LaQ on ABC Channel 30

The story was covered by ABC Channel 30 La Querencia Residents Explain Sustainable Living

The Unitarian Universalist Church of Fresno, Green Sanctuary and Adult Religious Education Committee sponsored Community Building as a Model for Sustainable Living on Sunday, January 24. Guests learned about how cohousing models a sustainable way of life not just by considering well-accepted environmental concerns such as energy efficiency, but also by cultivating an atmosphere of trust, and nurturing a sense of belonging.

Guest Speakers were Katherine McCamant who has designed and developed dozens of cohousing communities and is the architect of the UU Church of Fresno, a LEED Certified church and Jim Leach of Wonderland Hill Development Company, a full-service real estate development company that partners with cohousing groups to address the growing demand for cohousing.

Joe in Youth Symphony makes the magazine

Fresno Scene magazine (the one that featured La Q last month) has a cover-story about the Fresno Youth Philharmonic Orchestra this month:

Joe even shows up in the photos! (page 9 online page 7 hard copy).

-Bryan

Garden 2010

How does this sound? Get more physically fit in the great outdoors, boost your self esteem by accomplishing a task that benefits yourself and your community, decrease your carbon footprint by growing your own food and thus eliminating the fossil fuel requirements of food processing and transportation. All of this adds up to working to be more healthy and enjoying the benefits of your efforts.

We will be receiving a delivery of base rock tomorrow to put down paths in our community garden. Tomato, eggplant and sweet pepper starts are doing their thing on the window sill.

Next weekend is 3 days long for many of us. What a great opportunity to dig out the planting areas to grow our own food this year. There will be tasks for all levels of physical strength, age, time restrictions, dirt phobia, and familiarity with gardening.

Next season's garden has the potential to be beautiful, bountiful, and to make us greener and healthier.

Please harvest TODAY: heirloom cutting lettuces, carrots, beets, celery

What we have to look forward to: spinach, chard, tomatoes, eggplant, sweet peppers, potatoes, sweet potatoes, popcorn, summer squash, winter squash, melokhiya, herbs, heat resistant greens (spinach substitutes), ground cherries, grains, capers, sunberries. And much more. A mix of perenials and annuals so we can have food crops growing year round. We are blessed to live in a climate that supports the ability to have our own sustainable garden.

Holiday Activites

Much happened over the recent few weeks - Starting with a breadmaking class, followed a week later by a cookie exchange in the morning of LaQ folks then a lunch for a large group from our new neighbors the Buddhist Church - two doors down. A week later there was a Holiday Open House, then Christmas Day Potluck, and New Year's Day a Polar Bear Plunge into a 50 degree pool - followed fortunately by hot cocoa and a dunk in the hot tub. This Saturday there will be a Lance canales concert(tickets are still available) Steve and Cindy Concert (tickets on sale now) movie nights, more dinners and so many fun things you won't want to miss any of it!

See the photos on our flkr site & the plunge video on YouTube - plus of course the brief account of the events here - Enjoy! Don't forget to Stop By any Sunday between 1-3 to see the houses and the community and have a very Happy and Prosperous New Year!

Bread Making
I just got home a few minutes ago and got down to the CH for the Tasting
Section of the workshop. Wow--what bread! Pat

Holiday Open House
That truly is one of the best, most joyous holiday parties I've ever been to! Thanks to Don Gaede for this terrific idea. I hope this was the "First Annual," and that we'll continue with Second Annual, Third Annual, etc.

We're sitting in the Sacramento Train Station now (with free wi-fi--yaaay!), waiting for the Zephyr to Denver. Thank you, Bryan, for the early morning ride to the Fresno station. Everything has been on time so far.

Back to the party: our dog-walking friends that we see when we take the boys and girls out walking were totally impressed with our community last night. As they left, Jan said they had lived in Napa for almost 30 years and had never had a connection with their neighbors like we have.

So many thanks to all--Joe, our violinist, the accordion play from Don, all the people who set up, cooked, opened up their homes, greeted people, cleaned up--it was one of my most memorable and enjoyable times in cohousing!. This is what it's all about! Happy holidays to you all! Pat and George

More on Holiday Party
It takes a Village to raise a child and it takes lots of LaQ Villagers to put together a fantastic Holiday Open House!. Got some more people to thank:
Candy, and Barbara Cutright for helping with the Common House decorations. Mary, Candy, and Jenny for organizing the Cookie exchange. Barbara Cutright, Joe, Ana, Ruth, Lilly, Sean, and Emma for making the Paper Candy Canes and using them as CH decorations. Mary and Susan for taking on cleaning up and organizing the Children's room (looks wonderful. Christmas Elves who cleaned up after the party (these are only some of the names I could remember ) Bev, Bryan, Mary and Jared... It was so much fun, Thank you Don and Jenny for your wonderful ideas :) - Violet, for the social committee.

A big THANK YOU to all who helped out last night to make it a BIG success!
Kudos to Joe Syverson (the next Joshua Bell??), Violet and Mary and their helpers for decorations; Susan, Scott and their crew for preparing the common house; all those who opened up their homes; all those who brought snacks to the common house; and the Christmas elves (you know who you are) who cleaned up the common house after the party. Way to go, everyone!

Don Gaede

Polar Bear Swim
We had our first LaQ Polar Bear Swim (George's idea) around noon today, and you can see the brave souls that did it. Fortunately, we had our cheering section as well, and Violette brought out hot chocolate for all of us. The pool temperature was
50 degrees! The Syverson family went in twice, and Scott came running in at
the end, while we were all in the hot tub. Pat

Rainbow over cohousing

This was the most glorious rainbow I've ever seen--and then it
turned into a double rainbow!

It looks like in the first photo the rainbow ends - at the composting bin - no suprise there... the bounty of vegetables grown in their community garden last year, and the delicious meals prepared & shared by community with them would certainly indicate that it is indeed a pot of gold. Photos provided by Pat

Thanksgiving in the neighborhood

Thanksgiving at Fresno Cohousing is a community and family event. Imagine a day with your releatives and about 30 new friends. About 56 people attend, counting kids. Out of town relatives for residents came from Pennsylvania, Washington state, San Jose and Morgan Hill, as well as a returning college student from Cal Poly and local
relatives and guests. More turkeys, than needed were purchased - but where is the down side to that? We'll enjoy cold turkey sandwiches on white squishy bread with gobs of mayonnaise, soups and other yummies for several days.

Joe had a soulmate with his 11 year old cousin here. Both boys alternated between swimming in the very cold pool and jumping in the hot tub. The weather was balmy enough for several tables to be set up outside on the patio for al fresco dining. Several games of Wii, some puppy mischief (2 dogs left at home during the day managed to get into the pantry & dust the house with flour and rice - payback for being left out of the festivites I suppose) & great conversation made this Thanksgiving another reason to be thankful for the opportunity to live in LaQ.

Pat

Simple Pleasures

I walked out my back door at about 2 pm with recycling and trash. I dropped it off and went in the back door of the common house; got my mail and walked up the hall to the kitchen sign up sheet. I signed up for the next meal.

Then I walked out the front door to the pool. Monday is my day to check the chemicals and clean up. From there I walked in the exercise room next door and did 20 minutes on the bicycle while watching some of the Dr. Phil show.

Then I walked to the first house and visited with Violet and her 5 day care kids; I got to be "grammy" and read stores and play with them for 30 minutes or so.

Next I stopped at Neil's house to ask him a question. We talked about their vacation trip to Texas. I walked in my house about 2 1/2 hours later feeling great.

Barbara Cutright