Enjoy fresh vegetables and other offerings at the Omaha Farmers Market in the Old Market on Saturdays.
It runs every Saturday from 6 May to 14 October from 8 AM to 12:30 PM.
Location:
Old Market at 11th & Jackson Streets
Nothing like being in the right place at the right time for some unexpected fun.
You never know what you will see in Omaha and this was definitely nutty-the Planters Nutmobile.
Thank you to “Cashew Katie” for the interview which will be posted later. Please come back later to read it.
For now the #Nutmobile!!!
The outside is fun but what is the inside like?
Omaha Street Percussion is coming back middle of the day. They’ve been performing for us for several years. They’re a great performer and are very much interactive with the crowd. They generate a lot of excitement and energy. We’re excited about that. The pancake breakfast is back this year. New this year, one of the local Boy Scout troops is going to be running the pancake breakfast.
Are they volunteering or making the pancakes?
They’re making the pancakes. It’s a fundraiser for them. St. Cecilia is taking over our Kids Village. They do a fall carnival every year. And so, we’ve asked them to kind of do a mini carnival for the day. We’re excited about that. We are really excited about going from just having a collection of bounce houses to actually having something really interactive and growing that part of it. Music kicks off at four o’clock. Like we’ve been doing for the last few years, there’s no charge to come in. It’s family friendly, all ages.
What we do is, if you want to buy alcohol, you have to have a wristband. You get the wristband by doing an ID check which is $10. You pay $10 for the ID check to get your wristband. That’s basically a cover charge, if you want to drink, and covers our expenses. And that allows us to create a very family friendly, no gated admission, come and go as you please, great event. Music will go till midnight. It is nonstop from four to midnight, eight solid hours. While the main scheduled bands on the stage are changing out their equipment between sets, we have acoustic groups perform in between. So, like I said, it was nonstop. During the day we’ve got some poets from All Rights Reserved, which is the spoken word, high school teenage spoken word competition. They’re going to perform some of their work during the day. We get a little bit of everything. Really excited, about it.
We’ve got a phenomenal production team. We couldn’t do it without the production team. They’re a bunch of aces and they are always looking for new stuff to do and [the attitude is] “I can do that and I can do that.” It’s a lot of fun working with them. It makes my job very, very easy.
It’s very easy to see and from meeting you before and being around here, that Dundee is a wonderful neighborhood and that you have a great love for it as well. Tell me a little bit through your eyes about the neighborhood.
I was born in Miami and Fort Lauderdale and I spent most of my adult life in Atlanta. So, you know growing up as a kid, as a young adult, the idea of a small town was foreign to me. There is an area of Atlanta called Virginia Highlands. That is the Atlanta version. It is to Atlanta what Dundee is [to Omaha]. My wife and I always loved going into Virginia Highlands’ small shops and restaurants, but wasn’t necessarily you know, we didn’t live there. When we were first looking at moving to Omaha years ago, our first thought was [Dundee] was just like the Virginia Highlands. It’s a small town in a big town. All relative, right? What I have grown to love about Dundee is that- not that it doesn’t happen in other parts of Omaha -but for me, it happens here where I know a lot of the people on my street. I have great conversations. And through Dundee day, I’ve gotten to know merchants and have great interactions with them when I get a cup of coffee, go to the dentist, get my hair cut. You know, it’s all merchants that I interact with and treat me like and make me feel like a local. On Dundee Day, I see so many people that I know between my neighbors and my friends and my coworkers and the merchants and it just becomes one big friendly neighborhood party. So, the quality-of-life element there is unmatched.
Tell me a couple of new things about Dundee Day. Anything else?
Dundee Draws is definitely our big thing, 150 vendors and the food truck park is definitely a new feature. And the rest of it is the classics we love. The pancakes are back. The used book sale is back. Some of our favorite vendors are back and [there are] a lot of great new vendors.
One of the things I came to notice last year that I am really proud of is the diversity of our booths, not just the subject matter, but so many of our booths are woman owned or the point of contacts are women. A lot of independent artists and crafters are women and minorities and it gives me personal satisfaction to know that our event is a comfortable place for those folks to come out and have their booths on display. So, that’s exciting. I mean Dundee and Omaha in general are definitely diverse and inviting compared to maybe to the rest of the state or the rest of the Midwest and so it’s neat that our festival mirrors our community.
As I understand that Dundee was its own city and then it became incorporated like many other things that we know on Omaha neighborhoods today, but you’ve definitely kept flavor of what you were saying earlier. How do you think that that’s been kept because a lot of places can’t always hold on to it?
