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Support for Sexual Assault Survivors in the Sauk Valley Area Sexual violence is any type of unwanted sexual contact, including sexual assault and rape. This can include words and actions like sexual harassment, catcalling, and nonconsensual sharing of private images, such as revenge porn. Nearly 1 in 2 women and 1 in 5 men have experienced sexual violence other than rape in their lifetime. Anyone can experience sexual violence, including children, teens, adults, and seniors. Sexual violence happens in every community. Healing and justice look different for every survivor. The YWCA of the Sauk Valley’s Sexual Assault Program offers a variety of services to help survivors heal in their own time and their own way. Support and services are also provided in Spanish. Often, people who have been sexually assaulted may not want to talk about the assault with family and friends. Young children may not realize they have been victimized. Older children may want to protect their parents. Teens and adults may fear losing their friends or hurting their family. They may also be concerned that they will be blamed, or they won’t be believed. YWCA staff and volunteers listen without judgment and believe survivors who call their hotline. It doesn’t matter what they were wearing, how they were acting, or if they were drinking. Sexual assault is never the victim’s fault. Some people who have been assaulted will go to the hospital for medical treatment, testing, and evidence collection. These processes can be invasive, lengthy, and confusing. YWCA staff and volunteers will go to the hospital to be with those survivors to support them, explain their rights and options, and help them understand their follow-up care. YWCA Advocates assist survivors who choose to move forward with the criminal justice system. Advocates refer them to the appropriate law enforcement agency or DCFS. They help survivors with Orders of Protection, Civil No Contact Orders, and Stalking No Contact Orders, and provide them with emotional support during the court hearings associated with the assault. Survivors can experience anger, fear, sadness, and other strong emotions. By talking to someone trained specifically to deal with sexual trauma, survivors are able to identify and develop healthy coping skills. The YWCA provides free, confidential counseling to survivors of all ages and genders. They also provide free counseling to family members who have been impacted by the sexual violence. If transportation is an issue, they work with their clients to ensure they can receive counseling services. YWCA counseling services are available no matter how recently or long ago someone was assaulted. Teens are at especially high risk for experiencing sexual violence. The YWCA leads teen groups at several area high schools. The groups provide a safe space for youth to talk about their concerns, struggles, and successes in dealing with sexual violence. Topics include healthy relationships, sexual harassment, consent, and cyber safety. Healing from sexual violence is a unique, ongoing process. Please contact the YWCA’s Sexual Assault Program at 815-625-0333 or 815-288-1232 if you or someone you know would like more information about services.
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Deer Grove, Erie, Fenton, Lyndon, Morrison, Prophetstown, Tampico
FALL/WINTER 2018
Publisher Don T. Bricker General Manager/Advertising Director Jennifer Heintzelman Editor Jeff Rogers Magazine Editors Lucas Pauley Rusty Schrader Page Design Lucas Pauley Published by Sauk Valley Media 3200 E. Lincolnway Sterling, IL 61081 815-625-3600 Articles and advertisements are the property of Sauk Valley Media. No portion of Small Town Living Magazine may be reproduced without the written consent of the publisher. Ad content is not the responsibility of Sauk Valley Media. The information in this magazine is believed to be accurate; however, Sauk Valley Media cannot and does not guarantee its accuracy. Sauk Valley Media cannot and will not be held liable for the quality or performance of goods and services provided by advertisers listed in any portion of this magazine.
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Story By Phillip Hartman & Photos By Michael Krabbenhoeft For Small Town Living
Examples of some of the wedding invitations that Davis has created.
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or Holly Davis, there aren’t many breaks between home and work. She’s constantly on the go as Deer Valley Country Club’s venue coordinator and graphic designer. Davis started in February, and helps schedule weddings, reunions, proms, and other events while working with future brides and grooms on getting their big day perfect with invitations and more. When Davis goes back home to Milledgeville, she’s got a new son, Koster, born June 19, and daughter, Breanna, 3, to keep her and husband, Clint, on the go. “I love time with family. My daughter loves the zoo,” Davis, 35, said. Davis, a Milledgeville High School graduate, said she taught herself how to do graphic design. She also honed her celebration planning skills by starting out in wedding invitation design at SBM in Sterling, where she worked from 2012 to 2017. “I designed more than 125 invitation sets my first year at SBM, both invitations and envelopes,” Davis said. Continued on page 7
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The Deer Valley Country Club offers a large space for weddings in Deer Grove.
