Win a free Milkshake contest!

Chick-fil-a has Peppermint Chocolate Chip Milkshakes again!! Yum! Who wants a free one courtesy of Chick-fil-A Paradise Pointe?! Just "like" our status on Facebook about the contest and head over to https://www.facebook.com/cfaparadisepointe and "like" their page. That's it! I'll announce FIVE winners at the end of the day 11/20/13!

Iowa Distilling Co.

If you saw the photo on Facebook of me sampling some whisky and rum on Friday, you know, my average day at work...You might have been wondering just what I was up to.  Well, even if you weren't, I'm about to tell you all about it anyway!

I was just taking a tour and meeting the awesome guys at Iowa Distilling Company.  Of course sampling the goods was necessary as well.

The guys have a great story about starting out distilling in one of their garages (with proper license of course) before eventually ending up in their current location, a 100-year old building in Cumming, Iowa, They opened here about a year and a half ago.  It's conveniently located right across the street from The Cumming Tap.

The guys have come up with some stellar concoctions including all local grains.  They have Caribbean molasses shipped in from Barbados for their rum, but they use local ingredients wherever possible.

We got to sample the Iowa Shine, which is a 100% local corn whisky that is smooth and exciting for those who don't do wheat gluten.  We also tested the Steel Drum rum, which was lovely and their very popular Prairie Fire whiskey (my personal favorite) which is cinnamon-y and spicy and fantastic in warm apple cider.  You can find their products at most local stores who carry liquor as well as a lot of bars and restaurants around Iowa.

They do tastings and tours on Saturday afternoons and Tuesday evenings, which is totally convenient since Tacopocalypse serves up tacos on Tuesday nights just across the way at the Cumming tap (who also carried their product).  They also do tasting by appointment since they guys have flexible day jobs that allows lots of days spent at the Distillery working remotely.  Tastings are free and Todd, Tom and Phil and truly nice guys who are excited to show you around, so you the process and share their knowledge and local product.

I'm also excited to announce that they are teaming up with Dischcrawl Des Moines to bring you "Cocktail Wars" on December 10th.  5 local bartenders will come up with a cocktail using an Iowa Distilling Co. rum or whiskey and participants get to vote on their favorite to crown the winner.  Read more about Cocktail Wars and get tickets here.

Take a a short ride to Cumming and check out this awesome operation.  Support local!

EPLDSM Night @ Confluence Brewery

We are pleased to announce that our event on November 7th at Confluence Brewery raised $500 to donate to Greater Des Moines Buy Fresh, Buy Local.

There was plenty of food, beer and fun and we appreciated each and every one of you who came out to the event!

A Huge THANK YOU to all of the vendors, entertainers and donors that made this evening happen!!

 

Raffle Doantions:

Kritter Knits & More

Peace Tree Brewing

Moonbugs Art Classes

Padded Little Seats

Grounds For Celebration

Radiant Om Yoga

Dishcrawl Des Moines

The Durr Family

Vander Sluis Chiropractic

Chick –fil-a Paradise Pointe

Tarre De’Amore Farms

515 Brewing Co.

Rogue Sweets

Noodles & Co. – Jordan Creek

J Sayles Design Company

Buy Fresh Buy Local

Confluence Brewing Company

Mo'Rub

Norwex

Vendors:

Confluence Brewing

Mo’Rub

Tamales Industry

Noodles & Co. - Jordan Creek

Rogue Sweets

 

Entertainment:

Jerry Lorenson

Dishcrawl Des Moines

Des Moines Derby Dames

 

Eat Play Love Des Moines Night @ Confluence Brewery!

Don't miss it!  Proceeds from this evening's event will go to Buy Fresh Buy Local Des Moines!  This is a family-friendly event!  Please RSVP on our facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/events/407552842680118/?ref=3&ref_newsfeed_story_type=regular

Fall Festival - WDM UMC

While Mandi was having a great time at The Great Pumpkin Party, we were having a great time at The Annual Fall Festival at The West Des Moines United Methodist Church at the corner of 8th and Grand in WDM.

