Star City Blog

Licorice International Hosts Gingerbread House Contest

As the holidays approach, so too does the enamored tradition of building those domestic comestibles known as gingerbread houses. Amidst graham cracker doors and whipped frosting floors is an enchanting tradition that encourages creativity, diligence and a zest for all things sweet.

And what better way to kick off the holidays than with a gingerbread house contest?

Gourmet candy shop Licorice International, located in the Haymarket on 8th and Q, will hold its second annual Gingerbread House Contest With a Twist from Monday, December 5 through Friday, December 16. 

“It is so much fun to have an old-fashioned type Christmas project that excites people,” store owners Elizabeth Erlandson and Ardith Stuertz said of the event. “We had a lot of fun ‘oohing’ and ‘aahing’ last year over the various creations.”

Registration for the event is free and must be completed by Saturday, November 26 at Licorice International. Six gift cards to the candy shop will be given out to the top three winners in two different categories. $50, $25 and $15 gift cards will go to winners in the adult category and $25, $15 and $10 gift cards will go to winners in the children (13 and under) category.

Upon registration, a list of rules will be given to each participant that includes the following:

• Everything (except the base) must be edible.
• Four (4) different types of candy from Licorice International must be incorporated into the design.
• Entries cannot be larger than 10 inches deep and 15 inches wide. Height is limited to 13 inches. 
• Entries will be judged on creativity and craftsmanship by a panel of judges.
• Entries must be personally delivered (not shipped) to Licorice International by 5 p.m. on Monday, December 5th.
• Winners will be announced on Friday, December 16th and entries may be picked up any time after that.

The event spawned from a haunted gingerbread house that was made by a Licorice International employee for Halloween last year.

“We loved it and thought, wouldn’t it be great to do this at Christmas and let others in on the fun,” Erlandson said.

The store had about 12 entries for the event’s inaugural year; among them a farmhouse with a barn, a log cabin, a Victorian house and an old German house. Last year’s winner was Hannah Becker for her entry “Temporary Elegance”, a design based on her childhood dollhouse.

2010 Winner

This year’s winners will be decided by a panel of judges that includes celebrity judge Judy a la Carte (Judy Gilliard), radio host for KLIN 1400 Sundays at 10:00 am.

An open house will be held on Friday, December 16th at the store from 4:00 pm to 8:00 pm where visitors may view the winning entries and enjoy free samples of candy and beverages.

“This is such a fun, family activity and offers great opportunity for creativity. Plus, the prizes are totally awesome,” Erlandson said.

Over the past week, the folks at Licorice International have been prepping their store for the impending holidays. The staff has ornamented their store with sumptuous festoons and has received new shipments of festive candies like Belgian chocolate-covered pretzels, gourmet salted caramels and white chocolate-covered toffee.

With colorful speckles and bright candy freckles, culinary architects will spread creativity, whimsy and holiday cheer at Lincoln International’s Gingerbread House Contest, while all the gingerbread men look forward to having many new places to call home sweet home.

Click here for a registration form for the event.

For more information on the event, call (402) 488-2230 or email licoricenews@licoriceinternational.com

 

via: Downtown Lincoln Association - Licorice International Hosts Gingerbread House Contest

The People's City Mission to Serve Thanksgiving Meal to Hundreds of Lincoln Homeless

The People’s City Mission will be serving up hundreds of turkey meals to Lincoln’s homeless on Thanksgiving Day this year.  Guests of the People City Mission along with others who attend on Thanksgiving will be seated at tables and waited on by over 90 volunteers including Nebraska Governor Dave Heineman and First Lady, Sally Ganem.  The menu includes turkey, stuffing, potatoes, cranberries, green bean casserole, dinner rolls, sweet potatoes and assorted pies.  The meal will be served at 11:15am and continue until 1:30pm. 

The People’s City Mission believes that everyone deserves a great meal, a place to stay and plenty of hope not only on Thanksgiving but every day.  People’s City Mission houses over 90% of Lincoln’s homeless and has served the Lincoln community since 1907. 

The People’s City Mission was started in 1907 by local churches, offering food and shelter for transient and impoverished men, women and children. In 1987, PCM moved to the current location, with expansions in 2002 and 2007 to accommodate more people and provide more security, and now houses 350 men, women and children each night in the emergency shelters and the Curtis Center transitional housing program. The Mission Distribution Center opened in 1990 as our primary distribution point for free food, clothing, household items, furniture, toys, and personal care items. The PCM Medical Clinic opened in July 2009 to provide free medical, dental, vision, and behavioral health care to low-income Lincoln residents without medical insurance. Last year that PCM has maintained non-profit status since 1934.  In 2010, the People’s City Mission helped 26,751 people in Lincoln/Lancaster County. 

PCM was recently awarded with a “Four Star” rating from Charity Navigator for the sixth year in a row! Less than 4% of all non-profits around the country have achieved this distinction. This rating is based on how well non-profit organizations utilize their resources and how much of a donor’s contribution is actually spent on the need being addressed and not administrative or fundraising costs. In 2009, PCM was able to use 91.9% of its donations on the needs of the less fortunate they serve. This places PCM in the top 1% of all charities in the country in regards to their financial efficiency.