I think for the longest time Dundee was one of the few neighborhoods that that had that history and that actively preserved it. There were the Dundee Memorial Park Association, the Neighborhood Association and the Dundee Merchants Association, and the Business Improvement District. Those were all established to make, create and maintain that sense of community within the neighborhood. So that we see things like the flower baskets in the neighborhood and we see things like the signs say welcome to historic Dundee. The hardscape and landscaping up and down Underwood, the improvements that have been made to the business district that all create a cohesiveness within the community. Now while other neighborhoods are doing that now, Dundee has been doing that for a long time. And I think [of] events like Dundee Days 30 years as an organized event. We’ve been doing this since the 90s. There are not that many other neighborhoods in Omaha that have an event that has gotten to that age, to that success.
So, I think that’s a big part of it. And then I just think it’s just the nature of it’s an environment that welcomes getting out and talking to your neighbors and walking from your house up to the ice cream parlor or walking to the gas station to get a soda and so that I know my neighbors when I’m doing yard work and they walk by we always hear or say hi to each other sometimes stop and chat. So, I just think it just builds that community, that small town feeling.
Thank you. Anything you want to add?
All the extended weather forecast signs all seem to be pointing towards a really nice day. Cross our fingers..
And toes…
We’re not going to wash our cars…We’re just going to hope for really good weather.
We have we have been very fortunate to have good weather, the last three or four years to every year more memorable than the previous and I think if weather holds out I think this is going to top it all.
Thank you.
Dundee Day could use additional volunteers to help set up and tear down the event.
Check out their website for more information and how to help.
Please tell me about the upcoming Dundee Day.
This is our 30th event. It is technically our 31st year, but we skipped 2020, so we’re calling this our 30th event.
By all accounts, this is the largest Dundee Day that we’ve ever had. We have figured out how to put 150 booths in this two block stretch. So, folks are going to get cozy, but we’re going have 150 different vendors.
Wow.
That’s my goal. And we always have some no shows, but my goal – I’ve got people on wait list. Instead of having food trucks in line with all the vendor booths, we’re going to have the food trucks up in the KFAB parking lot. We’re going to create food court tables with umbrellas and … creating an actual destination. I’ve seen them called food truck parks and or pods, and so we’re going to create one like that for Dundee Day. We’ve got, you know, another great parade probably a good hour’s worth of participants in the parade. Fire trucks will be back. The vintage fire trucks will be here. 501st Legion is going to be here with some storm troopers. Central High marching band. New this year, we have an adult marching band that’s going to participate.
Dundee Dash is back this year. I think we’ve got over 50 applicants and entries.
Dundee Day started as basically sidewalk sales for the merchants, and it really became sort of an enhanced, a celebratory business promotion and from there it got more and more and more established and bigger. We added the parade.The event grew beyond just merchants, sidewalk sales and started including other vendors. And so, what we’ve been trying to do over the last three or four years is make it really an established part of the community, a community event. Something that a whole lot of people look forward to, not just the merchants with their sales. And we’ve been doing that consistently.
One of the things that we decided this year was we really wanted to really grow the art side and make it a more well-rounded festival and a real community. We initially were going to do a high school art exhibit, but with us being an early to mid-August festival, [it is] only a week or two after school starts. It really is a logistical challenge because we found that we would be telling high school students right before summer, and then telling them two weeks before the event right as they’re starting back to school, the whole class load and all that, we just weren’t getting traction.
So, I saw an event in Atlanta, called the Art Throwdown. It’s a competition. I call it interactive. So, we’re going do our version of the Art Throwdown called Dundee Draws.
An alliteration…
I love alliterations, and we have the Dundee Dash and Dundee Day and Dundee Draws. So, … there’s going to be two segments. There’s going to be a youth part and then an adult part/segment. Each segment will feature 12 artists. They will sit in a circle at 50th and Underwood, right in the heart of Dundee Day, and they will have a subject. They will have 30 minutes using the medium of their choice to draw that subject in any way they see fit. And at the end of that 30 minutes, we have a professional artist who’s going to judge and then somebody, either the subject themselves or somebody related to the subject will then have the opportunity to choose their favorite. Whether it’s the first place or not, they’ll choose their favorite. So, the subject for the segment is TJ Weiss, who works over here at Abe’s and is a very well-established member of our community of Dundee. He’s always helping people out. He’s always taking time out of his schedule to help merchants or to help residents and we kind of feel like this is sort of like a grand marshal kind of thing. It’s a way to celebrate him as a member of our community. And he’ll get a piece of art – custom drawn art.
