Join the friends of the Beacon Food Forest at the Jefferson Community Center 3801 Beacon Ave S Seattle, WA on Saturday March 9th from 1 - 4 pm. The Plaza will help to serve the community in many positive ways to create a local food source in our neighborhood. Call for Volunteers Interested in helping out at the forum? We could use about 12 people to help greet and do other tasks. Let us know by RSVP emailing Judi, our Volunteer Coordinator: foodforestvolunteer@gmail.com We would also really like someone(s) to video at the proceedings. If you can help with this and have the equipment please let us know. About Friends of Beacon Hill Food Forest - The Beacon Food Forest is the work of a dedicated group of volunteers in partnership with the City of Seattle Department of Neighborhoods. We work to create an edible forest of fruit and nut trees along with P-Patches to create a local source of food for the neighborhood. We welcome the participation of all cultures and the sharing of gardening knowledge from around the world. Please visit our web site for more information: http://beaconfoodforest.weebly.com
Hello Food Foresters, We would like to thank everyone who came out Saturday and continued the effort to build the Fruit and Nut Tree Groves. We successfully sheet mulched another 1200 square feet of grass into forest floor for our Fig and Asian pear trees. It is a great pleasure to see the grass disappear and a forest begin. Thank You! On Saturday there were people from 23 different zip codes working together and stewarding their public lands. We would also like to thank Central Coop, Essential Bakery, Tall Grass Bakery, and Melanie, John, Julie, Stephanie and Morgan for making all the chili. Thanks for another great community lunch on the farm! Thanks also to the Seattle Parks Department. Next Community Work Party: March 16th 10am-2pm. The Calendar on the website lists all our meetings and events planned. www.beaconfoodforest.org If you are interested in doing more field work you can sign up for the Irrigation Team, Timber Wall building team and/or the Retaining Wall team. Contact Glenn: glennherlihy@speakeasy.net and we'll keep you posted. Thanks again, Friends of the Beacon Food Forest
We are throwing a party to celebrate the work our community has accomplished, the new grant award, show a great 53 minute film called 'The Power of Community' and our Cause* (see below for rouge definition of our cause after you read the info about the party). Lets have some fun! When: Friday Night January 18th, 7pm Where: Garden House, 2336 15th Ave S, Beacon Hill. 7pm What: Family Celebration Social/Dessert Potluck Film and Dessert Feast. We are serving popcorn and desserts but would will probably want to hug you if you bring a favorite dessert to share. We'll also have a variety of beverages mostly warm and yummy. Everyone welcome! Questions and offers to help please contact Melanie at: melanie.coever@gmail.com We have really great news to share about our recent award from the Dept. of Neighborhoods Matching Fund Grant. On Jan 18th we will explain what we are doing with this grant and how it will empower our community. Bob Redmond, our favorite Bee keeper from www.urbanbee.com will be on hand with an info table and local honey. The Film trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urTPsSFV2y8 Please forward this on to friends and family. Hope to see you there, Friends of the Beacon Food Forest www.beaconfoodforest.org * To empower ourselves and be the intelligence and processors of nutrients from the forest we steward. To be similar to beneficial bacteria that maintain our ability for resiliency and good health and to be very unlike and have no reference to virus' who kill their hosts. Long live the ability and will power for Humanity to evolve with its Host, Earth.