Continued from page 5
Once she started at Deer Valley, Davis found the facility doesn’t have a slow season either. Davis also can create custom invitations for wedding parties, with no geographic limits. Most of the clients come from the Sauk Valley, with some from Princeton and Mendota. She also helps with decorations for receptions. Davis said many brides are going with rustic themes, using wood crates, burlap, lace and other materials. “I’ve got one in a couple of weeks going all modern. One bride did a book-themed wed-
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ding with library cards as save-the-date items,” Davis said. Often, engaged couples will bring their own materials or go to decorators, such as Selmi’s or Behrz Bloomz in Rock Falls. Davis’ work on invitations can be done with a quick turnaround. She has a number of printers and paper cutters in her office, and can create seating charts as easily as she can make signs. “They tell me what they like and don’t like, and I give them a sample. It can be done in 1 to 3 business days,” Davis said. Wedding ceremonies also can be held at Deer Valley, as well as receptions. About 25 percent of weddings at the club involve cer-
emonies as well as receptions. The facility can seat up to 450 people, and isn’t just for weddings. “We also do reunions, fundraisers, proms, business meetings, birthday events, graduations, and anniversary parties,” Davis said. Planning ahead is key for wedding and other reservations. Davis showed copies of an invitation she’s already done for Christmas. “You want to book at least 6 months out, and get invites in the mail 8 weeks before the wedding,” Davis said. She can do invitations for people who aren’t having functions at Deer Valley. One bride who contacted Davis is from Haywood, Wisconsin. s
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Prophetstown still feels impact of devastating fire, but the tight-knit community finds a strength it didn’t know it had Story By Pam Eggemeier & Photos By Michael Krabbenhoeft For Small Town Living
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Ann’s Hair Salon and Spa is one of two businesses to rebuild at the site of the July 15, 2013, fire that wiped out an entire city block in Prophetstown’s business district. Shown here are employees Alizabeth Craig (left), Ann Ford, Marissa Johnson and Ashleigh McEvoy. (Submitted photo)
t was Ann Ford’s longtime dream to bring her beauty salon downtown. Ford grew up in Lyndon and was a product of Prophetstown schools. She had been running the business from her home for more than 20 years and was finally ready to make the big move. An existing salon was available on Washington Street and her dream was within reach. Fate then intervened in the early morning hours of Monday, July 15, 2013, and the town of 2,100 would never be the same. “My husband went to work at 5 a.m. that day and called to tell me that a large part of the downtown had been destroyed by fire,” Ford said. She lived just a couple of blocks away, so she rushed downtown to join the other residents who had already gathered and couldn’t believe their eyes. “So many historic buildings were gone and the smell was awful,” Ford said. “It was unreal – everyone just stood around in awe.” Eight buildings were destroyed and two others damaged in the 300 block of Washington Street. Two brothers, then 12 and 16, were in town visiting their father. They had snuck out of his house and set the fire in a recycling bin filled with trash. When all was said and done, it had wiped out an entire city block. Continued on page 11
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Five years later, Ann’s Salon and Spa is one of two new businesses to build at the site of the 2013 fire. The other is IH Mississippi Valley Credit Union, which took three of the lots and moved from its previous site on Washington.
Continued from page 9
Ford’s downtown salon was gone, and she wondered whether her dream was, too. “I was finally in the process of moving downtown and I was standing there looking at the empty space where my business was supposed to be,” Ford said. “I was thinking that maybe this just wasn’t meant to be.” Five years later, Ann’s Salon and Spa is one of two new businesses at the fire site. The other is the area’s new anchor, IH Mississippi Valley Credit Union, which took three of the lots and moved from its previous site on Washington. Ford waited until the lots were available for $1 and decided to build her dream from the ground up. Her project was financed by her neighboring credit union, which had held the groundbreaking ceremony for its new branch on the 1-year anniversary of the fire. Ford will mark the second anniversary of her opening in August. While the path to bringing her business downtown is still difficult to
comprehend, the tight-knit community rallied around her efforts. “Everyone downtown was so supportive and the mayor did his best to try to take care of everyone,” Ford said. Sometimes it feels as if the tragedy occurred yesterday, but some aspects of the pre-fire downtown have already begun to fade from memory, Mayor Steve Swanson said. “This is a small town and people still talk about it a lot, but it’s only been 5 years and it can be difficult to remember where each building was,” Swanson said. The only displaced tenant in the fire area to move to another site wasn’t a business. The Prophetstown Historical Society moved to 302306 Washington St. in spring 2013. The family of Anita Oetzel donated the buildings to the historical society after her death. The upper floor of the museum had been destroyed, but many items on the first floor were saved. Many volunteers helped to salvage the artifacts, a common theme in the aftermath of the blaze.