 

For more information on The People’s City Mission, please visit: http://www.peoplescitymission.org/

 

 

 

If you would like to help the People’s City Mission feed the homeless of our community by making a donation, please mail your donation to People’s City Mission, 110 Q Street, Lincoln, NE 68508 or go to www.peoplescitymission.org and click on the black and white Thanksgiving banner.

 

 

Lincoln Ranked Second Best U.S. Retirement City

By Eric Jones 

As baby boomers hit retirement age, they’ve come to redefine what’s typically expected of the “golden years”. Many of them are not content to sit in a lawn chair and spray a hose over the garden while reading. They’re picking up side jobs merely for the pleasure of getting things done. Catey Hill of “Smart Money” released an article last Monday ranking some of the best places to retire in the United States. Lincoln came in at No. 2, besting even some of the larger tourist cities like Ithica, New York and Santa Maria, California. 

Hill cited that the reason for this is that Lincoln boasts one of the lowest unemployment rates in the nation. A mere 3.7% in a nation that’s stuck at an immovable 9%, and that’s drawing a lot of retirees who are not so keen on leaving the workforce. There’s also a direct correlation between low unemployment rates and low crime rates. Since most people with good jobs don’t have any reason to knock over a liquor store, Lincoln remains one of the safest places in the U.S. 

Another reason many are retiring to Lincoln is that it remains a safe haven from the dried up housing market. The recent foreclosure crisis has left those heading into their retirement years scrambling for a place to put down some solid post-vocational roots. In the desolate world of foreclosures and toxic assets, Lincoln remains an oasis. The cost of living in Lincoln is 6.7% lower than the national average. Housing prices here have essentially remained flat since the crisis started in 2007, making it a respite from the rest of the country’s woes. That’s just the kind of bastion that retirees are hoping to find. 

What Hill doesn’t mention is that Lincoln is one of the most unified cities in the nation as well. Even if retirees are not big football fans, there is a pride that comes from rallying together on Game Day that Lincolnites enjoy more than most other cities. The University of Nebraska football team is one of only six other teams to have won over 800 games, making them one of the best teams ever. They’ve also had a rich cultural history that spans over a hundred years, and have maintained strong ties to the community. 

The rich communal ties between Lincoln and football have woven the fabric of loyalty, brotherhood and sisterhood tightly among Lincolnites, and that is an attractive feature in a retirement location. Lincoln is a big city, but it feels small, and carries the advantages of both worlds.  Being located in the Great Plains gives it a direct route to some of the greatest scenic beauty in America. There are plains so flat that you can see three different types of weather from one spot. Also, since Lincoln is centrally located, it’s only a six hour drive to just about anywhere you’d want to go. 

 

When looking for place to retire, why lock yourself into one tourist spot when you can pay low housing costs and find a spot that will easily allow you access to places like Chicago, IL, Denver, CO, Minneapolis, MN, Madison, WI, and Omaha, NE? For retirees hoping for affordable travel, all the showiness of the big city with the courtesy of a small town, and luxurious living, you can’t beat Lincoln! 

Check out Catey Hill's regular column on retirement at SmartMoney.com, and Lincoln's stellar retirement statistics at USNews.com!  

 

 

 

Lincoln, Nebraska: Home on the Prairie | People & Places | Smithsonian Magazine

The thing you have to understand about Lincoln is that it falls under the radar. Unless you’re from Nebraska—or possibly South Dakota or Iowa—it’s probably not a place you’d think of visiting, much less moving to. No matter how unaffordable life becomes in Brooklyn or Portland or Austin, Lincoln is unlikely to turn up on a list of “unexpected hipster destinations.” But, being extremely unhip, I moved there anyway. In 1999, when I was 29, I traded New York City for it and stayed nearly four years. This was a strange thing to do, and it perplexed a lot of people, particularly because I did not, contrary to some assumptions, go there for school or a guy or because I was in the witness protection program. As a result, there’s a part of me that feels like an impostor whenever I write or even talk about Lincoln. I’m not from there, I don’t live there now, and when I did live there, I occupied an often awkward middle ground between guest and resident. By this I mean that even though I lived in a house and had friends and a relationship and a book club and a dog, I was always regarded as “the person who moved here from New York for no particular reason.” In Nebraska that translates loosely into “deeply weird person.”

via www.smithsonianmag.com

Excellent article that, to some degree, speaks to my own Lincoln experience (sans farm animals). I'm not “the person who moved here from New [Jersey] for no particular reason.”  (I came to unite my family with my brother's, and to start a new adventure.) Still, there's much I can identify with in Meghan Daum's article about her relationship with this unique place. Enjoy.

