Crochet with a cup of coffee

Two stores join forces in Welches

By Garth Guibord

The Sandy Post, Jul 21, 2009, Updated Oct 30, 2009

Garth Guibord / Sandy Post

Lora Crampton mixes up a coffee drink behind a counter full of baked goods at Café Aria and Cast One On.

Kara Verdoorn needed a new larger store for her Welches knitting shop in order to expand her stock. Meanwhile, Lora Crampton and Nathan Bent returned to the area to start a coffee shop after budget cuts cost Crampton her teaching job.

The two businesses combined forces in one location, 24540 E. Welches Road behind the Hoodland Shopping Center, and while the pairing doesn’t quite reach the level of chocolate and peanut butter, customers are finding the benefits.

“It’s like split; half the people come in and say, ‘Oh wow, you have coffee,’ and half the people come in and say, ‘Oh wow, you have yarn,’” Crampton said. “It’s good; it’s building off of each other.”

Crampton and Bent’s store, Café Aria, offers a wide variety of coffee and other drinks, plus baked goods including cookies, scones, quiche and chicken bundles (chicken wrapped in proscuitto with pesto and tucked inside a pastry). Crampton also makes her own caramel, which goes into drinks and some of the tasty treats.

The store also offers fresh fruit and frozen bananas or cheesecake dipped in chocolate and on a stick.

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