Week One...

I wanted to give a quick recap of our first week... We didn't have much time during our first week to do so. It has been a pretty crazy last month!!! We couldn't really have asked for a better first week. If you were a part of that... we thank you. If you are far away... it was a smooth week filled with good coffee, conversation and community.

Monday morning came very quickly after our opening night... but it was fun to jump back into the world of coffee routine. I am happy to say that things went smoothly for our first week. We had a bus full of high-schoolers, Christmas in a cup, wi-fi, hat day, roller-bladin, latte art, guitar surgery, psiii line coffee delivery, 5x7=110, Zoka Way, good music, and lots more!!!

We are looking forward to working out the kinks, and rolling into December full steam ahead. Look for expanded hours, and other fun stuff as we get into it.

Hope your Turkey Day was a wonderful one... Shaky Tree certainly has plenty to be thankful for!!!

We Did It!!!

Opening night has come and gone... and last night I actually got over 6 hours of sleep! There was work going on up until the doors were opening, and it was all worth it to see the finished (well, almost) product. We had a full house (not too crazy like we thought it could be), and things went very smoothly. Mike Comfort was a great fit for our "Open House", lots of energy (and new faces)... as well as hearing one of his band members (from Sac) say, "this place feels like it could be in California." Our design goal certainly wasn't "California Cool...", but a "Rural Sophistication" that brings a certain level of atmosphere not normally seen in the rural midwest. We want Shaky Tree Coffee to be an oasis for anyone (rural farmer to urban traveler) looking for something of authentic quality to add to their day. Last night we took a giant step towards making that a reality... and had a lot of fun doing it!!! A big thank you to everyone who made it possible, both with physical help... or supportive energy!!!

I got a few more pics up (use the link to the right)... but not many of the actual event (to busy making coffee ;-)

T

Right now I am enjoying a beautiful cup of tea from the folks at Gong Fu Tea. We will be featuring their tea at Shaky Tree Coffee, and what a good fit... these guys do it right. If you are ever in Des Moines you should definitely check them out! If you are in NW Iowa you can come to the Tree and sample a few that I picked out today. I can't think of a better way to start out the last full day of preparation for our open house tomorrow. Yup!!! Tomorrow!!! Ahhhhh... Ok, time to do some running around and get back to Spencer.

Workin!

Starting up... again.
Originally uploaded by TreeBed.

Well, this is what we look like in the morning before our coffee gets us up and workin again. It is hard to believe the week is gone... geez!!! However, it was a big week, and we are feeling good about our pace. It has been a hard few days on the body (lots of long hours), but it has payed off. We are getting very close. One more big weekend of work... and then it is a whole new game of craziness (the craziness of actually being open ;-) Look out... here we come!!!