Your Common Ground

Your Common Ground • NIAGARA’S COMMON GROUND •
Specialty treats & coffee with a side of friendship.
Our family has been in Niagara for generations. Now?

For decades we've lived in our small rural township and watched as it grew, and grew, and grew. Pelham and its neighbours are blossoming into cities with hundreds of thousands of people. Before our eyes, our small community became filled with strangers. And we became strangers too! Do you know your neighbour? How active are you in your community? We found we lost what was so natural to us,
overwhe

lmed by taking care of our own we forgot that we are stronger together. We wanted to bring back the sense of connection and community that we felt was being forgotten. Check out both of our shops located in the Niagara Region:

Font Coffee Bar
120 Highway 20 West, Fonthill,
Ontario

Junction Coffee Bar
1398 York Road, St Davids,
Ontario

08/18/2026

You will have a day where you make something and HATE IT. Cathy Cullis still has those days after years of being an artist.

Even though she is recognized as a Master by pastelartists.ca , a Master Circle member with the International Association of Pastel Societies (IAPS), a Signature member with the Pastel Society of Eastern Canada (PSEC) and an active member of Federation of Canadian Artists she STILL has days where she wants to walk away from the easel!

Let this remind you to pick up the project you’ve left unfinished and get back at it. 🤍

Three Niagara bookshops worth building a whole afternoon around. Save this for your next day off!📍 Thistle Bookshop and ...
08/11/2026

Three Niagara bookshops worth building a whole afternoon around. Save this for your next day off!

📍 Thistle Bookshop and Cafe, Port Dalhousie
Brick walls on the old canal, coffee that never runs dry, shelves curated by a friend not an algorithm. Built for staying, not just browsing.

📍 Someday Books, St. Catharines
Opened after its owners won a local competition built for entrepreneurs willing to bet on an idea. The name is the whole point, someone stopped deferring their dream and built the damn thing.

📍 Pickadilly Books & Coffee, Port Colborne
Run by two people who grew up walking on West Street, left for England, and came home to open the shop they used to talk about as a maybe. He does the coffee, she does the books.📚 ☕️

Different towns, different stories, all three worth the drive.

Send this to the friend who says they’re “trying to read more” this year. Tag the one who still hasn’t been to any of these.

08/05/2026

Sandra Iafrate builds an imagined past.

Old maps. Antique lace. Forgotten cooking vessels. Things once cherished, then discarded, now revived. Her current body of work layers  these vintage materials with paint as she renders vignettes of food, still and abundant tables.

“This is not a flawless retelling of a historical era,” she says, “but a contemporary mashup of found treasures.”

It’s not nostalgia exactly. It’s closer to a wish.✨

For slower mornings. For meals made and shared without a screen nearby. For a version of gathering she calls genuine connection, before consumerism made convenience the whole point.

If you want to see the work in person, Gate Street Sudio is open daily this summer, 1pm - 4pm.
She’s also running two workshops this year, a week in Sicily this October and a retreat here in Niagara-on-the-Lake, with 2027 NOTL dates now open for booking!

07/31/2026

Blink and you’ll miss it.
Life is happening every day, chase after it.

Captured at Ryerson Park Tourism Niagara-on-the-Lake

You don’t lack creativity. You lack courage.We opened Sue Monk Kidd’s newest book expecting a light guide to writing. In...
07/30/2026

You don’t lack creativity. You lack courage.
We opened Sue Monk Kidd’s newest book expecting a light guide to writing. Instead we got a mirror. She has this way of naming things you didn’t know you were avoiding. She calls out that the reality is, most of us aren’t short on ideas, we’re short on the nerve to actually make something with them.

If you’ve got a notebook with four pages filled in, or a camera roll no one’s ever seen, this one might hit the same way it hit us.

This is a book for the over intellectualizer who needs to be brought back to earth and given concrete tools to apply and express what they feel so deeply within!

We picked this book up Nottawa Cottage Bookstore
but it is available where all books are sold!

Full essay is up on Substack now, link in bio.
Pull up a chair.

07/24/2026

If you’re looking to get creative, find connection and support local artists - you need to visit LADY LOU COLLECTIVE | GIFT SHOP ✨ ✨

Sometimes being creative is just giving yourself permission to do the thing! Catherine and her team at Lady Lou created such a fun atmosphere for people to explore crafting in a really chill and low stakes way. We all have great ideas, but the budget to build an artists paradise at home is not always attainable, Catherine brought the supplies to us and let us go wild.

The other cool thing about this? You didn’t have to bring a friend, so many people came solo and it was a great way to connect and make friends with people in the community.

Special mention needs to go to the snacks, which by the way are both Canadian:
Klondike Kettle Corn - seriously the best popcorn and they do not skimp on the flavour!
Cove Soda - totally thought these were bad for us until we read the label and saw they were 0 sugar?!

Lady Lou Collective is hosting more crafting nights through the summer- make sure you follow them!

05/10/2026

The festival is on for 2 more days!

Trust us, it’s the kind of day worth rearranging your plans for. Even for locals!
Talented florists and artists all in one place. With a smattering of events,classes and food that will make you think- “I can’t believe this is in our own backyard!”

This is the stuff we’ll be finding for you. More art, more makers, and places you want to know.✨

Be sure to check out the talent from these great folks while you explore:


floral



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y.artist


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Font Coffee Bar 120 Highway 20 West
Fonthill, ON
L0S1E0

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