| View this email online if it doesn't display correctly |
|
|
|
| Dear Friends,
These are strange and fearful times.
That could almost be all we say. These are strange and fearful times. But we need to write the rest of our newsletter to share that these strange and fearful times are not idle times! Not for your friends at FRESH New London!
While we physically distance and work from home and wash our hands and cover our mouths and watch out for our elders and entertain/educate our young, we must also be growing food and helping to connect those who are most vulnerable with the resources they need.
We hope you are safe, healthy and well-fed. And please reach out to let us know what we can do to help! The survey (linked below) is the best way to share all your thoughts with us!
In Solidarity,
FRESH New London |
|
| | TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Resource for New London, Updated for April
Survey: Help us Help New London
Edible New London: Gardening in the Time of Pandemic
Distance Learning, FRESH Style: Julie Garay
Scenes from the Green House
.... Read all the way to the bottom to learn that we are organizing our Plant Sales online/curbside! |
| | | | URBAN FARMING, NOW MORE THAN EVER! SURVEYING THE COMMUNITY |
| | How can FRESH New London can best support our neighbors and families during and after the COVID-19 crisis. Is it by getting you started with a garden at home? Getting more spring crops into the ground? Collecting your extra seeds and giving them out to your neighbors?
Please take a few minutes to fill this out this SHORT survey.
|
| | EDIBLE NEW LONDON: GARDENING IN THE SEASON OF PANDEMIC |
| Edible New London. It has been FRESH's vision for the past two years that our small, vibrant community be alive with food growing and available for the harvest. As we developed the Five Year Plan for Urban Agriculture, this vision anchored our work around building snack harvest boxes across New London, stewarding fruit trees, building a large urban farm and encouraging back, and front yard gardens throughout our community. We imagined and organized, dreamed and planned. 2020 was to be the year of Edible New London. And, the pandemic makes that work even more important!
Like so many other individuals and organizations, FRESH has been reeling as we learn more and more about this novel coronavirus.
A part of our response is to activate Edible New London in new ways. We are planting out a round of spring crops in all FRESH gardens, to be ready in 4-5 weeks. And we are asking others to do that too. Backyard gardens, school gardens and community garden plots are all a part of the solution. Do you have garden space that you would be willing to plant with food for the community? Let us know and we can get your land into the Edible New London network.
As urban farmers, our essential personnel know that people need food! And that the normal ways that we get food-- going to the grocery store, receiving donated food from the Food Bank, eating at the soup kitchen-- are all complicated, dangerous and over-stretched at this point.
As we discussed in our last email update, our staff is working from home or in isolation at our growing sites. The many programs, plans and hopes for our ambitious 2020 Growing Season are all under way, but require constant revision and reevaluation as we learn more about how to keep ourselves and others safe. All this to say, we are adapting and we continue to grow food.
If you have something to offer into the Edible New London solution or are in need of healthy fresh food, please make that you fill out the survey above.
And stay safe everyone! |
| | DISTANCE LEARNING: FRESH STYLE By Julie Garay, Youth Organizer |
|  |
Through the worries and fears from COVID- 19 we still have to continue some sense of normal-ness for our own sanity and mental health.
Throughout my many years at FRESH, the youth continue to be the ones to remind me to keep a positive outlook and remain optimistic and now is no exception.
Throughout the winter program, which started in January, we met once a week for a couple hours and did some community learning as a group. We looked at our food system, food/social justice movements, and things that impact us on a day to day that relate to FRESH's mission and vision.
Once schools closed because of COVID-19, we have had to move towards online learning for our safety and the safety of others. At first I was worried about sending out articles and videos and not being able to have face to face interactions with the youth. But once we started with our first article “COVID-19 Threatens Food Supply Chain as Farms Worry About Workers Falling Ill,” the youth were ready!
I am used to having these conversations in person and they are very organic and smooth but I was worried about having them online because to me it seemed less personal but young people have proved me wrong. They shared their ideas about the article, what feelings surfaced from it and asked some deep and thought provoking questions to each other.
I asked them at the end of our first conversation what they thought about this format and they really enjoyed it, and are ready for more information. Even though I have grown up in an era where technology has developed rapidly and I would say I am pretty savvy with it, I still have my doubts but at a time when we can't physically be together, it is a blessing.
Moving forward, we are going to keep engaging from afar. But, everything keeps changing. The Youth Crew members just started distancing learning with school and there is added pressure because the rumor mill is saying that schools won't reconvene in person for the rest of the semester. Everyone in the Youth Crew is struggling to adapt to the new routine of online school and so we decided to take a little break. We'll be back at it soon enough, and will share again when that happens. |
| | | | AND NOW FOR THE BIG QUESTION..... WILL FRESH STILL HAVE OUR PLANT SALES? .....YES, BUT UNLIKE ANY YOU HAVE EVER SEEN! |
| Plant Sales Are Still On....But Different
Our April and May plant sales bring a lot of us together to celebrate the growing season. And while we can be physically together, we can still get plants to out into the community.
So we will be hosting a virtual plant sale of sorts- at least for the April sale. It will entail pre-ordering, mostly online and curb side pick up. We are still figuring out the details but be assured you will be able to get all your favorite vegetable plants from FRESH this spring. Stay tuned!
|
| |
WE NEED YOUR SUPPORT
Interested in supporting FRESH with a tax-deductible donation?
Of course you are! Follow this link: http://www.freshnewlondon.org/support-us |
| |
