2012 Volunteer Appretiation Party! 02/03/2012
 Click photo to view more! The Growing Project kicks off our 4th year in style as we welcome back old volunteers, greet our new ones...and introduce our newly elected board members! Last Wednesday, January 25th, marked The Growing Project’s 2nd annual Volunteer Appreciation Party! Hosted by our good friends at Odell Brewery! Volunteers spent the evening enjoying food, drinks and live music! The night also hosted a silent auction with proceeds benefiting our Giving Gardens of 2012. This year, we teamed up with ‘Hunger free Colorado’ and asked our guests: What are you hungry for? This campaign allowed everyone to take part in the “hungry for change” campaign, and gave each participator a chance to write their request on their hunger for change plate. Hunger for change is Colorado’s leading anti-hunger organization leveraging the power of collaboration, system change, policy change and social change to end hunger in Colorado. You can, yourself get in on the action by signing your virtual plate here. Thank you to Ron James photography who captured photos of the plate dreams in action, as well as the bright smiling faces of the 2012 leadership and BOD team! Thank You! to our all of our sponsors and donors who made this event possible: Odell Brewery, Pickle Barrel, Fort Collins Food Co-op, Balanced Healing Yoga, Rocky Mountain Home Collection, The Bean Cycle, Brave New Wheel, Wisdom Ways Acupuncture, Sarah DeNardo, Core Power Yoga, Heller Work, Fort Collins Nursery, Green Buffalo Foods, Erin Edwards, Telle May Pettinger, Small Farm, the Cowboys Dead band, Amber Spenser Photography, local artist Gail Kenney, Ace Coatings, Achiving Health, Your Daily Fiber, Jerry’s Artarama, Mad Greens, Noodles & Company, Canino’s Restaurant, Rio Grande Mexican Restaurant, Ingredient, Salon Nani, Curiosities, Nature’s Own, Inspector Magic, The Cupboard, Greenredfield Media, Jax Restaurant, Kelsi Nagy with Slow Foods, and the FoCo Press. Our event wouldn’t have been successful without your support! The giving, growing and sharing season of 2012 has started, and we here at The Growing Project, couldn’t be successful in the continuance of change if it weren’t for the great community builders we are so lucky to have as friends! Thank you to everyone who has helped us along the way! Add Comment We had another fabulous evening last week at our second monthly book group meeting. We discussed our thoughts on Michael Pollen's "Omnivore's Dilemma", which stimulated questions about our own food choices, and what, if anything, has changed for each of us since reading his book. Because his book can leave many frustrated, feeling there is no solution, this month we move on to Barbara Kingsolver's "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle"...a lighthearted and lyrical story of how her family DID find a solution, by deciding to "go local" for a year. Hopefully, this book will inspire and challenge many to take on what they can of their own "local challenge", this year. At the very least, maybe we can see what possibilities are out there. If you're interested in joining us, you don't even need to buy your own copy of the book...the public library has many copies available. For the next meeting, we will have read up through the Month of April, as each chapter is divided by the month that of their local year that they're in. And, we will try a new venue, Gravity (located at the FC Brewery) where they feature as much local food as possible on the menu. We're not quite sure what local foods will be available at this time of year, but we're excited to support another local business and try a new place! We hope to see you there!!!  ~Myrtle Street's Enchanted Food Forest~ Written by Becky Weidhaas, Resident Manager Myrtle St. SRO In early 2011, Fort Collins Housing Authority's (FCHA) Charlee Rocco and The Growing Project (TGP) Co-Director Chad Shavor, began discussing the possibility of a garden being built at one of FCHA’s supportive housing facilities which houses individuals who are homeless, called the Single Room Occupancy (SRO). As the resident manager of the Myrtle Street SRO, discussions between TGP and Charlee were presented to me for consideration for a pilot program that TGP was set to launch, called Urban Food Outreach (UFO). TGPs mission is to increase self-reliance and create a strong, diverse, just, and local food system. At the time of collaborative planning, I felt this would be a good fit for the Myrtle SRO because the residents of the three SROs in Fort Collins would learn how to grow their own organic food. This would not only increase their self-sufficiency skills, but expose them to the freshest, healthiest food available. I was convinced this project would bring great opportunities to my residents, and because my team at the Housing Authority agreed, the planning and implementation of a new hosting garden soon began. The Myrtle house collaboration with TGP went from designing & building, to a now successfully growing food garden on our property. Together with the residents, we made this a summer project to be proud of! With A total of 450 lbs grown and gleaned, I am happy to report that Myrtle's UFO garden, SUCCEEDED!  