By Southland Savvy
Southland residents are invited to celebrate the Earth at a new, free event this year: Earth Day @ the Oaks. Earth Day @ the Oaks will be Saturday, April 17, 11 a.m.-3 p.m., at the Irons Oaks Environmental Learning Center in Olympia Fields.
Activities will include nature hikes, art projects, qi gong, a native landscaping workshop with Possibility Place Nursery of Monee and outdoor challenges, such as climbing up the 30-foot Climbing Tower (waiver required). Demonstrations will be held by the University of Illinois Extension, and Bloom High School will present its Bio Diesel Bus. Indoor activities include exploring the new Irons Oaks Discovery Center Museum and meeting with local, green exhibitors, including the Izaak Walton Preserve.
Entertainment will be provided by David Stokes, a naturalist and humorist from Wisconsin. Stokes uses songs, stories and hands-on materials to get kids actively engaged in learning. Live animals will also be included in his show. Catch him at noon, 1 or 2 p.m. The Illinois Raptor Center — a non-profit wildlife and environmental education center located near Decatur — will present Raptors 101, which includes meeting four different types of birds, at 1 p.m. A hot-dog lunch — compliments of Whole Foods — will be served until 1 p.m., and campfire s’mores will be served around 2:30 p.m.
The first 200 guests at the event will receive green giveaway items, compliments of Walt’s Food Center and the Irons Oaks Foundation. A raffle will be held for green prizes, including a rain barrel from Coyote Run Golf Course and a family picnic backpack from REI.
This free event is sponsored by Irons Oaks, the Homewood-Flossmoor Park District and the Irons Oaks Foundation with support from Whole Foods and Walt’s Food Center. Irons Oaks is a 40-acre nature preserve and a joint project of the Homewood-Flossmoor and Olympia Fields Park Districts.
For more information, call (708)481-2330 or visit ironsoaks.com.
About Me
- Bob Bong
- I have more than 40 years in the news business and have successfully evolved into an electronic journalist. Comings & Goings and Southland Savvy track news about businesses in Chicago's Southland.
Pet lover opens Best Bites pet food store in Palos Park
By Bob Bong
Southland Savvy
For Joy Metzger, of Orland Park, her new business was a natural progression, not to mention a mouthful.
Metzger opened Joy’s Best Friends Ltd. Best Bites the day after Thanksgiving at 13034 S. LaGrange Road in the Shoppes of Mill Creek plaza in Palos Park. She sells all-natural pet food for dogs and cats along with some other pet supplies and toys.
She said she decided to open the store as a result of her search for natural pet food for her boxer Layla after the pet food scare of 2007. Pet owners may recall that pet food contaminated with melamine was recalled by the FDA in 2007 but only after killing dogs and cats across the United States.
“I started trying to find all natural food for my boxer puppy Layla,” says Metzger. The quest eventually led her to open her own store.
“I sell all natural pet food made in the U.S.A,” she says. “There is no corn, no gluten, no soy and no animal byproducts in the food I sell.”
“I figured I should open the store while I can,” says Metzger, who has operated a pet-sitting service out of her Orland Park home for nine years.
“Business has been so far, so good for me. People always treat their pets nice, even in a down economy,” she says.
Pet sitting and selling pet food is a far cry from her previous job as a CPA. “I’m far happier now,” she says.
And the strangest pet she’s ever cared for?
“A bearded dragon lizard,” she says with a laugh.
For more information, call Metzger at 708-448-1515. Her Web site is being updated to reflect the pet food business. You can find it at www.joysbestfriends.com
Burrito Loco opens in Tinley Park
El Burrito Loco opened last week at 8005 W. 183rd St. in Tinley Park. It is the chain’s 21st location.
Burrito Loco is a place to go if you have a hankering for Mexican food either early or late. The kitchen opens at 8 a.m. daily and closes at 1 a.m. Monday through Thursday but not until 3 a.m. on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
For a complete list of El Burrito Loco locations, visit www.elburritoloco.net
Meijer update
Readers keep asking about the Meijer store under construction in a former Value City Department Store near 159th Street and Harlem Avenue in Orland Park.
Here’s what I know. The store will be 102,000 square feet. That’s about half the size of traditional Meijer stores. It’s one of the company’s two experimental “grocery-focused stores.” The first opened in January in Niles. The idea is less general merchandise in favor of grocery items.
