Author: Lara Oppenheimer

Sustainability Hub Day, Saturday June 20th

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Greenrise Community Sustainability Hub Day

Saturday June 20

10am-2pm

4750 N. Sheridan Rd

–VIEW & DISCUSS the film Food Patriots with director, Jeff Spitz
–MINGLE & MEET people from Uptown & surrounding communities
–EXCHANGE giveaway items at a free market
–SHARE & LEARN skills with community members
–TINKER at the community glue workshop
–& MORE!

Check out the full schedule here!

RSVP to attend or host a workshop or volunteer for time hours at http://tinyurl.com/GRhub

Email Samantha at ssainsbury@ica-usa.org for more info.

Facebook event page

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Join Us April 30 for CTX Action Planning!

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Come join the conversation on how we activate the CTX in Chicago!!

When: Thursday, April 30th

Where: ICA GreenRise at 4750 N. Sheridan

When: 6-7:30pm

Who: YOU!!!

Two months ago, 17 of us met on a super snowy day and envisioned what an activated CTX might look like. We want to start taking action steps to help get us toward our shared vision.  Come help shape the CTX and future activities!

All are welcome!! Please RSVP to sevagandhi (at) gmail (dot) com if you plan on attending.

Cheers!!

Happy Huggy Hygge Party, Sunday March 15th

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The CTX, Links Hall and At the Table present

The Happy Huggy Hygge Party,

this Sunday March 15th!!

3111 N. Western
6-9pm and it’s Free! (like the love in your heart:)

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The HYGGE needs YOU to make its tiny lights twinkle!!

Search your soul to see WHAT LIGHTS YOU UP – and bring a little bit of that to share: at a skill table, the talent show, through creative response/documentation or your warm, engaged conversation with friends old and new.

6-7pm: Potluck and Open Mic sign up
7-9pm: Open Mic Talent Show
Ongoing: Tables for people to share skills, teach talents and hang out!

On the physical plane, TABLES are needed (whatever you can bring) and CANDLES (let your little light shine!) Also GOOD FOOD to share for the potluck:)

There will be a FREE TABLE! Bring any decent stuff you want to circulate into the community and take anything that strikes your fancy!! Spring cleaning = sharing:) (Anything left over will be donated to the Brown Elephant.)

Questions? Inspirations?
Contact Lara Oppenheimer at laraoppenheimer at gmail dot com

Crowdsourced community party, YAY!

All our tiny lights together will bathe our hearts in a glorious warming glow:)

Visioning the Future of Time Banking in Chicago, Feb 15, 1-3pm

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You and your needs & superpowers
are hereby invited to 
a visioning session on the future on Time Banking in Chicago!  
This Sunday, Feb 15th
1pm-3pm
 
The Chicago Time Exchange is a web-based skill pool where the currency is time and everyone’s time is equal.  It’s a co-created community economy where you can request what you need and offer skills out of your abundance and passions.  It’s one way for us to connect resources across the city and reimagine community support outside of capitalism and the market.
 
The CTX currently has close to 400 members!  The potential here for vibrant community economy* is VAST.  Let’s activate Time Banking in Chicago, grow this living system and have more of us sharing stewardship of the CTX.
 
All are invited! Bring your visions, desires & talents and JOIN US!
Looking forward to merging needs & superpowers for the creation of the world we want to live in:)
*What can a hoppin’ timebank really DO? Check out these short videos about the timebank in Portland, MA and the one in Louisville, KY and get inspired!!

The 2nd Annual Happy Huggy Hygge Party – FOR REAL now…

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HYGGE FOR REAL NOW

Let’s try this again!

SUNDAY, MARCH 15th

Links Hall and the Chicago Time Exchange and YOU

will bring happy back at the 2nd Annual Happy Huggy Hygge Party!

Community + potluck + a talent show & skill shares + little twinkling lights = hygge!! (say hyoo-gah)

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 Sunday, March 15th

6-9pm (note earlier time, it’s Sunday, y’all!)

Links Hall, 3111 N. Western

Free! (like the love in your heart:)
BYO yummy food to share!
Constellation Bar is open! ONLY $2 PBRs
6-7PM: Potluck, Open mic sign up and ongoing skills shares
Starting at 7 PM: Presentation of talents and skills
Ongoing: Tables for people to share skills, teach talents and hang out
Check it out the six things that make us happiest:
1) Intimacy/making love
2) Sports/running/exercise
3) Theatre/dance/concert
4) Singing/performing
5) Exhibition/museum/library
6) Hobbies/arts/crafts
Come share what you’ve got for #2-6.
(You are on your own for #1 but who knows, you may meet a friend:)

Read your freshest poetry! Teach us clapping games or ways to say “beer” in five different languages! Delight or defy us with your best/worst jokes! The possibilities are ENDLESS…

You are GUARANTEED to meet one new interesting person, learn one new thing and laugh at least one time, open-mouthed with astonishment and delight.

Questions? Inspirations? What to help out and get time credits on the Chicago Time Exchange?

