone who preserves or makes salsa.
I have a solution - Family Vegetable Garden Collectives. A group of families can collaborate on the crops they would like to see in the coming growing season, apart from the traditional tomatoes and peppers. From this list, the families’ individual garden plots can be assigned plants throughout the gardening season. Normally, if you wanted lettuce or radishes you would have to find a place in early spring to plant, and wait to harvest in late spring. This early season crop can overlap with the planting of other summer produce. This can be difficult to manage as one person.
If a collection of families can coordinate the planting of early season, mid season, and late season crops, a huge bounty of produce can be grown on less space and with less effort from each individual family and shared among them. For example:
Jones Family: Early spring crops such as lettuce, spinach, radishes, strawberries and early green onions.
Johnson Family: Late spring plantings such as tomatoes, cucumbers, late large onions, and peppers.
Smith Family: Summer plantings such as watermelon, or cantaloupe.
Moore Family: Late planting such as a variety of squash.
This means each family only tends a garden for a period of the growing season and benefits from the gardens of others in the collective.
Family Vegetable Garden Collectives can be as small as two households working together to get more from their plots, or as many families as you can gather. Make an event out of it. Each Friday families can get together to pick what is ripe and divide it amongst themselves. Weekly gatherings to collect and cook food produced at home can be healthy for your body, your wallet and your soul. |
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July 9, 2010
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| Take A Class |
Summers can be busy, without a doubt. Still it is the perfect time to learn something new. Taking a class is a great way to meet new people and learn new hobbies or skills. Enrolling your children in summer classes and activities can also be a great way to keep them engaged and sharp through the summer break.
There are many places in the Des Moines area to take classes on a variety of subjects. The Des Moines Public School’s Community Education program offers classes in arts and crafts, personal enrichment, dance, health and exercise and many more. You could take ceramic tile making or self-defense, or even ball room dancing.
The Des Moines Social Club offers classes in all sorts of dancing, from belly dance to salsa, you can find something to move your feet. The Des Moines Social Club also offers classes in filmmaking, drawing, knitting, and writing.
Even Living History Farms offers classes from traditional bread making to photography.
Outside of Des Moines, there are still plenty of opportunities for learning. Wheatsfield Grocery, in Ames, offers monthly classes and workshops on eating healthy, cooking creatively, preserving, healing with herbs and other exciting topics.
There are many ways to expand your understanding, learn a new craft or skill, meet new people and make new connections. Between baseball games and beach bumming you can find something to enrich your mind and possibly change how you see and interact with the world. |
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Nightlife and Attractions
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| Breweries And Wineries In Iowa |
| Iowa has more than 60 wineries and breweries. Many of them offer special events including live music from local Iowa bands, four-course dinners and live theater. Check them out at IowaWineAndBeer.com. |
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| Cultural Corridor |
| Looking to take in a little drama or experience the opera in Eastern Iowa? The Iowa Cultural Corridor Alliance offers a full listing of events in Cedar Rapids and Iowa City. |
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| Iowa.com |
| Iowa.com is about providing Iowans an opportunity to search for all types of events throughout Iowa and to be the ultimate online guide to finding those events wherever they may be in the state. They believe that Iowa is a fun, progressive, growing state that has a lot going on that you should know about. |
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| Iowa Nightlife |
| IowaNightlife is the one-stop, online nightlife resource guide for Iowa. Throughout the region, tens of thousands utilize IowaNightlife to find out which bars, clubs, and restaurants are most popular from night to night. In addition, IowaNightlife provides useful information including hours of operation, directions, food/drink specials and on-location photo albums. |
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| Iowa State Fair |
'You Gotta Love' the food, the fun, the Fair! The country's most famous state fair features mouth-watering foods, fabulous free entertainment & blue-ribbon competition. Special offers available for groups. Check it out August 7-17, 2008 - "U Gotta Love It."
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| Iowa Ticketmaster |
| Ticketmaster is the world's leading ticketing company, providing ticket sales, ticket resale services, marketing and distribution of event tickets and information. Find tickets for Iowa sporting events, concerts, special events, comedy, arts, theater and more. |
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| Iowa Tix |
| Big shows. Small fees. Find information on Iowa arts, entertainment, culture and music. |
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| Quad City Times Event Calendar |
| Search entertainment, music, community, arts, and all other types of events happening in the Quad Cities. |
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| Smart Career Move Entertainment Links |
| Life in Iowa is a day at the beach…or the park, or the ballpark, or the bike trails, or the concerts. There’s no shortage of activities to enjoy. Find information on Iowa arts, sports, diversions, recreation and tourism. |
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| Smart Career Move Multicultural Links |
| The Iowa Careers Consortium members make a concerted effort to promote multiculturalism in Iowa. Check out links to community resources, organizations, events, museums, music and media resources. |
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Get Some Fresh Air
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| Biking And Hiking Trails |
Iowa has hundreds of trail miles to help you discover our state's natural areas, rural landscapes and friendly communities. This site contains information on 43 Iowa trails that you can search by name or location. There you'll find trail facts and maps – plus local links for planning your complete Iowa trails adventure!
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| Iowa Outdoor Recreation |
| Bike, hike, climb, kayak, fish, hunt, golf and more. Campgrounds across the state afford relaxing getaways and access to hundreds of miles of hiking and biking trails. Rivers and lakes await you with opportunities for boating and fishing. Whether you prefer to get out your walking stick or your golf clubs, Iowa offers great ways to enjoy the great outdoors. |
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| Water Trails |
| This is a growing resource for canoeists and kayakers to find water trails - segments of rivers and lakes that have been developed in ways friendly toward canoeists and kayakers, where ample warning is provided for known hazards like low-head dams, and where portage exist either to get around hazards or to get from one body of water to another. |
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Extreme Sports
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| Des Moines Skydivers |
| Check out the Des Moines Skydivers, home of the "couch freaks." Based in Winterset, this is the largest state-of-the-art skydiving club in Iowa. If you want to make a skydive you have found the right place. |
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| Iowa Off Highway Vehicle Association |
| We are a group of dirt bike and ATV riders who believe that working within the system of the State and Federal governments will allow our user groups to fairly share in our land recreation resources. We will work in a positive manner to maintain integrity as a user group and respect for the environment while still enjoying our form of recreation. |
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| Iowa Paintball Locations |
| DSMPaintball.com's listing of Iowa paintball locations. |
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| Paradise Skydives |
| Check out Paradise Skydives in Vinton. |
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Volunteer in Iowa
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| Iowa Commission On Volunteer Service |
| Ready to volunteer and give something back to your community? Explore the possibilities! |
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News You Can Use
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| Core Magazine |
| Core magazine is for the “urban enthusiast” residing in America’s heartland. Through its editorial content, core is committed to high-lighting development trends, urban lifestyle, architecture & design, social trends and culture as well as environmental, technological & economic responsibility; all with a central focus on the urban areas of Greater Des Moines. |
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| Des Moines Juice |
| Geared towards Des Moines’ 20 and 30 somethings, Juice highlights where to find a cheap lunch to upcoming concerts. |
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| Vue Magazine Online - Cedar Valley |
| Covering 16 counties from the Tri-States to the Cedar Valley - 32 pages of live music, movies, national concert tours, books, dining, theatre, comedy and art. The ultimate tour guide for the entertainment hungry. |
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