Hello SLOWest!
It's been a while! Just as a reminder, this blog will serve as a portal for my own personal experiences with SLOWest, but if anyone else wants to join me and blog about their own experiences, I am happy to share the login information.
The other night I had my first meeting with the Grow Slow gardens group. Approximately 10 people were in attendance, all coming to the group with different goals, agendas, expectations, intentions and plans! In the end, we all just want to dig in the dirt, grow some food and share, not only with each other, but also landowners and others in the community.
Last year there were 3 gardens tended to in the yards or lots belonging to people in the community, and 15 gardeners were involved. Much was planted, weeded, harvested and learned, and now we're back for another year! This year will be my first year actually joining the work in the gardens, last year I simply wrote about their experiences.
Over cups of tea and delicious muffins, we mapped out a year's worth of preliminary plans and each contributed ideas and goals that we wish to see come to fruition by the time the winter solstice comes along in December. It was a group made up of both novice and very experienced gardeners, enthusiastic environmentalists and food lovers, and community-minded individuals.
I committed to sharing as much as possible about the process on the various blogs I'm involved with; trying to create connections with local artists in the neighbourhood to create more community around the gardening projects; and connecting with another local food group to see about working together.
The quote, "earth care, people care, fair share" came to my mind that night while we were brainstorming, so thank you to my friend Jackson for sharing that quote -- I think it encapsulates beautifully what we're trying to do with our community gardening endeavours in Grow Slow.
Looking forward to getting some dirt under my nails,
Heather
