Two Great Corvallis Businesses

Click the post title to go to Kid Puzzles website. This is a south Corvallis husband and wife business. They create beautiful wood puzzles, some 3D and sell them all over the country. There is an article in the local paper about them and their lifestyle. They hit the festival circuit during the summer, to sell their product and combine their trips with passions like camping and kayaking.

I visited another great Corvallis business and I don't know the name of it. They make shoes, flat soled shoes, like the Barefoot Runner, out of basic ingredients, like rubber and leather. I was at the business which is down across from the Beanery on 2nd street because Stinod's adoptor was filling in there, for the holiday peak season. She had bought Stinod a cat bed that they had then slept with, to get their smells on it, then I picked it up and brought it here, so she could get used to their smell, before she went to them.

I didn't go on a tour because they were very busy, but it looked like Santa's workshop and the workers, I swear, they all looked like elves, with their hair pulled back and their aprons and the general pleasant attitude that permeated the air.

I can buy leather there for the shoes I intend to make for myself.

I never did return those Columbia sportswear boots/outdoor shoes I got on Zappos with the e-certificate a stranger sent me. I keep wearing them around here, and thinking to myself, "I think these will work out for me." And I think they will. I still have plenty of time to return them if I decide they will hurt my feet.

I like going barefoot like I said and only wear shoes if I have to. It is generally talked about, the bad sizing out there now, but the big shoe companies do not react to customer babble about the bad manner in which shoes now are sized to sell. Are they deaf?

Everyone I've talked to who has owned a pair of Keen shoes likes them, but they change their sizes too, and suddenly, a style that fit you well will no longer fit. Keen shoes are better built to fit a foot, I think. They just don't make them long and narrow to fit my own feet anymore. Sad. I love Keens.