“Donations came in to help with the process, everybody came together, and the city was cleaned up in 6 weeks,” Swanson said. “Another positive is that no one was hurt or killed. We were very fortunate because it happened in the middle of the night.” Some of the buildings had upstairs apartments. One woman, who was still asleep, had to be rescued. The city bought all of the lots from the owners and still has three of the parcels. While the $1 lot incentive remains, the mayor admits it can be hard to justify spending the money for a new building in a small town’s business district. Some of the space has been filled in with donated pine trees that are decorated for the holidays. “At this point, we’re open to just about everything at those sites,” Swanson said. “The pine trees are nice, but they don’t pay the bills.” The loss of sales tax revenue was minimal but noticeable. A couple of the businesses had planned to close and the historical society and a judge’s office were among the tenants.
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Continued from page 11
With many small-town mom-and-pop businesses already in survival mode, the fire added even more stress to the local economy. “I grew up here, and when I was a kid, a majority of us stayed, but there aren’t as many places to work and kids leave and never come back,” Swanson said. In addition to the loss of sales tax, jobs and property tax revenue was lost. Some of the people who lived in the apartments left town. “The Walmarts and Menards have been tough on small businesses, and we’re lucky to still have a drugstore and hardware store,” Swanson said. “The fire has slowed down activity at the rest of the businesses downtown.” The loss of Cindy Jean’s, a popular restaurant, has residents pining for another downtown eatery. Owner Cindy Eriks had considering rebuilding, but decided against it. Swanson had hoped they could have filled that void by now. The entire downtown is in a TIF district, and parts of it also are in the enterprise zone, which Swanson hoped would spur development. The local Main Street group has made facade grants available. Eileen Detra was the executive director at
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The following businesses and offices were destroyed in the July 15, 2013, fire in downtown Prophetstown. The only one that relocated was the historical society. • Cindy Jean’s restaurant • Twisted Scissors hair salon • Kim’s Monograms • The Ceramics Center • D’s Variety and Crafts • Prophetstown Historical Society • Office of Judge Vicki Wright Main Street at the time of the fire and still serves on its board of directors. She vividly remembers the tragedy and how quickly residents came together to get the community back on track. Like many other lifelong Prophetstown residents, the loss of such a large part of the historic downtown went beyond dollars and cents. “I was born and raised here, married a Prophetstown guy and raised five kids here,” Detra said. “It was devastating to stand there and watch those buildings burn down.” Main Street’s stated mission of helping downtown businesses had been taken to an almost overwhelming level.
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“We met with the mayor and community members and we found out how strong this little town was,” Detra said. “Our mayor played an integral role in helping us survive and so many volunteers came together.” Main Street has stepped up its efforts to sponsor events, including Arts on the Square, planned for Sept. 29 at Eclipse Square. The non-juried show will be from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. and a pet parade and costume contest will begin at 2 p.m. on the square. The Main Street Golf Outing is planned for Sept. 8 at Prophet Hills Country Club. The 33rd annual Lighted Christmas Parade will make its run Nov. 24. “This small community has struggled, but because there is so much pride, we realized it was worth saving,” Detra said. “We have a nursing home, a park district, a grocery store and a lot of things that many towns our size don’t have.” In 2015, Prophetstown received an award at the Illinois Main Street and Historic Preservation Conference that was created just for them. Prophetstown had submitted applications in two awards categories, both tied to efforts to rebuild the downtown after the fire. The awards committee decided to present a new form of recognition based on both applications, calling it the Phoenix Award. s
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Popped up from the peat
Baar & Sons Potato Farm offers more than potatoes
Story By Cody Cutter & Photos By Michael Krabbenhoeft For Small Town Living
Steve Baar’s grandparents didn’t have much when they emigrated to the United States from Holland in 1933. More than 85 years later, Baar and his wife, Gwen, do business with a variety of plants and vegetables using the same soil his family found along a bottom around Rock Creek near Fenton. Potatoes remain the specialty at Baar & Sons Potato Farm, 12712 Fenton Road. The large sign leading to the driveway reads “Baar & Sons Potato Farm,” but there’s more than just potatoes popping up on their peat.
