The Leelanau Peninsula Wine Trail has announced the launch of its newest winter event, Snow on The Vines, taking place Feb. 20–22. This inaugural winter celebration invites wine lovers to experience the charm of Northern Michigan’s wine country wrapped in a cozy, snow-kissed setting.
Lucky 7’s took the gold medal for the best chili at Glen Arbor’s annual Winterfest held on the deck at Boonedocks on Saturday, Feb. 14. The crew at Crystal River Outfitters finished second. Boonedocks placed third. Meanwhile, Paul Blome won the inaugural Ken Fosmore Memorial Ice Fishing Tournament on the Glen Lakes with a 14 and 1/8-inch perch. Nick Rice finished second with a 13 and 5/16-inch catch. Madeline Carrol took third-place honors with a 12 and 7/8-inch fish. And Ron McNeal finished fourth with a catch of 12 and 3/4 inches. Proceeds from Winterfest are given out on senior scholarship night at Glen Lake School to deserving students to help offset college tuition.
Glen Arbor hosts its winterfest the Saturday of President’s Day weekend, which this year falls on Feb. 14. The event includes a chili cook-off on the deck of Boonedocks restaurant from noon-3 pm and an ice fishing contest on the Glen Lakes from 7 am-1 pm.
One week after Fernando Ramirez was released from the massive federal immigrant detention center in Baldwin, he sat beside his eldest grandchild Liam on Jan. 17 in a family member’s home in Grand Rapids and placed a lit candle in the 13-year-old boy’s birthday cake. “You are affectionate and charismatic. I wish you everlasting happiness,” the abuelo told the newly minted teenager. During his more than three months at the North Lake prison, Fernando became a leader and advocate for fellow prisoners in his pod—most of whom were Hispanic. Older than most, and fluent in English, he interpreted for them, bonded with them, encouraged them to eat meals, remain active and avoid sleeping too much. Meanwhile, his daughters Samantha and Nahomi quickly realized that they could play a critical role in supporting not just their father but his fellow detainees at North Lake. The sisters helped members of Fernando’s familia inside the prison walls reconnect with their own families. They interpreted for family members who didn’t speak English, and sometimes phoned the North Lake staff to share important medical information. Late last year they started a Facebook page called “Raíces Migrantes” to help families in West Michigan whose loved ones are detained by ICE—many of them at the North Lake facility in Baldwin.
It’s a community party. It’s a mystery. And it’s a delicious farce. Welcome to the next Cocktails, Canapés, and Comedy theater production, courtesy of the Northport Performing Arts Center. The two-act play Unnecessary Farce involves two cops, three crooks, eight doors and plenty of laughter. The plot revolves around a corrupt mayor who is meeting with his female accountant in a motel, while in the room next door, two undercover cops wait to catch the meeting on video. There’s some confusion as to who’s in which room, who’s being videotaped, who has the money, who hired a hitman and why. Plus, why does the accountant keep taking off her clothes?
Report from the resistance to ICE’s invasion of Minneapolis: “We take the bags of groceries—dried beans, rice, cornmeal, plantains, avocados, fruit pulps, meats I don’t recognize and juices with names I can’t pronounce—and load them into the IKEA bags in my trunk. Quickly, in case Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents are nearby. Five deliveries today, down to Eagan, out to Woodbury, and a few in St Paul. The car smells like tamales. This isn’t our usual Sunday afternoon Trader Joe’s run,” writes St. Paul resident Julia Wheeler Ludden, who was raised in Leelanau County. “We’ve been coming here for weeks now, picking up groceries to deliver to families “sheltering in place.” Usually reserved for natural disasters, this phrase now applies to many people of color in Minnesota. It’s anything but natural, and yet, two months into the largest federal immigration roundup operation in U.S. history, it has started to feel normal. White folks and brave Black and Brown U.S. citizens deliver a lot of food these days. We all follow the same protocols: Text when you arrive. Don’t knock. Expect dark windows, shades drawn. They’re home.”
Remembering a near-death experience on frozen Lake Michigan. It was Super Bowl Sunday of 1984, and the carefree 15-year-old girls wanted to find ice caves. Karen Gros and Bobbi Boos, students at the Leelanau School north of Glen Arbor, walked onto frozen Sleeping Bear Bay in search of tunnels and mammoth formations they expected to find on Lake Michigan. The girls suddenly found themselves on a chunk of ice that broke off from the pack and began floating away from the shore. Suddenly, the ice on which they stood began to disintegrate into smaller chunks.
John Arens reflects on the coffee company—and Glen Arbor mainstay—he and his brother Steve launched 33 years ago. They sold the company early this year to Grand Rapids-based Schuil Coffee Co. Leelanau Coffee opened in 1992 on Lake Street, sharing a 500-square-foot space with another startup called Cherry Republic.
Thirty-three years after two brothers started the locally loved—and widely recognized—Leelanau Coffee Roasting Co., they sold it. The acquisition officially took place on New Year’s Day when Grand Rapids-based Schuil Coffee Co. took it over. Like Leelanau Coffee, Schuil is a specialty, Michigan-based roaster that’s withstood the test of time. In fact, when Garry and Gladys Schuil started the company in 1981, it became the first specialty coffee roaster in the state. Inside the Glen Arbor cafe, things feel unchanged. “Right now, it’s business as usual and will be for the foreseeable future,” said Mara Miller, the cafe’s manager and one of its longest working employees.
Grocer’s Daughter Chocolate in Empire is closed today, as part of a nationwide “ICE OUT!” day of protest to call attention to the federal agency’s aggressive tactics in Minneapolis, which have resulted this month in the killing of two U.S. citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti. The Folded Leaf bookstore in Cedar will also close today in solidarity with protests against ICE. Traverse City Area Public School high school students are also planning a walk-out this afternoon to stand in solidarity with Minneapolis and protest ICE.