The store will have a deli and a drive-through pharmacy. Meijer expects about 150 jobs when the store opens.
The store is expected to open in June.
I’ll pass along more as I hear it.
Southland Savvy
For Joy Metzger, of Orland Park, her new business was a natural progression, not to mention a mouthful.
Metzger opened Joy’s Best Friends Ltd. Best Bites the day after Thanksgiving at 13034 S. LaGrange Road in the Shoppes of Mill Creek plaza in Palos Park. She sells all-natural pet food for dogs and cats along with some other pet supplies and toys.
She said she decided to open the store as a result of her search for natural pet food for her boxer Layla after the pet food scare of 2007. Pet owners may recall that pet food contaminated with melamine was recalled by the FDA in 2007 but only after killing dogs and cats across the United States.
“I started trying to find all natural food for my boxer puppy Layla,” says Metzger. The quest eventually led her to open her own store.
“I sell all natural pet food made in the U.S.A,” she says. “There is no corn, no gluten, no soy and no animal byproducts in the food I sell.”
“I figured I should open the store while I can,” says Metzger, who has operated a pet-sitting service out of her Orland Park home for nine years.
“Business has been so far, so good for me. People always treat their pets nice, even in a down economy,” she says.
Pet sitting and selling pet food is a far cry from her previous job as a CPA. “I’m far happier now,” she says.
And the strangest pet she’s ever cared for?
“A bearded dragon lizard,” she says with a laugh.
For more information, call Metzger at 708-448-1515. Her Web site is being updated to reflect the pet food business. You can find it at www.joysbestfriends.com
Burrito Loco opens in Tinley Park
El Burrito Loco opened last week at 8005 W. 183rd St. in Tinley Park. It is the chain’s 21st location.
Burrito Loco is a place to go if you have a hankering for Mexican food either early or late. The kitchen opens at 8 a.m. daily and closes at 1 a.m. Monday through Thursday but not until 3 a.m. on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
For a complete list of El Burrito Loco locations, visit www.elburritoloco.net
Meijer update
Readers keep asking about the Meijer store under construction in a former Value City Department Store near 159th Street and Harlem Avenue in Orland Park.
Here’s what I know. The store will be 102,000 square feet. That’s about half the size of traditional Meijer stores. It’s one of the company’s two experimental “grocery-focused stores.” The first opened in January in Niles. The idea is less general merchandise in favor of grocery items.
The store will have a deli and a drive-through pharmacy. Meijer expects about 150 jobs when the store opens.
The store is expected to open in June.
I’ll pass along more as I hear it.
The lieutenant gov sweepstakes: Yearning for a job no one should want
Dean Koldenhoven, a literal profile in courage from Palos Heights, wants to be the next Illinois lieutenant governor.
"Is this for real? I hope it is. I want the job. I want to do it," Koldenhoven told the Southtown's Guy Tridgell. "If I do get the job, you will know the process was honest."
He won't get the job.
Just the fact that Orland Hills Mayor Kyle Hastings was on the panel selecting finalists speaks to the absurdity of how we're going to get the Democratic nominee to the most useless office in the constellation of statewide offices.
A decent man by all accounts, Koldenhoven's claim to Southland fame is his mayoral veto of a smarmy city council effort to buy an old church building to prevent a mosque from moving into Palos Heights. The move cost him his seat in the next election.
So unlikely a finalist is he, in the Beachood Reporter's "lieutenant governor brackets," Koldenhoven plays the role of "who's he? vs. who's she?"
Which is why he should get the job.
Dennis Robaugh can be reached at dennis@southlandsavvy.com
"Is this for real? I hope it is. I want the job. I want to do it," Koldenhoven told the Southtown's Guy Tridgell. "If I do get the job, you will know the process was honest."
He won't get the job.
Just the fact that Orland Hills Mayor Kyle Hastings was on the panel selecting finalists speaks to the absurdity of how we're going to get the Democratic nominee to the most useless office in the constellation of statewide offices.
So unlikely a finalist is he, in the Beachood Reporter's "lieutenant governor brackets," Koldenhoven plays the role of "who's he? vs. who's she?"
Which is why he should get the job.
Dennis Robaugh can be reached at dennis@southlandsavvy.com
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