Different kinds of potatoes and a wide variety of vegetables can be found at the farm, owned by Steve’s parents and maintained by the third generation of Baars. “His grandfather came over on the boat through Ellis Island with a rake or a shovel,” Gwen said. “They were broke, and started farming.” About 100 acres of property is set aside for corn, and 65 acres are for potatoes. “It’s potatoes, corn, beans, and 10 acres of garden,” Steve said. “It’s a pretty good-sized garden. It keeps us out of trouble.”
The large sign leading to the driveway reads “Baar & Sons Potato Farm,” but there’s more than just potatoes popping up on their peat. Gwen and Steve Baar grow a wide variety of produce on the farm near Fenton, which is owned by Steve’s parents and maintained by the third generation of Baars.
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The most common image of a potato is brown and oval-shaped, but there are more kinds of potatoes. The Baars raise red, white, Yukon gold and Russet potatoes – the latter the more-common brown-skinned variety – and raise more red potatoes than anything else. Yukon golds are a wetter and pastier potato with yellow, sweet flesh. Many stores like to carry the red potatoes because the others can turn green under fluorescent lights. They are the first potatoes to be grown and should be ready by mid-August.
“The red potatoes are a wetter potato, and are great for potato salad,” Gwen said. “The whites ones are good for baking, mashing and frying. They’re a drier potato and they’re flakier. They’re along the lines of a russet. We sell a lot of russets for multi-purpose potatoes, because they’re big and [people] like the size.” None of the potatoes have to be transported on road to the barn; rather, wagons traverse the many strips of dirt roads to collect the produce. Potatoes are dumped from wagons to a rear room of the barn and go through a potato grader. After passing through a dirt eliminator, the potatoes go up and through a sizer, where any that are less than 2 inches get weeded out. They then go through a washer and through dryer rolls, and a pair of workers grade them at the end of the line. Anything odd-shaped is a No. 2, according to Steve, and thrown into a different spot and bagged in 50-pound bags. The larger ones eventually get stacked onto 2,000- to 2,200-pound totes. Continued on page 17
Kohlrabi is one of the vegetables grown in the garden at Baar & Sons Potato Farm.
Gwen Baar pulls up some red potatoes at Baar & Sons Potato Farm.
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Continued from page 15
“If a potato sits dead on the ground, the skin toughens up,” Steve said. “We have a machine to make it a nice looking product.” Potatoes and cabbage were the original specialties, but Steve’s mother, Neva, expanded the farm to include a wide variety of vegetables. Asparagus, cauliflower, green onions, leaf lettuce, okra, peas, radishes, spinach, and tomatoes are among the common vegetables grown in the garden near the barn. The vegetables are Gwen’s specialty, and she likes them hand-picked. In addition to the farm, Gwen has a table at a farmers market in the Quad Cities every Wednesday and Saturday. “I didn’t really want to do it,” recalled Gwen, who didn’t grow up on a farm. “We had a child and I needed another job, and I knew [Steve] wanted me to become a part of it. I ended up loving it.” Among the vegetables difficult to find fresh at most stores are lima beans and kohlrabi, both are raised and sold at the farm. “People like it,” Gwen said of the kohlrabi. “It’s a member of the cabbage family. Most people eat it raw.” The secret to the Baars’ success lies in the soil – actually, it’s peat, which is light, spongy and can retain water better than regular soil. The area around the Baars’ farm was once part of a slough of the Mississippi River thousands of years ago when the river bed wound a few miles east of the current channel. Peat farms surround the Baars’ property on three sides. Upon entering the Baars’ property, a long driveway leads to a raised, at-grade Burlington Northern Santa Fe railway crossing. The peat, and most of the farm, lies east of the tracks, and the Baars have noticed a difference in the freshness of their produce depending on the type of ground. “The peat grows good crops,” Steve said. “Wet years, not quite so good; it can get back quick. It’s a high mineral soil. It’s good ground.” “Steve’s mom realized that the soil helped grow good root crops such as beets and carrots,” Gwen added, “Someone would say to her, ‘Can you raise my beans?’ and she started to do all these vegetables.” Baar & Sons Potato Farm is open from early May to late October, or until produce runs out. The Baars have a staff of four employees when potatoes are not in season, and around 15 during season – most of whom are friends, neighbors, or other farmers. Machinery keeps the potato farm operating efficiently, but there are signs of the original way of doing things on the property. The original barn sits to the left of the railroad crossing; half of it was razed recently. “It had one grader, and my husband’s grandmother would turn a crank on it all day so that it would roll to grade the potatoes,” Gwen said. “They were 100-pound bags, hand-sown with twine.” Times have changed, but the peat has not – and its kept Baar & Sons Potato Farm prospering and growing. s
Baar & Sons Potato Farm near Fenton grows a wide variety of produce, including carrots (shown below).
