Cohousing-L Mailing List: National Cohousing Open House Weekend:Tips, Progress, and More to Come

[Raines Cohen (rc3-coho-L]

So as we are in the second day of the weekend, with dozens of events
already completed, I have to ask:

* How's it going with your Cohousing Open House Weekend events?
* Where have you gotten to?
* What's worked in terms of outreach and format?
* What have you learned?
* What might you do differently next year?

Myself, I had a blast at the "No-Bus Bus Tour" that Mid-Atlantic Cohousing
ran yesterday on Zoom, bringing together communities from as far apart as
Pennsylvania and Florida, and Neil Planchon did a great job of dispatching
and reporting the wily troll who kept making sarcastic remarks, then
changing his name so we couldn't find him.

And my wife Betsy Morris hosted a diverse group of community seekers over
bagels at our home community, Berkeley Cohousing -- she reported that "it
wasn't just all old folks like us," with some millennials also trying to
understand how to find community that works for them. A couple neighbors
joined in to show off a home and keep the crowd in line.

I do want to point out that events are STILL being added to the list (and a
few corrections are being made, thanks to eagle-eyed weekend co-organizer
Neil Planchon), and the page does NOT automatically refresh. So if you have
it open in a browser window, be sure to reload/refresh to get the latest
updates.

Like: this afternoon's open house with a home for sale at Mason Street
Cohousing in Portland, Oregon. And the first-ever open house at the Boston
area's most-recently-occupied cohousing neighborhood, Bay State Cohousing
in Malden (convenient to both subway and bike routes).

And some events, that while past, keep repeating, so are worth putting on
your calendar for next month: an in -person tour of Hundredfold Farm
cohousing in Pennsylvania (with 5 lots still available to build homes on),
and the regular virtual tours of Pleasant Hill Cohousing and Phoenix
Commons Senior Cohousing, both near San Francisco.

And if you don't have it handy, here's the page:
https://www.cohousing.org/national-cohousing-open-house-days-2023/

And yes, you can still submit your upcoming events that fit the theme.

Note that there are still more events beyond today, including:

* An in-person report-back on the weekend, tomorrow night over potluck
dinner with the East Bay Permaculture Guild, at a PLACE for Sustainable
Living, the local cohousing-style tiny home EcoVillage in Oakland,
California.

* A virtual call Tuesday afternoon introducing Grandmother's Village
Project, a visionary eastern Massachusetts community with a vision of
supporting low-income BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) elders
living in sustainable community.

* A national virtual opportunity to share our experiences at the monthly
Cohousing Commons call this Wednesday, always the 10th of the month at 10
AM Mountain time. We'll dedicate a breakout room to this topic if there's
interest, after the regular Cohousing 101.

* A national zoom call Wednesday afternoon/evening highlighting several
emerging communities with innovations in affordability and diversity,
including Maine Artist's Cohousing, a Seattle forming community not just
dreaming of affordable, inclusive housing where people of all backgrounds
can live together with stable costs, but also investing in feasibility
studies on how to make it happen, and pioneers bringing together
cohousing-style Tiny Home EcoVillages.

* A multi-day mostly-virtual "Cohousing University" set of sessions this
week for a shovel-ready community in Fremont, California: Mission Creek
Village. This includes an exclusive in-person tour next Sunday of Silicon
Valley's only cohousing community, Mountain View Cohousing. Paid
pre-registration required; the primary audience is Mission Creek's future
members.

* The UK Cohousing Network's monthly "Cohousing Cafe" Monday (9 AM PDT,
noon Eastern), featuring prestigious academic and author Flora Samuel
discussing her book "Housing for Hope and Wellbeing" and reflecting on the
cohousing movement.

* Some additional events next weekend, from groups that weren't free this
weekend.

I look forward to seeing you out there! Lets keep the energy flowing.

Raines Cohen, National Cohousing Open House Weekend Co-organizer
Living in community in Berkeley, California