Nebraska National Guard Sargeant Wins Star City Blog eNewsletter Giveaway

Rick Carter of Lincon, Nebraska was randomly selected as the July 2011 winner of the Star City Blog eNewsletter Giveaway.  His wife Jessica Greenwald and their three children (shown at left with Dennis Kornbluh, publisher of Star City Blog) accepted the prize, a Barnes & Noble Nook Reader, on his behalf. Carter could not accept personally because he is currently stationed in Kandahar, Afghanistan where he is serving a tour of duty for the U.S. Army through May of 2012.

Carter is a staff sargeant in the Nebraska National Guard with a 22 year record of service. He specializes as a flight engineer for Chinook helicopters. Coincidentally, Rick is assigned to the same unit that lost two NE servicemen in the Chinook helicopter crash that claimed a total of 38 lives in Afghanistan on August 6. One of those servicemen, Sargeant Patrick D. Hamburger, was also a flight engineer and a resident of Lincoln.

"It makes it all real", according to Jessica, who plans to send the Nook to Rick in Afghanistan.

While he is at home, Rick is the Executive Director of the Human Services Federation, a non-profit organization that is based in Lincoln.  Rick and Jessica are both lifelong residents of Lincoln.

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The Star City Blog eNewsletter Giveway is a semi-annual drawing that randomly selects a subscriber to receive a Barnes & Nobel Nook reader.  All current subscribers are eligible to win.  Click here to subscribe to the Star City Blog eNewsletter.

Science Odyssey: Can Economics and Political Science Make Sense of the American Morass?

By Clay Farris Naff

Following a week of political agony and financial turmoil, we turn to the social sciences to try to make sense of what strikes many as irrational behavior among politicians and investors.

In Part 1 we hear from economist Michael Goldberg, Roland H. O'Neal Professor in the Whittemore School of Business and Economics at the University of New Hampshire. In Part 2, we hear from political scientist John Hibbing, the Foundation Regents University Professor of Political Science at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Policon, Part 1

Policon, Part 2

Clay Farris Naff is (claynaff.com) is a science author and blogger whose weekly radio program, Science Odyssey, airs Saturday mornings from 8:30 to 9 a.m. CST on KZUM, Lincoln's community radio station. You can hear it over the air at 89.3 FM or on the web live at kzum.org. Clay's science and religion blog on the Huffington Post can be seen here.

 

Science Odyssey: Do Floods Call for More or Less Control?

By Clay Farris Naff

With floods threatening much of the heartland, we talk with the head of the U.S. Corps of Engineers Missouri River Basin Water Management Division on how they have prepared for the floodwaters and why the current situation exceeds all capacity for containment.

Then we hear from the climate change adaptation director of the advocacy group American Rivers on why containment strategies may not be the best way to respond to increasingly violent swings in the weather.

Rivers, Part 1

Rivers, Part 2

Link:

http://www.americanrivers.org/our-work/global-warming-and-rivers/weathering-change.html

Clay Farris Naff is (claynaff.com) is a science author and blogger whose weekly radio program, Science Odyssey, airs Saturday mornings from 8:30 to 9 a.m. CST on KZUM, Lincoln's community radio station. You can hear it over the air at 89.3 FM or on the web live at kzum.org. Clay's science and religion blog on the Huffington Post can be seen here.

Lincoln Bicycle Repair Kitchen Receives Community Grant

By Joe Younglove

 Loose brakes? Flat tire? Rusty chain?

The Near South Community Bike Kitchen has you covered; and thanks to a $1,500 neighborhood mini-grant the organization was recently awarded by the Lincoln Department of Urban Development, their mission to provide free bicycle repairs to Lincoln residents just got that much easier.

Photo by Joe Younglove Lindsay Graef and Drew Nelson work at the Near South Community Bike Kitchen on a recent Sunday.

The kitchen, located at 1720 S.15th St., had several people milling about during a recent visit, helping each other get to the bottom of any bike issue you can imagine.

Travis Davis of Urban Development said the Neighborhood Mini-Grant Program is for low- and moderate-income neighborhoods. He said any neighborhood association can apply for a grant, as long as it’s to be used for a visible project.

“The selection committee selects proposals that seem the most viable,” Davis said. “We feel like helping the bike kitchen in any way is definitely important for the community.”

Other recent grant recipients include the South Salt Creek Community Organization’s Standing Bear Park Project, and the University Place Community Organization Farmers Market.

Literally Running for Dollars

You don’t even have to run! This fundraising race takes place Saturday, June 4th, starting at 7:30 am. We’d love to have you join one of our teams in the 10K run, the 3K run, or the 3K walk. Our teams are called Go Big Read! The entry fee is $17 per person payable to Lincoln Track Club, and you can register online at www.lincolnrun.org/Havelock/havelock.htm.

via lincolnliteracy.org

After Fukushima | The Humanist

By Clay Farris Naff
Via TheHumanist.org

This past March was a great time to invest in gas masks. Or machetes.

These, along with iodine tablets, were among the many items Californians rushed to buy in response to the crisis at the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant on the northeast coast of Japan, following the March 11, 2011, earthquake and resulting tsunami that devastated parts of the country ...

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