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Cassie helps kids shine Local dance instructor brings out the best in dancers at her academy
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Story By Jessie Kern & Photos By Michael Krabbenhoeft For Small Town Living
growing dance studio in Galt has seen a lot of success over the years and is preparing to take on another competition
season. Cassie’s Dance Academy, 13686 Galt Road, has been increasing in size every year since it opened in 2004. Cassie Foster had been involved in dance for several years before getting Cassie’s Dance Academy up and running, having taken over her sister’s dance studio in Geneseo in 2000. “We competed against another studio in Sterling in 2003, and I guess they were just impressed with us and they asked me if I would start a studio over here,” Cassie said. She said initially she wasn’t sure because she was happy at her studio in Geneseo, but after meeting with the interested Sterling residents there were about 50 people prepared to take dance lessons from her. She put together a packet and had people hand them out around town. “It was kind of a cool thing, because I didn’t really know these people but they just had confidence in me I guess, so it was kind of a cool thing,” she said. “So they got this place for me, the Grange, and I started a studio and it just grew and grew and then I closed my one in Geneseo because the one here just kind of took off.” Every year, more students come to Cassie’s and she currently has about 175 recreational students and 90 competition students. She said recreational students take classes just for fun
Cassie’s Dance Academy, operated by Cassie Foster, has been increasing in size every year since it opened in 2004.
and are offered ballet, tap, jazz and hip-hop. Competition students compete in ballet, jazz, tap, hip-hop, contemporary, modern and character dances. Cassie said she used to teach everything herself, but has taken on two former students, Kylie Reyes and Kallie Timmons, to teach the younger kids. The academy serves students age
2 and a half to seniors in high school. “They’ll grow up and I’ll see them graduate, so that’s been kind of cool to watch them become a little kid into an amazing dancer,” she said. “It’s kind of a cool thing to watch” Continued on page 21
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Students practice dance moves at Cassie’s Dance Academy.
Continued from page 19
She said her choreography here is more modern than what was being taught at her old studio, and parents appreciated that as well how she is with the kids – nice but direct. Stacey Kested, 40, of Sterling, said she started coming to Cassie’s Dance Academy recitals before her daughter, Ellie, was even born. Her niece danced at Cassie’s, so she’s been to the past 12 recitals. “I remember being pregnant with Ellie and I couldn’t wait for her to be born so she could
start dancing,� she said. “She started dancing when she was 2 and a half.� Kested said Ellie, 10, did recreational classes for a few years and started on the competition team when she was 5. She said Ellie loves dancing the theatrical jazz numbers. Her second year on the competition team, they competed in a small group theatrical number and won an award out of all age groups and styles to perform. “They were 6 at the time, and at their first competition they won the most outstanding dance of the entire day at the competition,�
Kested said. “It was pretty phenomenal.� She said all of the girls are really invested in dance, and it is one big family. She said the older girls are always taking the younger girls under their wings and everybody is always cheering each other on without competitiveness. “It gets better every year,� Kested said. “The dances change and are more amazing. ... I don’t know how she tops herself every year, but she does.�
Continued on page 23
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Cassie Foster, owner of Cassie’s Dance Academy, leads students through a dance routine.