Since breaking ground on April 10, 2011, it is amazing to report on just how much the garden took off and the sheer bounty that it produced. We built the soil in a ‘lasagna bed’ style, with TGP incorporating weekly education sessions on this, as well as other gardening practices. The residents, volunteers and SRO staff were able to learn in the beginning stages by planting cool-weather crops: radishes, beets, spinach, lettuce, cabbage, and kale. It was very exciting for all of us first time gardeners to plant these starts in our new garden, built with our own two hands...right there, in our very own yard! Throughout the summer, we focused on succession planting and harvesting. By early fall, we were still harvesting tomatoes and eggplants. The fresh produce was gleaned from our garden each week, going directly to the SROs resident kitchen at the Myrtle house, and often shared at the 1st Street location as well. The shared food brought smiles to group dinners, house meetings with fresh veggies, and countless birthday and holiday feasts. (Complimented meals still being talked about to this day!) Myrtle house residents know that not only did this past summer bring them new beginnings, but that their work allowed donations of 50 lbs of extra produce to be given to the Food Bank of Larimer County, thus benefiting others as well.  The Growing Project played a vital part in our garden by providing the tools, seeds, soil, education, and the multitude of resources and support it took to make its first year such a success. And I take great pride in witnessing how the residents enjoyed working in the garden. It brought me joy to see that some even took on their own 'side projects' in the yard.  In June 2011, TGP and FCHA applied for the Community Air Grant (CAIR) through the City of Fort Collins. The goal to enhance the three SROs in the Fort Collins Communities was awarded, and granted funding for both 1st Street and Myrtle SROs to have vermiculture (worm compost) bins. John Anderson, Colorado's "worm man", has led the discussions and increased our education about compost. These sustainable practices are helping us to lessen our impact on the Earth. Due to the positive feedback of the Myrtle garden, TGP and Rick Torres (1st Street SRO resident manager) have decided to collaborate on a NEW giving garden at the 1st Street SRO location. December 2011, marked the beginning of this new project. The day brought a majority of the 1st Street residents and many TGP volunteers out in the winter sun to work on building the soil and beds at the property in preparation for the spring. Such exciting times are ahead for TGP! The Myrtle SRO residents are very excited for the 2012 growing season to take off again. The anticipation of the 1st Street giving garden is in full swing! I look forward to sparking up a friendly gardening competition with Rick as he ventures into the gardening fun that will bring him, as it did me, copious amounts of joy and enthusiasm for everyone involved! Come partake in the treasured experience of growing and giving! I hope to see you in the gardens! Becky Weidhaas TGP Volunteer Coordinator, FCHA Liason, & Gardening Enthusiast 
Happy New Year! 01/01/2012
 Happy New Year!! 2011 was quite the year for us here at The Growing Project! We have a number of accomplishments to be proud of thanks to our tireless volunteers, community leaders and our dedicated sponsors! Here's a recap of what you may or may not have missed! The Glean Team project had another successful year. Through our gleaning efforts, TGP was able to contribute over 3800 pounds of food to theFood Bank of Larimer County and directly to families in need. Earlier this fall, TGP volunteers also picked and gleaned at the Grant Family Farms 'Harvestival.' Those efforts resulted in nearly 50,000 lbs of potatoes being given directly to the Food Banks throughout northern Colorado. In 2011 we also introduced another new pilot program, Urban Food Outreach, which brought five new 'Giving Gardens' to the Fort Collins community. These gardens are hosted by homeowners who pledge to donate at least 50% of produce to needy members of our community. TGP was able to provide gardening expertise, plant starts, seeds, tools, and many volunteer hours to ensure these gardens were successful. We have already received a number of applications for new gardens for 2012and are looking forward to expanding the Urban Food Outreach program! We would like to give a special "Thank you" to our man on the ground, Chad Shavor. His dedication to the design and implementation of the five 'Giving Gardens' this year was paramount to the success of the program. 