This last Friday Christian and I participated in a monthly gleaning hosted by the local Irvine homeschooling group – where we went out for two hours and helped harvest, or in this case plant, food in the Incredible Edible Park. While I got a bit lost and arrived late, we were able to plant cauliflower starts in teams of three until the job was done.
This is the kind of win-win kind of activity that I just LOVE.
To start, The Incredible Edible Park is eight acres in the middle of suburban Irvine that was donated to Second Harvest Food Bank by Edison.
This garden provides over 300,000 POUNDS OF FRESH PRODUCE EVERY YEAR to this local food bank.
Although there are two daily full-time workers (riding tractors), volunteers do much of the planting, weeding, tending, and harvesting work.
Christian and I get to get our hands dirty and learn about gardening.
For FREE! (I love Earthroots, a local non-profit that has a Toddlers in the Garden program – but that costs $25 per two hour session. Luckily, I am able to offer web editing services for a trade…)
We normally get a part of the harvest to bring home as a “thank you.”
And the best part? We are working with a group of HOMESCHOOLERS!
Wait, is the best part that we are feeding the homeless?
We plan to go back the first Friday of every month from now on.
I even got permission to post it as a meetup for the South OC Attachment Parenting Meetup group.
If you want to join us, let me know and I’ll send you the particulars. The cauliflower we planted this weekend will be ready in 60 days. I’m already looking forward to next month.