Continued from page 21
Kested’s always amazed at what Cassie is able to come up with. “We’re just blown away, what she comes up with and what the girls are capable of doing,” she said. “I’m amazed at how quickly she pushes them and how much they can do at such an early age.” Kested said there are few teams with girls their age that can do what they can. She said when families from different studios sit near them in the audience it’s always cool to hear them talk about how amazed they are by their kids, because it’s got to be something special. “They seem to win a lot and it’s really, in my • Tee Shirts • Sweatshirts • Custom Design • Screen Printing • Provide your own design
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opinion, the choreography,” she said. “Every competition we go to, [Cassie] wins multiple choreography awards. So I think you can have good dancers, but if you don’t have the choreography it doesn’t stand out as much.” When things don’t come easy or naturally for some kids, Cassie said giving them an extra push and believing in them gives them selfconfidence and they bloom.
The competition team gets stronger every year and did incredible last season, Cassie said. Last year at competition, she won two choreography awards out of about 200 dances both times and the girls won first overall in most categories. “This is what I love, that we can have a class where we’re wild and fun and everybody’s jumping on each other and having a ball, “ Cassie said. “But then we can be cool, stop and be serious and do ballet and slow it down, and we just kind of go back and forth pretty easily between the two. “I just really like working with the kids; it’s rewarding.” s
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Head to the shed Small business in Erie offers many goods that residents used to have to travel miles out of town to get
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Story By Jessie Kern & Photos By Michael Krabbenhoeft For Small Town Living
ustom furniture, clothing, accessories, candles, coffee and more have made their way to a new business in Erie, and people are pretty excited about it. The Shed, 624 12th St., is a small shop, but it’s filled with a little bit of everything. What was previously a Quality Interiors has transformed into a business for home decor, gifts and more. Owners Nick and Erin Stern and Cal and Becky Bebon had been friends for years before deciding to take on another business together. Cal and Nick opened S & B General Construction in 2012, which The Shed collaborates with to make custom furniture. Erin said it all started when she asked her husband to make her a barn table. Nick really enjoyed making it and he made and sold several more. She said Cal then suggested opening a store to sell custom-made furniture. “It kind of just snowballed from there, that we went from having the custom furniture to, ‘Oh we can do home decor,’” she said. “And then we were like, ‘We should have clothes!’” Erin said it’s been a lot of learning as they go because none of them have retail experience. She said they went to a vendors market in Atlanta and enjoyed picking things out to sell in the store. “I grew up here so I kind of know pricepoints that work for people in this area and
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Erie residents used to have to travel out of town if they needed a new outfit for a night out on the town. Now, they can head to The Shed and look through clothes and purses from Revive in Dixon.
what they would be interested in buying,” she said. “Right now, rustic and farmhouse ... is really in, so we’re able to provide a lot of that and it’s fun to shop for it.” Becky said she and Erin were somewhat nervous about opening a business because they both have full-time jobs, but when Cal and
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Nick bought the building for their construction business they decided it was too nice to use just for a woodshop. She said it’s been fun getting into something new and learning all the time to run the business. Continued on page 25
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“It’s just exciting to see something new and I’ve kind of always been interested in decorating and the home decor kind of thing, so it’s just exciting to kind of be doing that now,” she said. Becky and Erin are constantly coming up with ideas to hand off to Nick and Cal, because their woodshop is right through the backdoor. “It’s very convenient,” Becky said. “They can get together on the weekend and build whatever we want them to, so it’s been really great to have that available to us.” She said they have gotten several orders where people have looked things up on Pinterest and asked if Nick and Cal can make it. “I think people are interested in that aspect of it, something different,” Becky said. “They know who to get a hold of now, who can make their furniture. Everyone that comes in seems to be excited that the friends opened the business in Erie, Becky said. “They don’t have to go out of town anymore if they need a little gift or the clothing,” she said. Erin said people can come in and request certain dimensions for furniture and they work with customers on what kind of wood and color stain they want. She said people really enjoy the custom pieces, furniture and decor, and Nick and Cal are constantly building more to keep the shop stocked. The shop also offers jewelry, coffee and tea from Steam Anchor Coffee in Fulton, candles and wax melts from White Meadows Candles in Erie, and clothes and purses from Revive in Dixon, which have been very popular. She said they also have smaller items such as keychains, cosmetic bags, insulated drinking cups, and lotions, hand sanitizers and lip glosses by Naked Bee. “We just wanted to add something new for Erie,” Erin said. “We just really wanted to make it really good, to make people want to come here and make the drive to come here.” s
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The Shed in Erie offers a variety of items – including coffees and teas from Steam Anchor Coffee and Cafe in Fulton.