2011 marks Chad's third year of dedication to TGP's success. This year, in addition to running the Urban Food Outreach program, Chad continued his work with The Remington House to ensure that our Garden Time program continued to make a difference with at-risk youth. The youth participating in Garden Time were again eager to learn everything they could about gardening! The youth enjoyed giving their extra produce to needy community members as much as they enjoyed eating the veggies they helped to raise. Thank you, Chad Shavor, for your dedication, your time, and your huge heart! You are an inspiration to all of us, and we look forward to all of the greatness to come in 2012! We would also like to note that 2011 allowed us to coordinate and strengthen ties with several of our partner organizations for the "Plant a Row" campaign. A very special "thank you" to Jedel Graff Farms for participating with "Plant a Row"! Thanks to Native Hill Farm, Happy Heart Farms, and Grant Family Farms, all of which contributed mightily to our Glean Team program. We cannot begin to thank every single volunteer, company, sponsor, advocate or member of The Growing Project in a single blog post. However, we would like to say THANK YOU to all you that have been or would like to be involved with TGP, by throwing a party! Please join us for TGP Volunteer Appreciation Night at Odells Brewery on January 25, 2012, at 7:00 PM. We would like to invite all volunteers to our event. We will also be hosting a silent auction at the event in hopes of raising money for another great project scheduled for 2012... TGPsCommunity Gardens at Habitat for Humanity! The first garden will be at the Rigden Farms Community! Stay tuned for more information this spring! Please consider joining us and RSVP no later than January 24, 2012, at 5:00 PM to ensure a free admission to our party. RSVP to Becky Weidhass at volunteer@thegrowingproject.org. I told you that you needed to put on your smartypants glasses! We've even got HOMEWORK for you! OK well, not really, we're not that scary. But, we do recommend that you check out this online discussion group for food-for-thought questions to get you thinking a little deeper about this month's reading. We'll go over these questions and any other topics that come up at next month's meeting! Until then, have a great holiday, and lots of healthy eating to you!  This week, our much awaited reading group met for the first time at The Mayor of Old Town. We decided which books would be at the top of our list, and also created our much loved name for our new group, The Garden of Readin'! Thanks to Charlee Rocco, our Clover Queen, for that one! :-) The first book on our list will be "The Omnivore's Dilemma" (TOD), by Michael Pollen. This is a foundational reading for anyone interested in the food movement and/or local food. Next, the plan is to read Barbara Kingsolver's "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle", which will take the information we learned in Omnivore's Dilemma and show us how one family lived practically throughout the year on these sound sustainable eating principles. If you are interested in joining our reading group and would like to attend next month (we want you there! We had a blast!) then you just need to grab yourself a copy of TOD and read the Part I of the book, and come prepared to discuss your thoughts on what you read over a glass of wine or a fine beer! Our next meeting will be on Jan. 12 at 7 pm, once again at The Mayor of Old Town. Bring a friend! Put your smarypants glasses on!  Still need a calendar for 2012? It's not too late to get your SEXY farmer's calendar! Liz Gaylor and Kelsi Nagi, of Slow Food, collaborated with local FC farmers to create this fabulous, funny, and inspiring 2012 pin-up calendar. You'll see many familiar faces showcased if you hang out at our farmers market for long! Maybe you can even ask them to sign yours! :-) Find them at the winter farmer's markets in the Opera Galleria. And be sure to go online and check their schedule, as it varies throughout the season. The Growing Project won the 2011 Larimer County Environmental Stewardship Award! We are proud to represent Larimer County. Read more here. UFO Invasion! 11/13/2011
The second year of the Urban Foods Outreach (UFO) program is about to begin. The UFO program has taught numerous volunteers about sustainable urban agriculture and provided much needed food to those in need. We are accepting new applications for UFO hosts and UFO host renewal applications through February 1, 2011. Please visit this page to find out more: http://www.thegrowingproject.org/become-a-ufo-garden-host.html | Be our Friend! Donate!
ArchivesFebruary 2012 Links
|
| The Growing Project |
RSS Feed