Welcome back to the Kawartha Commons newsletter! We hope you enjoy it and we welcome feedback and ideas.  Send to outreach@kawarthacommons.ca .      

NEW READERS who are asking “What is cohousing? What are KCC’s goals? What will the building and site be like?” “How can I find out more?” will find lots of information on our website: https://kawarthacommons.ca/

This newsletter and subsequent versions will have three main sections.

1. UPDATE ON THE SITE AND THE BUILDING 

2. GETTING TO KNOW OUR PETERBOROUGH: What Peterborough area has to offer you.

3. OTHER KCC NEWS

1. UPDATE ON THE SITE AND THE BUILDING

The big news is that the City has just replied to the “concept design” by our architect, Coolearth. As background for newer readers, the first step in seeking site approval from the City is a pre-consultation meeting, at which all relevant City departments listen to a presentation by the developer (us) and then reply with requirements or suggested changes. The roughly 14 studies required include, for example, a traffic study, a down-stream sewage study, a soil study and a tree inventory. They also include a consultation with local First Nations over possible archaeological interest (completed with no artifacts found). An initial design by Lett Architects was presented for pre-consultation in May 2023. There were no serious red flags from that pre-consultation, nor from our revised concept design.

The next step is to provide the results required by the pre-consultation, as part of a “Technical Adequacy Review” (TAR). Laura Stone, of One Community Planning, has been retained to guide KCC’s application through the TAR. This will include a plan for a public consultation with the neighbours. If all goes well, construction could start as early as mid-2025. Coolearth reports that their preliminary energy modelling is consistent with the high energy-efficiency Passive House standard.

The current building design has been sent to a firm that will provide an estimation of construction costs, expected by mid-June. This will enable an updated estimate for prices of individual units. 

2. GETTING TO KNOW OUR PETERBOROUGH

Peterborough is a vibrant community with strong arts and sports components. In the next several newsletters, we will explore the variety that is available. This series, called Getting To Know Our Peterborough, begins in this issue with an overview of the arts in Peterborough by Bea Quarrie. Bea, a long-time resident of the city, is very involved in both the dramatic arts (primarily through the Peterborough Theatre Guild where she regularly directs plays) and the visual arts (through her own painting). Bea was a long-term adjudicator for various Ontario theatre festivals. 

Getting to Know Our Peterborough - the ARTS by Bea Quarrie

 Many entry levels exist for anyone seeking to sample theatre, visual arts or music and dance, spoken word poetry. Commercial as well as community events throughout the city happen regularly but how does one find out about them? Usually events are reported on after they've happened, and with the demise of print in daily newspapers, there is no central website or news outlet listing available offerings. However, Kawartha Now (https://kawarthanow.com/) offers an online summary that is updated weekly.

Institutional offerings from the Art Gallery, Showplace and Market Hall, feature the Symphony, choral groups, and international dancers. New Stages, 4th Line Theatre, Peterborough Theatre Guild, St James' Players, Trent University's Indigenous Theatre works and The Theatre on King Street continue to offer their works. Musicians regularly  make the restaurant/bar circuit. In addition there are grassroots activities; for example,  Trent Valley Archives has added theatre presentations to schools, featuring our collective history.

This past week's offerings provide a glance at how diverse and robust the arts are here. I attended the first ad-hoc meeting of artists in any discipline coming together to talk about their work. A dancer presented his experimental piece to get some feedback from the other artists present. Numerous dance studios exist in town, but working on a new piece in isolation without available large space is difficult. A film foley, working out kinks for a soundscape for a rare 1902 silent film, wanted to hear back if her work was reaching the onlookers. A puppeteer lamented her puppet's technical problem and wanted some feedback on how to overcome her writer's block for an upcoming show. An emerging sculptor explored adding spontaneous sound/music to his metal works, elusive as that may be. A young mother and aspiring playwright wanted to know if her stories would find any resonance with outsiders because they were very personal. Everyone left the gathering energized, ready to work further on emerging pieces that will add to the discourse in our community.

At a pay-what-you–can event at the black box Theatre on King Street on May 1st, a play reading chronicled the dark history of eight Canadian working men imprisoned for their belief in Communism in the early 1930's. The audience was diverse and mainly young, some devotees and some new walk-ins.

The arts are in transition here as they are everywhere. Since Covid, we are all morphing. Communing together, having civilized dialogue, dignifying grass roots work will help us see what our relationship to the arts will be in the future. It will hopefully help define our collective voice in a turbulent world.

