What a great event we had today! Twenty-six people - some member-owners and some not-yet member-owners - visited the home of Co-op Board President Alison Fritz (and yours truly) for an instructional session on how to make your own mushroom log.

Instructor Rich Meyers led the group through a brief history of mushroom cultivation and the science behind how mushrooms work. Then he turned us loose with mallets, hammers, hole-filled logs and mushroom mycelia-infected wooden dowels. After a half hour or so of hammering away (wonder what my neighbors thought was happen), we stepped into the backyard where Rich guided us through sealing off the holes with melted candles and crayons. This is to prevent the mycelia from drying out while it spawns and eats the log from inside.

I uploaded some selected photos of the event to our Facebook page. No need to be a Facebook member or fan of our page to see them. Just click on this link. (But, hey, while your there, consider "Liking" our page.)

Thanks again to Rich Meyers and everyone who came by today. Oh... yeah... and one more member-owner signed up at today's event! That's one closer to our first goal!

After having seen all the pictures of the progress of their new store that Mariposa Food Co-op has been posting on their Facebook page, I'm about as close as one co-op supporter can get to being jealous of another co-op. And for good reason. The place is awesome! On Saturday, April 21, we'll all get to check it out in person when Mariposa celebrates it's Grand Opening. Store opens at 10am; festivities begin at 11am. Their new address is 4824 Baltimore Avenue in West Philadelphia. Join Congressman Chaka Fattah and other very special guests in celebrating Mariposa's new location and successful capital campaign! Featuring food demonstrations, special sales and more.

Growing Home is Nationalities Service Center’s (NSC) urban farm. The farm offers newly arrived refugees the opportunity to reconnect with their agricultural roots, strengthen bonds within their own ethnic community and connect with South Philadelphia’s other communities. Growing Home is also improving the participants’ health by increasing their access to affordable and nutritious food. Located at 8th and Emily (just north of Snyder Ave), the Refugee Urban Farm was also featured in last fall's South Philly Food Co-op Garden Tour. We're helping them spread the word about some upcoming workdays. They are also seeking extra garden hoes and flower plants as donations to help spruce up the block. Vist http://nscfarming.wordpress.com for more info about the farm. This Saturday (TOMORROW!), March 31, from 10 am - 2 pm they are having a workday in the garden!! They're looking for help to distribute soil to fill a few new beds and to clean up the gardens, plant, and mulch. On Saturday April 14, from 2pm - 5pm they will be doing a block clean up as part of the Philly Spring Clean-up. They will also be out every Monday from 11-5, Thursday from 1-6, and most Tuesdays and welcome any volunteer help they can get. Email [email protected] or call 609-577-1471 with any questions.

File this under co-ops helping co-ops. The Philadelphia Area Cooperative Alliance (PACA) is an umbrella organization that includes representatives from several major cooperative organizations in the regions, from credit unions to grocery stores to cooperative housing arrangements. Last month they held a great event attended by more than 70 people interested in co-ops and credit unions.  There was a lot of excitement in the room about the resolution that was passed by the City of Philadelphia and the work that PACA's doing and going to do in support of co-ops in the region. If you are excited about what the South Philly Food Co-op has accomplished so far and are looking for ways to strengthen the cooperative movement in other sectors of the regional economy, consider volunteering some time with PACA. They are forming three committees to work on:

• Planning and promoting future events for the Interational Year of Cooperatives, like a celebratory event in October (co-op month!)
• Public policy research and advocacy
• Coordinating local co-op communicators and developing PACA's own communications

If you are interested in getting involved with one or more of these committees, or have other ideas about how to get involved go to: http://philadelphiacoops.wufoo.com/forms/get-involved-with-paca/. PS - If you haven't already signed up for the free co-op conference this June, there's still time.  Sign up today!

For our friends at the East Passyunk Avenue Business Improvement District we're passing along information about a couple of really fun events that are happening soon. On Saturday, March 31, 2012 (that's THIS Saturday), EPABID is hosting an Easter Egg hunt at Le Virtu's garden (1927 East Passyunk Avenue). Bring your kids to the Avenue for a FREE Easter Egg Hunt! Kids will receive bags to decorate and use to hunt for Zitner's Fine Confections and candy filled eggs. The Easter Bunny will be hopping around. Lucky egg hunters will find "golden ticket" eggs with certificates for large one-pound Zitner's chocolate eggs and treats from Ms. Goody Cupcakes, who is debuting her cupcake truck at the event. Times are staggered by age group: 11am - ages 4 and under, 12 noon - ages 5 to 7, 1pm - ages 8 to 10. Select restaurants will offer kid-friendly brunch that day, including Black N Brew, South Philly Bar & Grill and $1 pancakes at Fuel. Many of the child-oriented shops will have special Easter sales. This event is free and rain or shine. Special thanks to Zitner's, Le Virtu, Ms. Goody Cupcakes and the South Philly Review. And on Saturday, April 28 from noon to 4pm, East Passyunk Avenue will once again host Flavors of the Avenue. Tickets are on sale at VisitEastPassyunk.org. Proceeds from the event will be used to hire police again to patrol the Avenue on Fridays & Saturdays during the summer from 12:30am-3:30am. So start your day at the southern end of East Passyunk Avenue for Flavors before moving on up to Passyunk Gardens at East Passyunk and Wharton for the Happy 2nd Anniversary, South Philly Food Co-op party from 1pm to 4pm.