The subject of the adult segment is going to be a custom-creative-floral piece by a company called Fresh Floral, which is brand new. They’re up on Dodge and 50th, next to Dundee Theater. They are actually a retail outlet of a North Omaha community partnership. They are a new company. They bought Voila which was a for profit company and they are still going to do floral creations. They’re going to have florists on staff. Residents who go through their program can then work at Fresh Floral, learning from professional florists and learning a trade and learning alongside professional florists learning a skill and being able then to either continue working there or go work at another floral shop around town.
This reminds me of how No More Empty Pots does things. Is that the same group?
It’s not same group but it’s very similar. They’re a member of the Merchants Association. They’re a brand new nonprofit here in Omaha and they’re going to donate a piece in the center. And then their manager will have the opportunity to pick something that then they’ll take it have on display at their store. What’s really unique about it as I said, you’ve got 12 different artists, we will provide drawing boards and the paper they’re going to provide whether they want to do it in pencil or chalk or acrylic or oil or whatever, wherever their media of choice is they will provide that. So, you’ll have different media. You have 12 different artists. You’re going have different styles. And because they’re sitting in a circle around the subject, you’re going to have 12 different physical perspectives.
Somebody might be drawing the back of TJ said somebody’s going draw left profile and right profiles. Somebody’s going to have the Dundee clock in the background. Somebody’s going to have the Abe’s gas station in the background. So, they’re all going to have something different. And it’s a really neat as a spectator. It’s really neat experience to walk around the outside of the circle and look over their shoulder and see what their what they’re drawing. And, you know, different artists pick up different things. Some artists think that you know, a person’s eyes are the most valuable trait. And so, the image will be very much focused on your eyes. Some people think that [it’s] the facial hair or the beard or chin or something. So everybody has a different style and it’s a really neat experience to see that happening within 30 minutes. Right in front of you and we’re really excited about that. I think this is going to be something that will become a fixture, again and again. It’s a great way to grow the art part of what we do.
How did you come up with the idea to have it sort of live instead of submission?
It’s based on this Art Throwdown event that I’ve watched down in Atlanta. The Art Throwdown actually is so popular that they have, I think it’s four to six categories. And they actually say okay, this is going to be, you know, pencil drawn or this is going to be modern art style. So, they separate by style. So, you get a little bit of similarities to it. We’re not quite that big ,yet. Yeah, the live drawing event; it makes it again, an interactive part of the event.
Yes, that’s something that could be just very static and people just walked by, but now it is an event itself.
(End of Part One)
Learn more about Dundee Day at:
https://www.dundeeday.org
Learn about Dundee Draw at:
https://www.dundeeday.org/dundee-draws.html
Up this week are Dundee Days (Saturday), Opening of the Heartland of America Park (Friday) Omaha’s Original Greek Festival (Friday, Saturday, Sunday) and the Polish Festival(Sunday)!
Visit back later for more details and stories.
OmahaNebraska.com mostly focuses on free events but includes others.
If you have an event you would like us to cover, please email us at info@omahanebraska.com
This is one of my favorite Omaha Farmers Market and is in Old Market, not too far from the office of OmahaNebraska.com
Please enjoy the photographs and check out these great vendors and people!
Do you have a favorite vendor or Farmers Market? Let us know at info@omahanebraska.com
A huge crowd came out to support Terence Crawford and welcome him back to Omaha.
Add to that great parade and celebration, Mayor Stothert announced the Omaha City Council to vote on “selling” property near the B&B Gym to Terence Crawford for $1 to expand his gym!
Here are some photographs from the event:
Enjoy this two day musical festival in nearby Bellevue at Falconwood Park starting at 4 PM on Friday with gates opening at 3 PM. On Saturday gates open at noon and the event starts at 1PM.
More at:
https://www.outlandiafestival.com
Come and celebrate our local hero, Terence “Bud” Crawford.
This Omaha event runs 10:00 AM to 12:00 PM.
Gene Leahy Mall
1001 Douglas St.
Omaha, NE 68102
Enjoy fresh vegetables and other offerings at the Omaha Farmers Market in Aksarben Village.
It runs every Sunday from 7 May to 15 October from 9 AM to 1 PM.
Location:
Aksarben Village at 67th Street & Mercy Road
