{"id":6012,"date":"2017-05-10T07:22:26","date_gmt":"2017-05-10T15:22:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wou.edu\/westernjournal\/?p=6012"},"modified":"2017-05-10T07:22:26","modified_gmt":"2017-05-10T15:22:26","slug":"saturday-means-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/saturday-means-community\/","title":{"rendered":"Saturday means community"},"content":{"rendered":"<pre>By: Zoe Strickland\r\nManaging Editor<\/pre>\n<p>Every Saturday from April to November, you can find a community of vendors in downtown Independence.<\/p>\n<p>These vendors are either part of the Independence Farmers\u2019 Market, located in the parking lot of Umpqua Bank, or the Independence Riverview Market, which is held in the Riverview Park Amphitheatre. The Independence Farmers\u2019 Market has been around since 1993, with the Riverview Market joining the vending scene in 2012.<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernjournal\/files\/2017\/05\/farmersmarket-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"329\" height=\"219\" class=\" wp-image-6050 alignright\" srcset=\"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/files\/2017\/05\/farmersmarket-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/files\/2017\/05\/farmersmarket-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/files\/2017\/05\/farmersmarket-1024x683.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 329px) 100vw, 329px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The Independence Farmers\u2019 Market has a variety of vendors selling everything from homemade cat toys to produce. Both markets also have masseuse tents set up.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt goes up and down. The most we\u2019ve ever had is 15, and I think now we\u2019re down to, like, 12,\u201d said Marti Sohn, owner of TDM Acres, when asked about the size of the Independence Farmers\u2019 Market. Sohn has been a vendor at the market since 1998.<\/p>\n<p>While walking through the market, it\u2019s apparent that there\u2019s an encompassing sense of community within the vendors.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI just &#8230; I love this atmosphere. All the vendors are real people. There\u2019s nothing phony about a farmer\u2019s market; it\u2019s a good place,\u201d said Cheryl Gaston, owner of Cheryl\u2019s Cottage Bakery, who has been a vendor at the Independence Farmers\u2019 Market for two years.<\/p>\n<p>The same customers tend to visit the markets every week.<br \/>\n\u201cI have some fans now,\u201d said Gaston.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBest challah bread around, makes the best french toast ever!\u201d interjected a passerby.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat\u2019s my favorite part. I mean, people like what I do. You can\u2019t beat that,\u201d continued Gaston.<\/p>\n<p>The Independence Riverview Market had an equal number of vendors, but a more independent atmosphere. The vendors were primarily selling homemade goods, with only two stands selling produce.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFor us, our farm is five minutes away. So being able to connect directly with the people that our produce and meats are feeding is amazing,\u201d said Malinda Bermudez, of Bermudez Family Farm. \u201cI like being able to educate people on where their food is coming from, and a lot of people really appreciate that connection &#8230; it\u2019s very rewarding,\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The best piece of advice that the vendors had to offer? Sohn suggested that college students should just \u201ccome on down.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Contact the author at journalmanaging@wou.edu.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By: Zoe Strickland Managing Editor Every Saturday from April to November, you can find a community of vendors in downtown Independence. These vendors are either part of the Independence Farmers\u2019 Market, located in the parking lot of Umpqua Bank, or the Independence Riverview Market, which is held in the Riverview Park Amphitheatre. The Independence Farmers\u2019 [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":937,"featured_media":6050,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6012","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"modified_by":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6012","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/937"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6012"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6012\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6050"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6012"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6012"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6012"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}