CHERRY VALLEY TOWNSHIP – Shar Miller wanted to bring the community together as well as help her neighbors.
The Back-to-School Bash at The Petal Post, owned by Miller, was the perfect way to accomplish those goals.
“It’s just nice to kind of have that old-timey feel,” Miller said. “Everybody knows each other. If you need help, you can call your neighbor and they’ll show up, that kind of thing.”
“Today’s event is a Back-to-School Bash,” Miller continued. “We wanted to give stuff to the local community, school supplies. I’m taking donations and then people can pick up what they need or drop off more supplies. We also have some (Pymatuning Valley) FFA girls here helping to park cars and just helping out, passing stuff out, whatever we need them to do.”
The Back-to-School Bash brought in local vendors, many of them Miller’s neighbors, to The Petal Post.
“My neighbor from up the road and I like to work together,” Miller said. “She does a farm-to-table food truck (Nita’s Farm Fresh Café). She (Anita Stringfellow) raises her own beef and non-GMO grains. They grow their own corns, hay, everything (at Stringfellow Farms). She’s probably a mile or two up the road from me. Brian Edelman just started an ice cream truck this year. He’s another neighbor. He has ice cream from a creamery somewhere locally in Ohio.”
“My aunt, Tammy (Gale), is here with her Sweets and Treats,” Miller continued. “She does large crumble-style cookies and cakes. There’s Crumbled Bakeshop. They’re another of our neighbors. The Sassy Shack, I know her from family friends. She’s right in Orwell. Everybody’s local, and I’m trying to support local people. We’re just trying to get everybody together and have people come out.”
Miller donated some of the school supplies, as did the vendors who participated in the event. Donations were also received from the Yuhasz family and Three Brothers Garden as well as other members of the community.
Miller planned to divide any leftover supplies and give them to both the Grand Valley and Pymatuning Valley school districts.
Aside from local vendors, Miller donated $1 toward school supplies from every bouquet sold, and The Sassy Shack held a drawing for a school-branded backpack.
School supplies were also available for no charge.
“Being in a rural community, not everybody has a lot, so it’s nice to kind of give back, and everybody always needs school supplies,” Miller said. “Everything’s crazy expensive right now, so it’s nice to provide something back to the community. A lot of local people are who come to my business to begin with, so it’s nice to just support them.”
Miller enjoyed having the community come together at her farm.
“It’s nice meeting new people,” Miller said. “It’s nice seeing people wander around the farm and actually appreciate agriculture. I think a lot of people are out of touch with what agriculture really is. They think, ‘Oh, this is just a big factory farm.’ It’s not. This is a family farm. There are only four or five of us that run this whole place. It’s same with Nita’s farm. She raises her beef right there. It’s just nice for people to kind of see what goes into farming in general. It’s the same with the flowers. It’s a lot more hands on. I have pumpkins. You’ve got to do everything by hand.”
The first Back-to-School Bash was a success, and Miller hopes it can continue in the future.
“I’m hoping to have some more people show up,” Miller said. “I do have a photographer (Emerald Photography of Ohio) coming, and I know he’s fully booked. He’s another local guy. He’s from Geneva and he does mini sessions with families, couples, dogs, whoever. He does a really great job.”
“It’d be nice,” Miller continued. “I’d like to have the end of summer kind of festival thing every year, and hopefully, we start getting more kids, getting more supplies, and that kind of thing.”