This time of year is always a little stressful as we wait to see if a year's worth of earning, spending, and donating money will result in us owing a little bit more of it our federal, state and local governments or getting a tidy little refund for the interest-free loan we gave to Uncle Sam over the year. I gave up on doing my taxes long ago when my tax preparation software told me I owed $3.6 billion dollars. Perhaps I should have made more charitable donations. If you're expecting a check or direct deposit from the U.S. Federal Government, consider fighting the temptation to blow it on $200 worth of Oreos (aka the fate of my 1998 refund) and instead use it toward your member equity. For current member-owners, this is a great way to get yourself all paid off and then not have to worry about it for the rest of your life. For not-yet member-owners, let this be the sign from above that finally gets you to visit our easy-to-use online application so that you can be counted among our 250 Founding Members and get us to the point where we can start the process of looking for a location. Of course, you can join with an initial payment as low as $25 and then have until the end of 2013 to pay off the rest. But if you're sitting on a nice refund, why pay it all off now? I know the latest technological gadget is sitting on your other shoulder whispering for you to ignore the Co-op and instead spend it on him. Don't listen to him! Join the Co-op today! Besides, why spend this year's refund on an iPad 3 when you can just wait and use next year's on the iPad 4? And hopefully by this time next year, you'll be using it to keep track of our progress as we raise the capital for a our new location!

Hello, little arugula!

It's been almost two weeks since I planted my seeds and everything is starting to sprout.  The arugula is coming along the fastest which is pretty amazing considering it's outside.  Last year I started all my seeds in our front window because it's nice and warm and gets lots of afternoon sun.  And I did that this year, too, except...I ran out of room on the windowsill.  Oops!  But then I realized that it's been so warm that I could probably just put the hardiest of my seeds (arugula, spinach and lettuce) outside in the sun as a sort of experiment.  Well, luckily these past two weeks have been very warm so they all made it!  Of course the threat of frost isn't totally over yet and I did bring all three pots in one night last week when it dipped down into the 40s overnight.  But that's it!  Here's the spinach:

Little green ones!  The lettuce has also sprouted, too, but it is the smallest.  Here's a blurry picture of the little lettuce:

The tricky part about starting these outdoors is that I've got to be very careful of the temperature getting too low and either bring them inside or cover them.  I don't cover plants very much, though, since I'm afraid of forgetting to take the cover off during the day and steaming my plants to death (it can get really hot under there with just a little bit of sun.)  But the payoff is that they've got to be pretty cold-hardy by now, so unless it does actually freeze they should be fine.

The more delicate plants are all in the front window.  That's four kinds of tomatoes (Copia, Dr. Walter, Rutgers and Jersey Giant), Rosita eggplant, a sweet yellow pepper, basil, chives, and thyme.  Here's the Copia tomato which, judging by my experience last year, will be the biggest of the four:

I say that they're going to be the biggest because last year, from the very start, the beefsteaks were always the biggest and fastest-growing.  I guess if they're going to grow 6' tall they need to start growing early...

The Copia is actually a hybridization of a beefsteak, so they have lots in common.  The Copia tends to be not quite as big (so I've read) and has yellow stripes.  The Rutgers (developed at Rutgers University for Campbell's when they wanted a good canning tomato) is smaller than the Copia but is still fairly large.  I decided to try Rutgers because of the local connection and also because I'm thinking of trying to can some vegetables this summer.  And on that front, the Jersey Giant is also good for canning because it is long and narrow.  And Dr. Walter?  Well, could you resist a tomato called Dr. Walter?  I certainly couldn't.  Here are the little Dr. Walters growing:

Honestly, at this stage all the little seedlings look so much alike that I fear I would bore you all with pictures of each pot.  Instead, let's go back outside where...

the mint is coming back!  Always a welcome sight, especially this early on when it looks all innocent.  You're only a few plants now, mint, but I know in a few months you'll be threatening to take over the whole garden.

Lastly we have this little cutie:

This is my Bartram's Garden strawberry!  The man from Bartram's assured me that this strawberry had been growing outside all year long at Bartram's Garden so it would definitely survive the winter in my little backyard.  Of course, it came in a very little pot so I transplanted it into the built-in raised bed kind of under some ivy which I hoped might protect it.  And now it's got all those new little leaves growing!  Good job, strawberry.  I'm sorry I doubted you.  Let's be friends?

