Northern NM Growers & Makers Exchange – first season, it’s a wrap!
The Northern NM Growers and Makers Exchange (G&ME) took place nearly every Sunday from June 12th to October 2nd on the corner of hwy 522 and 38 in Questa’s village center. We offered a variety of food and craft to enjoy and take home. Community members were served by the G&ME and visitors came, too. We met folks traveling north to Denver and other Colorado cities after a weekend in Taos, and others coming north from the southern NM. If you joined us as a visitor, patron or vendor, we thank you for you participation!
(click on above images to view in slideshow mode)
Offerings included:
Traditional and gluten free baked goods
Vegetarian Lunch options and Frito Pies
Good coffee
Jams, jellies, honey
Bread and tortillas
Plants and starts and birdhouses
Handmade belts to fit
Home sewn items
Pottery and photographs
Fresh flowers and garden produce
And many Sundays of live music shared by local musicians – our thanks to:
Dean Gitter
Johnathan Hutchinson*
Mary Rose
Michael Rael
Bill Scott
Wyman Edwards
*Special thanks to Jonathan Hutchison not only for his own wonderful musical performance but also for helping to organize and facilitate music at G&ME Sundays!
We also send out our thanks to Cristina (on puppets) and Nat (on accordion) who brought Puppet Theatre los Titiriteros to the G&ME at the end of July!
The G&ME gave community members a place to gather and exchange goods, as well as spend time with one another, often around a table, sharing good food. It demonstrated that, while structural economic barriers exist, our community members are motivated to take on challenges and help themselves.
Our market gave those of us selling a chance to visit, too, and talk about our hopes for overcoming these barriers. One much-discussed need is for a commercial kitchen that supports local makers so they are able to scale-up production and enter larger regional marketplaces.
The Growers and Makers Exchange members want to explore what to do next. One thing we’d like to see is more vendors and a wider variety of offerings.
We’re interested in your feedback. We want to know if we ought to try again next season, what you thought worked, and what we could change to make it better. Again, we met on Sundays and our hours where about 10am to 2pm. Feedback on the hours and day would be great.
Share what you thought with organizer, Gaea McGahee, gaea.mcgahee@gmail.com, or at our G&ME Facebook page.
LEAP 
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