Coming event: Peterborough’s free outdoor summer concert series Musicfest runs every Wednesday and Saturday night at Del Crary Park, from June 29 to August 17. Bring your lawn chairs and a blanket for cold nights. The great lineup includes Metric, a Canadian indie rockband. Singer Emily Haines has family ties to Peterborough.

3. OTHER KCC NEWS

A Super Weekend of Community and Connection, April 19-21   by Aukje Byker

How do you build community when not everyone lives close by? By holding Super Weekends. A Super Weekend is when members near and far gather to get to know each other and Peterborough better. We spend an action-packed weekend engaging in a variety of activities, such as pot lucks, dinners in restaurants, a tour of downtown Peterborough, small group gatherings and large group gatherings. As much as possible we provide accommodation in members’ homes for those from out of town to make it easy for them and to facilitate an immediate personal connection.

Building community is one of the most important aspects of cohousing. Yes, the building itself is important, but the connections with the community and wanting this group of people as your neighbours, is the main thing that sets cohousing apart from other types of housing.  

The weekend of April 19-21 was our fourth Super Weekend. As always, this weekend included a lot of meals as sharing over a meal is one of the best ways to create community. And sampling different local restaurants also helps us all to get to know Peterborough better. This weekend we shared meals at: Fresh Dreams, a local Spanish restaurant everyone raved about, Village of Thai, the Vine and the Cork and Bean.  Peterborough has so many wonderful places to eat or just go for a coffee or tea.

Restaurants are wonderful, but sharing meals in people’s homes is more intimate.  On Saturday evening after a busy day we all went to Al and Linda Slavin’s house for a relaxed potluck dinner followed by some communal music making - another great community-building activity.

On Sunday, a few local KCC members had several prospective neighbours over to their house for brunch.  This was a great opportunity for getting to know people in a smaller, relaxed setting, and for members to share the many benefits of cohousing.

The weekend included a walking tour of downtown Peterborough and the Spark Festival (a May photographic celebration with displays around the downtown) a great opportunity for those who don’t know Peterborough yet to get to know it a bit and see some of what it has to offer. A workshop to look at how to distribute, in a balanced way, the work that is involved in being part of KCC was also held.

Of course seeing where our future home will be is a highlight. During the weekend there were 2 different opportunities to visit our site at 736 Maryland Ave. Someone from our Project Development Circle was there each time to explain where on the lot the building will be situated, and what needs to be done yet before we can start building.

These weekends allow us to get to know those new to Kawartha Commons and likewise for them to meet us face-to-face and find out more about the project, with a view to whether it might be a good fit for them. The next Super Weekend is planned for July 19-21, but there will be other smaller social events happening before that.

FOOD, GLORIOUS FOOD: Recipe Highlights

We started a recipe record several years ago – pre COVID - when we were meeting for regular potlucks and had great recipes to save.  It feels good to revive that habit and start naming the great food that each of us prepares. Maybe we can have a cook-off after we gather a few more taste sensations. 

The recipe below was a favourite at Myra and Tom’s brunch on the Sunday of Super Weekend. A big thanks goes to them for providing such good food, wonderful conversations and a great tour of their garden including the chickens.                                                                                                                                   

OVERNIGHT CREME BRÛLÉE FRENCH TOAST (yield: 6 servings)

INGREDIENTS

6 tablespoons (85 g) butter

¾ cup (159 g) packed light or dark brown sugar

2 tablespoons pure maple syrup, can sub corn syrup

6 to 8 1-inch thick slices country-style bread, cut into quarters or cubes

4 large eggs

1 cup half-and-half

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

¼ teaspoon salt

INSTRUCTIONS 

Add butter, brown sugar, and maple syrup to a microwave-safe bowl, and microwave for 1-2 minutes, until the sugar is dissolved. Stir to combine. (This step can be done in a pan on the stove.)

Lightly grease a 9X13-inch pan with cooking spray.

Spread the brown sugar mixture in the bottom of the pan and arrange the bread cubes in a single layer over the top, squeezed together so there’s no space between them.

In a bowl, whisk together the eggs, half-and-half, vanilla, and salt.

Pour the mixture evenly over the bread.

Cover the pan and refrigerate overnight (8-10 hours).

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Once the oven reaches temperature, bake for 25-35 minutes, until the bread is golden and the caramelly syrup is bubbling. Cut into squares and flip each portion upside down onto plates, so the syrup is on top of the square.

Optional: serve with berries and/or whipped cream (unneeded, in my opinion 😄)