We occasionally get questions through the Contact page on our website and have decided that rather than keep the answers between us and the questioner, we'd share the them with everyone in a new feature we're calling From Our Inbox. (Got a more clever name? We're all ears...) So let's kick this off with... Q: I’m new to the area... just moved to South Philly from the suburbs, and don’t know too many people/restaurants. Can you recommend any restaurants/stores that offer a decent alternative (i.e. gluten free) menu? - New to the Hood A: First of all, welcome to the neighborhood! With a member-owner count that is growing by the day, we can introduce you to a few hundred new people. And we can definitely suggest a start-up Co-op for you to join! To find out the answer to your question we checked in with the Gluten Free Warrior, Genevieve Sharrow MS, CN, and asked her about her favorite gluten free (GF) friendly eating spots in South Philly. Geneveive suggests: B2 has GF bread for sandwiches P.O.P.E. also has GF rolls/bread for burgers and such and their menu is relatively GF Adobe Mexican Cafe is GF friendly Cantina Los Caballitos is also GF friendly Also, several member-owners have said good things about the new bakery called "TOTÉ" on 9th street in the Italian market. If you are interested in learning more about a GF eating or want to meet up with other GF folks, check out the local GF MeetUp Group. Check back regularly for more From Our Inbox featured questions.

Our website is just full of all kinds of good information including a list of eventsthat the Co-op will either be hosting or participating in. In fact, coming up in the next few weeks we have:

• QOTA fundraiser at Paradiso, Wednesday, March 21 (TOMORROW!!!)
• Mushroom Log Workshop with Rich Meyers at Alison’s House, Sunday, April 1
• Join us at the Passyunk Gardens to celebrate our 2nd Anniversary with live music, raffles and an after-party at Devil’s Den, Saturday, April 28th
• LoMo Flea Market, Saturday, May 19
• General Membership Meeting at South Philadelphia Older Adult Center, Tuesday, May 22

Another cool feature of the Events page is that it also keeps a list of where we've been and what we've done that goes all the way back to December 2010 when we had that great fundraiser at the South Philadelphia Tap Room. It's a great way to look back and see all of the time, effort and energy that everyone involved with the Co-op has put in and remind you of just how quickly we've been able to pull this together. It also gives a nice guide if you happen to have a time machine and want to go back to one of these moments in Co-op history. Before you know it, we'll be at 250 Founding Members, looking for a location, and setting our next goal for the number of member-owners we'll need to open up shop! Of course, that time will go by even more quickly if you also check out our Membership page and our really handy online application.

Almost one year ago exactly we wrote about a congressional briefing being hosted by Congressman Chaka Fattah, whose district includes both Weavers Way and Mariposa co-ops. The briefing was prelude to a bill known as the National Cooperative Development Act (H.R. 3677) that Fattah introduced in mid-December and which has been cosponsored by Congressman Brady and Congresswoman Schwartz along with six other members of Congress. Full text of the bill can be found here. The bill, summed up nicely by The Campaign for Cooperation will:

• Provide loans and seed capital to groups who are attempting to form cooperatives;
• Award grants to nonprofit organizations, colleges, and universities so that they can provide technical assistance to operating cooperatives or groups that are attempting to form cooperatives;
• Provide guidance, information on best practices, and technical assistance to communities seeking to establish cooperatives;
• Provide funding for training of providers of technical assistance and supporting existing professional development training for organizations engaged in cooperative development;
• Establish cooperative development centers in areas that currently do not have them; and
• Authorize $25 million yearly for four years.

All over the world people are seeking alternatives to the system that enables corporate scandals and encourages greed. Because cooperatives are democratic and focus on member-owner needs rather than maximizing return for shareholders, they are perfectly situated to provide such an alternative. The National Cooperative Development Act is both an outgrowth of, and will help to support, this historic surge of interest in cooperatives as a means to build a better world. In case you don't remember what you learned in American Government back in high school, this bill still has a LONG way to go before it becomes law and will require the support of everyone in the country who would like to see the cooperative movement expand and thrive. One obstacle to overcome is getting companion legislation introduced in the U.S. Senate. So, Pennsylvanians, please contact Senators Casey and Toomey and ask them to introduce companion legislation for H.R. 3677 - the National Cooperative Development Act. Tell them it will be good for farmers (it will) and cities (it will). That pretty much covers all of PA right there. And if you happen to be reading this from a congressional district not covered by the 9 co-sponsors of the bill (which means you live in one of the 426 other districts), please contact your representative and ask him or her to sign onto Congressman Fattah's bill. To find out more about the legislation and how you can support its passage, visit www.campaign.coop.