This FREE event features inflatables (weather permitting), trunk-or-treating, a fire truck who throws candy, face painting and free food!  

The community is not only invited to attend, but to include decorated trunks to show off!  My son's favorite was the fortune-telling trunk.  

The fortune-teller told him he would grow up to be a gym teacher, I guess we'll find out if she was right in about 15 years =)

Another highlight was the fire-truck demonstration where the firefighter threw candy from stories above the kids.  Very cool.

Round out the night with hot dogs, chips, cookies and lemonade, all for just a free-will donation and you have a fun party!

What a great event.  Great to know our communities are offering such fun events in a safe environment and at a price that everyone can afford.

Great job WDM UMC!  Follow them on FB to keep updated on dates for next year's Fall Festival and other events that they hold throughout the year.

The Great Pumpkin Party

We are so lucky to have so many fun, free or inexpensive Fall and Halloween events around the metro.  We of course just can't make it to all of them (though we try!)! Luckily, I have super friends, like my friend Mandi (who is also the Des Moines Dishcrawl Coordinator) who loves to take her kids to do cool stuff.

Mandi had a great time at The Great Pumpkin Party at The Valley Church this week and was nice enough to share about her experience!

This was my first year going, and let me say I am disappointed that I haven’t taken my son every year! I walked in and was instantly in shock, I didn't know which way to go.

 I was as excited at my son was. We ran to the first bright and shinning thing, which happened to be a hall lined with tables of "hands on" chemistry things for the kids to get into.  Very cool. 

Thankfully in our front door goody bag there was a map. We began to come up with some organized plan to try to make it to everything. 

So many inflatables, games, face painting stations and crafts. They had two photo booths which I managed to drag my son to and get great photos at both. 

The lines where long for everything but well worth the wait. Across the street in the brand new community center, they had more inflatables and a petting zoo along with pony rides. 

As hard as we tried, we couldn't make it to everything, but the event runs for a few days so you could always go to the next night to enjoy anything your kid-o might not of enjoyed the first night. 


We especially love this event because they have a special evening just for special needs kids.  It's the same awesome party, but they understand that big crowds aren't always conducive to to some kids needs and they make it happen just for them.


And did we mention this event was all FREE?! Great job Valley Church!

Starbeque

Have you been to a Starbeque??

Out-of-this-world stargazing + summertime barbeques = SCI Starbeques! 

The Science Center of Iowa hosts this monthly event and here is their description:

Bring your blankets and get ready for a new summertime tradition. Gaze at celestial objects through telescopes.

This event is hosted at:

Ewing Park, 5300 Indianola Road, Des Moines some months and others on the front lawn of the Science Center.

This event is in partnership with City of Des Moines Park and Recreation the Des Moines Astronomical Society (DMAS).

Starbeques are free to attend and when at the Science Center they offer food and snacks for purchase.  Keep an eye on the calendar to see which location the event will be each month...here is the calendar.  September 2013's event will be held at Ewing Park on the 28th at 7:30pm.

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Illumifest

Illumifest held on September 28th, 2013 at 4200 Mills Civic Parkway (West Des Moines City School Campus) is A Fall Festival of Light. It offers a variety of activities and events for people of all ages!  The excitement begins Saturday afternoon with the inagural edition of the Illumifest Car Show.  The carnival rides and games will open Saturday morning and run throughout the day, and well as a wide variety of food stands.  Saturday evening will feature many of the Illumifest events that have made this festival the fastest growing community event in West Des Monies. 

*all information taken directly from Illumifest website.

