New Products
By Owner: Bonnie Meier

We have discovered a new source of wonderful little cookbooks. They are recipe sized and cover many subjects. They are published by a wonderful little company called Hearts & Tummies. The company is located in Wever, Iowa in the western part of our state. Renae Vander Schaaf and I are in the process of putting together a Dutch Cookbook which we hope will be available later this year or early next year. If you have any great Dutch recipes that you would like us to include in the book, please contact us. Hearts & Tummies is run by Marilyn and Bruce Carlson. I haven't met them personally yet, but have really enjoyed our telephone conversations.

RAGBRAI
By Owner: Bonnie Meier

Although we haven't had RAGBRAI yet as of the writing of this newsletter, by the time you receive it, it will be over for Orange City. People have been preparing for months and many, many people in Orange City have volunteered to help promote the event. We are anticipating 20,000 – 25,000 people coming to our fair city. Most stores and many private homes have bicycles in their windows or front yard with white lights. Our town has strung white lights across our main street, which I believe are going to stay after RAGBRAI is over. We are hoping to sell Rickaroons to the bicyclers because they are a great energy food for athletes. Dan Hurt will be here on Saturday, the 22nd to help people find the right size wooden shoes, slippers or Dutch garden clogs. We also have a table of items that will be 50% off for everyone and 75% off for those who have the official RAGBRAI bracelet. The main music stage will be located in the intersection closest to our store. I suspect we'll be able to hear the music without even opening the door.

Juliana Korver's Frisbee Adventures
By Owner: Bonnie Meier

My daughter, Juliana, provides our little store with many interesting items, i.e. jewelry, discs, knit items, original sewn items, etc. etc. Juliana's vocation is software engineer, but her avocation is anything dealing with Frisbees. She met her boyfriend through DDC (double disc court). DDC is a game played in an area similar to a tennis court. You play with two discs at a time and it is quite an interesting game. When this newsletter comes out Juliana will be England competing in the WFDF World Overall Flying Disc Championships. They start on July 24 and run through July 29. The games will be played over six days and contestants take part in 1) Accuracy, 2) Discathon, 3) Disc Golf, 4) Distance, 5) DDC, 6) Freestyle, and 7) Self Caught Flight. There will be teams there from Canada, Chinese Taipei, Czech Republic, Germany, Great Britain, India, Ireland, New Zealand, Poland, Portugal, Scotland, Sweden, United States and Wales. You can read more about the event at woc2017.uk

After that event Juliana and Rick will travel to Italy to compete in the 2017 Freestyle World Disc Championship. That event runs from August 3 – 6 in Udine, Italy. You can read more about that at www.fpawinthezone.com

Dates to Remember
By Owner: Bonnie Meier

Soon after RAGBRAI we will be bringing out our back to school products. August 2 – 5. Orange City will be celebrating Ridiculous Daze. We will have several specials at that time.

August 23. Arts on Central. In the past this has been a great day. Last year the street in front of us was blocked off so that we could use the street for special events. The day celebrates the college students coming back and emphasizes all kinds of art. Last year we had several authors out on the street autographing their books. Sharon Rens brought a spinning wheel and demonstrated spinning. This year we will have specials on all our art supplies which includes canvases, paint, and brushes. Many windows have live mannequins and music can be heard throughout the community.

September 11 we will start another estate sale. We have four people that will each bring up to 100 new items into the store and they will be available for about six weeks.

November 2 – 4. Soon after the estate sale is over we will be celebrating our 7 th birthday. We celebrate our birthday with three days of filling our store with balloons containing discounts. Every thing in the store will be on sale and the sale will depend on the balloon that you pop. Discounts will range from 10% - 40%.

Perusing our Guest Book
By Owner: Bonnie Meier

We have had a lot of visitors since June 20 and have had people come to our little store from many states including Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Texas, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin and all over Iowa. We also had people from Enterprise, Ontario in Canada and Noord-Brabart in the Kingdom of the Netherlands.