Humdinger cars and Good Gray: Penngrove humdinger happenings
Bring your chair and enjoy live music on Saturdays in August from 5 to 7 p.m. at Penngrove Market. The schedule:
Aug. 7 - The Beguilers
Aug. 14 - The Jewuets, featuring musicians from Royal Jelly Jive
Aug. 21 - The Penngrove Station Band
Aug. 28 - The Pickers & Stealers.
The outdoor grill turns out Yanni's sausage, Stemple Creek and Beyond burgers from 1 to 6 p.m., plus the indoor wood oven is open for pizza and other treats.
Rev your engines! The South of Heaven Filthie’s Car Club presents the Humdinger Car Show in Penngrove Park on August 7 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. You’ll see some unbelievable cars. NorCal Pin Up Girls host a pageant at 1 p.m. Penngrove Social Firemen will staff the BBQ, so you know the food will be tops. The show moved to Penngrove after outgrowing its Freestone grounds.
Welcome to Good Gray: A Commonplace Shop
A charming general store opened last month in downtown Penngrove, Good Gray: A Commonplace Shop. Useful household goods describe the merchandise, but doesn’t quite do it justice.
Owner Laural Reid carries products from Japan and Germany “which I admire for their design as well as their functionality,” said Reid. “There are products for the bath, the kitchen, and the mudroom, German brushes (from computer to cleaning), interspersed with books and art supplies.”
I spied the classic Opinel knife, a French folding knife so adorable and useful for picnics. It just might become my ‘gift to give for 2021’ (friends, forget you read this).
Good Gray was in business in Petaluma for eight years (sharing space with Maude, on Western Ave.) and has operated online during the pandemic. The new Penngrove shop is in the former Buddhist space at 9591 Main St., beside the Penngrove Motorcycle Company.
“I named my shop Good Gray after reading a little about Walt Whitman, who was once called The Good Gray Poet,” said owner Laural Reid. “But mostly because I just liked the sound of Good Gray.”
“I'm finding that poetry is finding its way into the shop and I have begun to learn more about Walt Whitman and poetry. I really love having little bits of art and literature interspersed with products intended for daily life. I received the keys to the shop on Whitman’s birthday.”
Reid believes that art, poetry and literature should be a part of daily life. So, she brings in “things that are useful or educational, and beautiful, and that I love.”
The shop tagline ‘A Commonplace Shop’ comes from the Commonplace Book of old, where people would record anything useful, interesting, or pertinent to their lives. It had its own system of indexing and evolved into a literary ‘thang’.
Reid is a 40-year resident of Petaluma. She worked at Novato Library and her mother was a librarian. At Christmas, the shop will continue its Yule Book Flood, an Icelandic tradition of giving books and chocolate on Christmas Eve, and reading.
Daughter Lily Reid shares the space with her Apprentice Studio Knitwear and boutique. She carries her own line of knitwear as well as other brands of specially curated clothing and accessories. Lily started knitting at age 6 and formerly worked at the Knitterly in Petaluma. Her website is www.apprenticestudio.com. She also co-owns Judith and Lily www.judithandlily.com with Judith Marciante of Petaluma. They carry classic yarns online look forward to resuming workshops in the future.
Laural likes “the quiet, old Sonoma County feel of Penngrove,” and so do we. Welcome to town! Visit the website at www.goodgray.com.
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Your Penngrove news and ideas are welcome. Email lyndibrown@sonic.net.