Schedule of Events 4200 Mills Civic Parkway Saturday - September 28, 2013
Illumifest Car Show Registration	11:00-2:00pm
Carnival/Food Vendors Open	1:00pm
Illumifest Car Show	2:00-4:00pm
FREE Paddle Boat Rides	3:00-8:00pm
Chinese Association Displays and Exhibits	4:00pm
FREE Lantern Making (Limited to first 1,000 people)	5:00pm
FREE Hot Air Balloon Rides (Rides are limited  & allow only two people per ride, riders must meet height restriction to ride)	5:30pm
FREE Facepainting by Library Teen Board in the    WDM Library Cafe.	6:00pm
FREE Outdoor Movie - Disney's  "Brave"	7:30pm
Fireworks Extravaganza over the Campus Pond	9:00pm
Festival Concludes	9:15pm

The hands-on lantern making activity starts at 5:00 pm.  Get creative and decorate a paper lantern to light the night!  Each lantern comes with its own LED light to illuminate your creation!  Supplies are limited to the first 1,000 people, and when they are gone...they are gone.

FREE Disney/Pixar movie "Brave" will be shown on a HUGE outdoor screen Saturday evening!  Bring your blankets and lawn chairs and enjoy this fun movie on the lawn of the WDM Library at 7:30 pm.

FREE hot-air balloon rides will be available Saturday evening starting at 5:30 pm.  Three balloons this year for shorter waiting lines!  Weather can play a huge role in the number of rides available.  Rides are limited to only 2 people per ride, and riders must meet a height restriction in order to ride.   

Dinner en Blanc/FlashDine

Have you heard of a Dinner en Blanc?  The concept originated in France as a private dinner party where everything, including the invitees are decked out in white.  A public place is chosen but not revealed to the guests until the day of the event.  Think of it like a FlashMob (You know where singers show up in a public place and put on a concert for surprised onlookers.) but instead of singing, everyone sets up tables, brings food and has a huge dinner party.  

This year marked the 3rd year that Des Moines held it's own version of this special event thanks to some dedicated food-lovers in the area like Larry Cleverly, Kim Wall and Rachel & Sheila Formaro.

The fun part about Des Moines' version is that you don't have to be invited to attend.  Everyone is welcome!  

This year's surprise location was the Riverwalk, right beneath the The Hub restaurant.  It was a perfect, beautiful, shady location.  Last year's FlashDine was held in the Sculpture Park downtown.


I'm already excited to start planning my menu and decorations for next year's event as the best decorated table wins a prize!  Make sure you follow us on Facebook because I'll post the link to the event as soon as it's posted for next year.

While sitting by the river with a glass of wine and our picnic dinner was a perfect date-night, the fun came when we started sharing our dishes with old friends and new.

My tip for this event when you come next year (and I hope you will) is to bring extra food for sharing because conversations happen and friends are made over food.  Don't be afraid to go to other tables and make new friends.  

We are so lucky to live in a city where new concepts are welcomed and embraced!  Such a cool event.

The Italian Heritage Festival

We always have a great time at the Italian Heritage Festival in Des Moines.  2013 was a great year for the event.  In it's fourth year, this was the biggest one yet.  The festival was July 26th and 27th in Downtown's Western Gateway Park. Lots of great food vendors, free inflatables, crafts, face painting and balloon animals for the kids, live music and lots of fun contests like pasta-eating and bocce ball tournaments.  The festival is free from opening until 5pm when there is a $5 cover charge to get in.  Children 12 and under are always free to get in.

Of course we sampled everything from pizzelles to meatballs to Italian Nachos (which I highly recommend) to gelato and fresh squeezed lemonade.

The highlight (food-wise) was the Italian Nachos that were topped with beef and sausage, tomato sauce and mozzarella.  There was a topping bar of peppers as well.  So good!  My sons favorite was the Italian cookies.

While kids spent most of the time bouncing on the inflatables (I also really appreciated that they had boxes full of socks available for kids since in the middle of July a lot of kids wear sandals and sock are required for the bounce houses.) and doing crafts, they seemed to really enjoy the entertainment that we caught that day too which included a bagpipe player and dancers.

If you missed this year's event, mark your calendar for next year!  A great, free (during the day) family outing or a great inexpensive date-night!  Alway wonderful to be able to learn a little about Italian heritage, have some great food and have some fun.