I cannot express the depths of my gratitude for each of our volunteers…your time, sweat, energy, and heart are priceless! Thank you a million times over for everything: our garden is going to be gorgeous, and I could not be happier with how everything worked out (rain and all couldn’t stop us!). Most importantly, thank you for just being such genuine souls, you are all amazing! We are fostering lasting relationships with our partners at GenerateHope and I appreciate your sincerity on getting involved. The girls had a lot of fun and will hopefully now be able to enjoy a gift that keeps on giving; their garden will continue to nourish them and serve as a therapeutic, symbolic outlet as well. Victory Gardens made everything possible for bringing our garden to life, and for that, I am ETERNALLY THANKFUL!!!!!

Below are a number of ways to stay involved:

1) ServeSD. For those interested in helping out with the hard work we put in to building a healthy, beautiful garden for our GenerateHope family: our first follow-up to meet to answer any questions, educate, and do a little gardening is on Saturday, March 2 from 9 until 11AM. We’ll meet again at Mosaic 30 min before to carpool. ServeSD is looking for ongoing volunteers to help the girls ultimately maintain the garden, plant new crops with the seasons, continue with beautification projects, help with cooking classes, etc. The best way to become a part of this is to let me, Jaime Perkins (jperkins88@gmail.com; 310-606-0263), know that you want to be involved. Furthermore, ServeSD has many different types of projects going on that we would love to have you collaborate with us on and we meet every month to plan new outreaches. If you’d like to be a part or our emails, please email me or Marc Wallis (marcwallis85@gmail.com) to be in the know on all of our philanthropic adventures!

2) GenerateHope. For those interested in collaborating with GenerateHope outside of (or in addition to) our gardening, please visit their website and fill out an interested volunteer sheet (http://www.generatehope.org/getinvolved/#3volunteer). Then, you’ll attend a training, I believe the next one is on February 20th. After your background check is cleared, Susan can get you plugged in to different ways to help out the foundation. Such an incredible mission!

3) Victory Gardens. My little garden gnomes! There were several of you wanting to get that thumb a bit greener, so here’s some more opportunities. Victory Gardens has a ton of really wonderful opportunities to get involved with the community through numerous projects. Here is their primary website: http://www.victorygardenssandiego.com/. You can get on their mailing list for events and such, they always have something going on. Visit their Indiegogo “Growing Food…Growing Confidence” project website (http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/310317) to see what else they are up to. They also have, for example, another course going on February 9, 16, and 23 from 9a-1p where you can learn about garden tools, garden siting considerations, testing and developing good soil, composting, building a variety of garden beds, plant selection and planting, integrated pest management principles and harvesting your bounty. If you take this course, you could be eligible for a home garden build as well. To sign up, email your interest to the Co-Director for VGSD Bob Greenamyer (bob@victorygardenssandiego.com); the cost of the course is $60, but if you have financial hardship, just let him know.

Alright, here is me sending all my good energy to all of you! 2103 is going to be a fantastic year, and please let me know if there is anything I can help you with to get plugged in. We want you to serve and contribute in ways that are meaningful for you…let’s go change the world!!! Yeah!

Best,
Jaime Perkins