WTG!
See you in the garden!
Monday, October 8, 2012
Thank you!
Thank you Alyssa, Annaliese and Laird Bowser, Haig Townsend and Skye Shansby for coming to the Garden Party Saturday! Not only did you harvest 54 pounds bringing Grace Organics to a total of 1365 pounds to date and help get the garden ready for fall: you made the front page of the Kitsap Sunday Sun!
WTG!
http://m.kitsapsun.com/news/2012/oct/07/community-gardens-help-fill-shelves-at-food/
See you in the garden!
WTG!
See you in the garden!
Friday, October 5, 2012
Grace Organics Update 2012
Grace Organics – Update 2012
• Total yield to date: 1,275 pounds – Already exceeded our previous maximum – Still a good amount still to be harvested – Includes 620 pounds of potatoes......
• Grew 15 different vegetables, in 32 different varieties.
• Helpline House has a website notice that Grace Organics again is the largest provider of fresh vegetables for this organization – here is the tally:
Grace Episcopal Church: 1,194 pounds –
Rock Farm Garden: 945.5 pounds –
Helpline Gardens: 561.5 pounds –
M.J. Sebastian: 1,063.5 pounds
Middle Field Farms: 60 pounds
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• Total yield to date: 1,275 pounds – Already exceeded our previous maximum – Still a good amount still to be harvested – Includes 620 pounds of potatoes......
• Grew 15 different vegetables, in 32 different varieties.
• Helpline House has a website notice that Grace Organics again is the largest provider of fresh vegetables for this organization – here is the tally:
Grace Episcopal Church: 1,194 pounds –
Rock Farm Garden: 945.5 pounds –
Helpline Gardens: 561.5 pounds –
M.J. Sebastian: 1,063.5 pounds
Middle Field Farms: 60 pounds
.jpg)
You never know....
Recently Neil was at his office loading a couple of full to overflowing trugs and five gallon buckets into his work van from his truck. He often goes out to water and harvest before work and then drops it off at Helpline on his lunch hour. We're pretty lucky he works for the company he does, the top management as well as the owner are very active in their own church and understand our mission with Grace Organics, so no one thinks twice when he loads 100's of pounds of vegetables in their various containers into his work van and takes off for the day.
This particular morning a colleague from another division asked him what he was doing. After Neil explained, the colleague said "Thank you for doing this. A couple of years ago my wife and I lost our jobs at the same time and it was five months before either of us found work. We have two kids and everything we ate for the entire time was from food banks or food stamps. So, thank you. " Neil told me this story that evening and we were overwhelmed thinking about what it must have been like for the man and his family and how you just never know whom is in need and whom you're helping.
Grace provides funds so we can garden and provide fresh food for families like these. I can't imagine trying to raise two kids on canned goods or leftover produce. It's important for people to have quality food to feed their families. Recently Phoenix, Arizona Mayor Greg Stanton tried to live on a standard food stamp allotment of $29 dollars a week and reported that he was tired, hungry and couldn't focus after a week. More alarmingly he found that fresh fruit and vegetables became a luxury and he had to subsist on mostly white flour foods that filled him up and provided very little nutrition. So thank you for helping us fulfill our mission to help our neighbors in need eat better than that!
See you in the garden!
Mayor Greg Stanton's story:
http://www.takepart.com/article/2012/09/30/phoenix-mayor-hungry-and-tired-after-living-food-stamps-five-days
Helpline thanks the food bank providers here:
http://helplinehouse.org/index.shtml
This particular morning a colleague from another division asked him what he was doing. After Neil explained, the colleague said "Thank you for doing this. A couple of years ago my wife and I lost our jobs at the same time and it was five months before either of us found work. We have two kids and everything we ate for the entire time was from food banks or food stamps. So, thank you. " Neil told me this story that evening and we were overwhelmed thinking about what it must have been like for the man and his family and how you just never know whom is in need and whom you're helping.