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Cruise out to Kegger’s Sterling business owners have reopened a bar near Galt that you might barrel-ly recognize Story By Jessie Kern & Photos By Alex T. Paschal For Small Town Living
K
egger’s Tap House opened in Sterling recently and its owners want people to know it’s more than just a bar. Heath and Beth Warner, who also own Warner’s MVP Lounge, 3 E. Third St., and The Boulevard Pub and Grill, 2501 Ave. E, wanted their newest business, at 13464 Galt Road,to offer an environment that all ages could enjoy. “We could do everything that we wanted to do here,” Heath said. “We could have weddings, we could have banquets, we could have graduation parties, we could have benefits for fundraisers, we could have school functions.” The name Kegger’s Tap House is a nod to the bar’s 36 taps and 24 different bottled beers, as well as the whiskey barrel theme. Dan Winstead, owner ofthe neighboring Winstead Pallet Salvage, helped the Warners with design ideas and renovations. “I can’t take all the credit,” Heath said. Winstead helped transform real whiskey barrels from Wisconsin into tables. “He’s really good with designing and making things like that, so we ordered the table tops and he built the bottoms,” Heath said. “He made the tables himself up at his shop and they turned out wonderful.” Heath said they considered naming the place “The Barrel House,” but ultimately decided against it because there are so many across the country. He said Kegger’s is simple, catchy, and easy for people to remember.
Heath and Beth Warner have renovated and reopened a west Sterling pub as Kegger’s Tap House.
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Kegger’s Tap House has the Tap Room, Barrel Room, a banquet room, and a outdoor space called The Beer Garden. “The Barrel Room is what we consider our high-end restaurant,” Heath said. “We serve really, really good food.” He said there is a “really great atmosphere” and it’s “family friendly.” The space also features TVs so customers won’t miss a minute of the big game. Beth said they will also be building a tiki bar for the Beer Garden. “It’s a destination,” she said of the revamped bar that previously housed The Tin Roof Tavern and Cochran’s Pub before that. “You can be outside at the tiki bar, you could be at the bar, you can be in here golfing, you could have a benefit, and you can have the dining room. I mean there’s so many different things going and it’s for all ages.” Heath said he always felt the need for another restaurant to serve steaks and seafood, because the town didn’t really have that. “We want to be known for the best steaks in town, really good seafood, good wings, good burgers, great cold beer on tap,” he said. The tap system is the same one used at The Boulevard, and Heath said it’s the best tap system available. Beth said the size of the location is what drew them to open another bar. The Boulevard is not large enough to host bigger groups. “Sometimes people want to have private parties and stuff,” she said. “They love the food, but ... we just don’t have the space [at The Boulevard],” she said. She said they really wanted to change the atmosphere of the business and make it more family friendly. “That’s why we changed it,” Beth said. “We added a hood in the back so we could have a grill, so it’s a full-fledged kitchen now where it wasn’t before.” Along with the addition of more high-end food, Kegger’s Tap House also has slot machines and a golf and hunting simulator. There are multiple TVs in both the Tap and Barrel rooms for people to watch sports on and the Barrel Room also has a smaller version of the main bar built inside. “We could have just turned key and opened it when we got it in March but we’re like, ‘No,’ you know, we wanted to add the floor, we added the drywall, we built that whole new bar that wasn’t there, the bathrooms weren’t there,” Beth said. She said previously the Barrel Room had metal walls with a concrete floor so they wanted to make the atmosphere more comfortable and welcoming. General manager Serenia Law said people can reach out to her about renting the space out. She said people can rent any of the rooms, or the entire building if they’d like. Law said it’s been amazing to see the overall transformation of the building.
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