Contact Lara at laraoppenheimer (at) gmail (dot) com.

Local Culture, Economy and Knowledge – Brown Bag Conversation Friday November 14

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International Alliance for Localization – Strengthening Local Culture, Economy, and Knowledge 

Join us for a conversation with Bayo Akomolafe  and Manish Jain – two of the founders of the International Alliance for Localization: a new forum for global collaboration to support place-based solutions on a planetary scale. The IAL is a network of individuals and organizations dedicated to exploring new approaches to today’s ecological, social, and economic crises – approaches that respect and protect cultural and ecological diversity while expanding international dialogue and exchange. 

This short film provides a framework: Localization for People and the Earth.

Share ideas and local efforts for building community across the city, region, nation and connect globally.  Meet Stephanie Rearick and Chris Petit ofThe Mutual Aid Network: a cooperative designed to pool and steward value and reward good work with cooperative economic tools such as timebanking, business-to-business mutual credit, and cooperative saving, lending, and investment.

Bring your lunch, your experiences, your ideas and your questions for a provocative and inspiring conversation!

When

Friday November 14, 2014 from 11:30 AM to 1:00 PM CST

Where

Elevate Energy
322 S. Green St., Suite 300
Chicago, IL 60607

MORE INFORMATION and REGISTER HERE

The Transformative Power of Art, Sunday October 19th

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Are you an artist, musician, arts producer/administrator into economies of creativity and relationship?  Then this event is for you!!
Sunday, October 19
Noon-3:30pm
6018 North Kenmore, Chicago
Free! Like your mind:)
Please RSVP here, space is limited.
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What is transformation? Is it changing the world or changing how we view the world?

This event pairs artists offering three unique transformational experiences. Timed during Chicago Artists Month, since many of CAM events involve artists giving to others, this event is for artists to nurture themselves. While artists are often called on to create group or societal transformations, this event offers unique ways of experiencing transformation together. 

Lara Oppenheimer and Maureen Walrath offer a gift circle, a simple way to explore economies of relationship and creativity.  Everyone offers a need (with no expectation of having it fulfilled) as well as a gift (with no expectation of having it received).  Connections are made, needs are met, gifts find a place to flourish!

Alice Berry, psychotherapist and artist offers Frames and Perceptions. If art is an agreement between an artist and an observer, group therapy is a similar pact between participants to experience together. This shared moment — an hour long client-centered therapeutic session for the group — explores the connections between perception and therapy; and art and experience.

Caro d’Offay and Laura Gilmore offer Lumetypes of your hand. Each person is invited to use their hands to illuminate photo-paper, which is then developed using photographic chemicals. Unlike photography, the phosphorescent paint reveals the wave/particle duality of light, scattering and revealing depths. This individual Lumetype of your hand potentially reveals how light works dualistically, but how the world may also be working and revealing itself — both logically and creatively — at this moment in your hand. 

CTX Event: Film Screening “Fixing the Future” Friday, September 12

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Interested in ways people are redefining economy?

Come watch an inspiring documentary, meet like-minded folks and learn some ways to get involved on a local level!

When: Friday, Sept 12, 6-8:30pm

Where: ICA GreenRise, 4750 N. Sheridan

Free of charge, but registration required

Register at: www.ica-usa.org

In Fixing the Future, David Brancaccio, of public radio’s Marketplace and NOW on PBS, visits people and organizations across America that are attempting a revolution: the reinvention of the American economy. The film highlights effective, local practices such as local business alliances, community banking, time banking/hour exchange, worker cooperatives and local currencies. 

The film will be followed by a short reflection, and representatives from the Chicago Time Exchange, Mutual Aid Network and Eco-Andersonville will share information on ways you can get involved in alternative economies in Chicago. This event will mark the first ‘hub’ activity for the Chicago Sustainability Leaders Network🙂

Community Glue Workshop this Sunday, August 17th

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Experience the creative community economy in action!  

Have fun and get your broken stuff fixed at the

cgw

FREE REPAIR CLINIC!

This Sunday, August 17th, 4-7pm

EDGEWATER WORKBENCH

1130 W. Thorndale Ave.

The Community Glue folks say “Revive your well-worn possessions and meet our growing community of fixers! We’ve got handy volunteers and tools available, so bring an item in disrepair and a can-do attitude, and we’ll do our best to breathe new life into your old items and keep them out of the landfill.

Things we have successfully repaired in the past:
– clothes
– simple jewelry fixes
– bikes
– kitchen appliances
– furniture
– bike accessories
– guitars
– toys (water guns, trucks, figurines)
– knick-knacks

We are always up for a challenge! We’ve got the hive mind on our side! 

This event is free, all-ages and BYOB! Come see what we’re all about! All are welcome to observe, fix, or get fixed! For more information, check outcommunityglueworkshop.org.”

It’s lots of fun.  I’ll be there with a broken chipper shredder and a broken glass beverage dispenser:)  Come on out and join the fixin’ fun!

If you can’t make this one, the next Community Glue Workshop will be Sunday, September 14, 4-7pm.