Grace provides funds so we can garden and provide fresh food for families like these. I can't imagine trying to raise two kids on canned goods or leftover produce. It's important for people to have quality food to feed their families. Recently Phoenix, Arizona Mayor Greg Stanton tried to live on a standard food stamp allotment of $29 dollars a week and reported that he was tired, hungry and couldn't focus after a week. More alarmingly he found that fresh fruit and vegetables became a luxury and he had to subsist on mostly white flour foods that filled him up and provided very little nutrition. So thank you for helping us fulfill our mission to help our neighbors in need eat better than that!
See you in the garden!
Mayor Greg Stanton's story:
http://www.takepart.com/article/2012/09/30/phoenix-mayor-hungry-and-tired-after-living-food-stamps-five-days
Helpline thanks the food bank providers here:
http://helplinehouse.org/index.shtml
Wednesday, September 26, 2012
Bainbridge Island needs Grace Organics and Grace Organics needs YOU!
Welcome to the Grace Organics Blog! If you're here you have signed up for our Ministry and we're looking forward to working with you and hearing your comments!
Only two days after the Ministry Fair the Bainbridge Islander published an article confirming what we have seen in our community since taking over the Grace garden in 2010; more and more people are depending on Helpline to meet their basic needs. Records for food assistance were broken in August in all of Kitsap County and Helpline served 263 families in one week. One week. 263 families. Think about that for minute. 263 families on Bainbridge Island didn't have enough money to feed their families.
This is the political season and I know there are lots of opinions about what is going on in a country that has such an abundance of food that 20% of our GNP is the food industry and yet in 2010, 14.5% of our neighbors were found to be what is termed "food insecure" which is the wonky way to say: Hungry.
But really this is the bottom line........
Our neighbors are going hungry in a place of abundance or forced to make do with seconds from the more generous grocery stores or whatever non-perishables we think to put in the basket at Grace or the bin at the local supermarket on our way out. Now think about coffee hour at Grace every Sunday and the beautiful food provided, some if it handmade, some of it purchased, but all of it presented lovingly and abundantly.
Hold those images in your mind and don't feel guilty, feel fortunate. There are plenty of places in Christ's teachings were he asks us to enjoy what we have in that moment and help others while we can. Enjoy your good fortune, help those less fortunate. Simple, direct and totally doable.
Hope to see you in the garden soon.
http://www.kitsapsun.com/news/2012/sep/18/countys-food-bank-directors-struggle-to-rising/
http://www.worldhunger.org/articles/Learn/us_hunger_facts.htm
Only two days after the Ministry Fair the Bainbridge Islander published an article confirming what we have seen in our community since taking over the Grace garden in 2010; more and more people are depending on Helpline to meet their basic needs. Records for food assistance were broken in August in all of Kitsap County and Helpline served 263 families in one week. One week. 263 families. Think about that for minute. 263 families on Bainbridge Island didn't have enough money to feed their families.
This is the political season and I know there are lots of opinions about what is going on in a country that has such an abundance of food that 20% of our GNP is the food industry and yet in 2010, 14.5% of our neighbors were found to be what is termed "food insecure" which is the wonky way to say: Hungry.
But really this is the bottom line........
Our neighbors are going hungry in a place of abundance or forced to make do with seconds from the more generous grocery stores or whatever non-perishables we think to put in the basket at Grace or the bin at the local supermarket on our way out. Now think about coffee hour at Grace every Sunday and the beautiful food provided, some if it handmade, some of it purchased, but all of it presented lovingly and abundantly.
Hold those images in your mind and don't feel guilty, feel fortunate. There are plenty of places in Christ's teachings were he asks us to enjoy what we have in that moment and help others while we can. Enjoy your good fortune, help those less fortunate. Simple, direct and totally doable.
Hope to see you in the garden soon.
http://www.kitsapsun.com/news/2012/sep/18/countys-food-bank-directors-struggle-to-rising/
http://www.worldhunger.org/articles/Learn/us_hunger_facts.htm
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