The Beacon Food Forest (BFF) was just awarded a Seattle Department of Neighborhoods Large Matching Fund Grant for $86,000 to design and build a community gathering building and tool shed on site. These buildings will serve many purposes to our community; from weather shelter, education and celebration area, to nursery and tool shed. We will be organizing the community to design these buildings in early 2013. Big "Thank You" to the folks at the Dept of Neighborhoods, Mayor Mike McGinn and the Seattle City Council for their ecological foresight and determination to support urban community agriculture. But thank you also to the many BFF volunteers guided by their own moral reasoning to apply, implement and manage this grant and other grants in their own free time. We'll be holding a celebration for this grant announcement Jan 18th, see info below. Other Grant News and Progress ACT Tree/ City Fruit Grant: We have successfully completed our ACT Tree grant in conjunction with City Fruit by reaching our goal of planting 14 fruit trees, and teaching community members to be young fruit tree stewards. This grant helped to purchase fruit trees and hold workshops to educate our community on maintaining fruit trees. Thank You ACT Tree and City Fruit. Sustainable Path Grant: We are in the process of selecting a design team to work with a BFF committee to create educational signage throughout the BFF site. These permanent signs will explain scientific and cultural aspects of permaculture, food forestry, community strengthening and how we are all interconnected in the natural cycles of our world. Very cool gift to the community. Work Party Progress From Ground Making Day on September 29th to mid November the community built over 21,000' square feet of planting beds and put in 22 trees in our Lower Bench area. Over 400 people participated in this year's work parties successfully planting the beginnings of a Fruit and Nut forest. Thank You Food Foresters! Work parties will resume in 2013 after construction begins, see below. Construction update The Seattle Conservation Corps will begin construction on the Upper Area and Lower Bench in late December or January. Putting up temporary fencing for erosion control and safety, grading for terraces, digging irrigation trenches, and gravel path work will be first on the list. We will still be asking the community to help with laying in irrigation lines and setting up hose bibs, but we won't have to dig the ditches Yah! If you have experience or want experience with irrigation lines or plumbing please contact: < mailto:glennherlihy@speakeasy.net>. subject "Irrigation". Future Events Friday Night January 18th we will be holding a Beacon Food Forest Celebration at the Garden House, 2336 Beacon Ave S. This event will be a celebration social open to the entire community. Details coming soon on the list serve. To volunteer or to offer your help please contact Melanie at melanie.coerver@gmail.com Community Open House to give input on the signage project. DTBA. Community Meeting to give input on the design of the Gathering Building and tool shed. DTBA. Spontaneous Beautification Art project. Details coming in January. Feel good by doing good If your family likes to give in-kind donations as presents for the holidays please keep the Beacon Food Forest in mind. A donation to the BFF is a great gift that keeps on giving to the community and has no waste products. www.beaconfoodforest.org click on "Donation", specify BFF, feel good by doing good. Wishing you a nutritious and safe holiday season, Friends of the Beacon Food Forest www.beaconfoodforest.org
131 people made the choice to go out in November and build a food forest this weekend. We moved 80 yards (!) of arbor chip mulch, 20 yards of compost, piles of cardboard and burlap and built a huge Nut tree bed. We put in many trees and almost finished our extensive swale system. Wow, community power. Thank you to the many groups of people like (CEP) Community Environment and Planning people who baked tons of food and rode their bikes together to the site, the UW fraternity who showed a lot of muscle, , Permaculture Meet Up, Tracy Y and her great group of friends and all the other conscientious intelligent volunteers who see what’s going on this planet and what needs to happen. Thank you also to our nutrient delivery system like Palace Kitchen and Dalia bakery for the unbelievably delicious soup and baked goods. The CEP people, Central Coop, Essential Bakery, Mighty O Donuts, and Tall Grass Bakery. We got so many compliments on the food and we did exactly what we said we would with all those kind gifted calories: Transform hundreds of square footage of grass into diverse community powered food forest. Check out how we move, here. www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.374688912614835.89463.115216535228742& Thank you Seattle!
Stay tuned for upcoming work parties later this summer and fall. In the meantime, there are committees working behind-the-scenes to develop various elements of this community project. Here are the committees and a contact for each. Administration, Melanie Coerver, melanie.coerver@gmail.com Outreach, Cheryl Wilder, wildercw@hotmail.com Education, Jacqueline Cramer, cramerjacqueline99@gmail.com Field work, Marketing and Communication, Glenn Herlihy, glennherlihy@speakeasy.net Arts and Culture, Julie Haack, julianorthred@hotmail.com
Saturday, June 30, 2012 10 am – 12 noon at El Centro De La Raza: 2524 16th Ave South, Room #310, 98144This workshop will include: permaculture concepts, soil building, plant guilds and leading a team in planting the first stages of the Beacon Food Forest. We will begin designing plant communities, sheet mulch, and create strategies for having productive work parties. This workshop is offered free of charge through a grant with ACTrees and City fruit. Please rsvp to Jacqueline Cramer, cramerjacqueline99@gmail.com
This Saturday the 16th at Jefferson Park Community Center, 3801 Beacon Ave S, 98108 10 am - 11:30 am FREE We will be sharing formation on building soil, food forests, permaculture and plant communities. These skills will enable our community to care for fruit trees, including those we planted last month into pots for the fall, helping build a resilient community and local food source. Thanks to the efforts of City Fruit, in partnership, we have been funded by an ACT grant to bring this information to our community. Please RSVP cramerjacqueline99@gmail.com
Saturday July 14th. An all day event celebrating the opening of Jefferson Park. The BFF is working on ideas for this event. Have an idea to share?
June 27th, 7pm, place to be announced here. If you are interested in a leadership role or joining a sub-committee please attend this meeting.
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