​What do beautiful pottery and delicious spices have in common? Both support Bountiful Ciites work! We are so pleased to welcome our newest sponsors and co-creators. Spicewalla is donating their amazing spices for our FEAST cooking and gardening education classes, and East Fork Pottery is donating pottery for an upcoming raffle! Stay tuned!

​On Sunday December 5th there will be a mix of local events around Buncombe County to honor soil by promoting awareness of healthy soil and celebrating its many benefits.
There will be  events  to help educate our communities on the importance of soil biodiversity and sustainable soil management. 
In the evening there will be a potluck and film viewing to celebrate the wonders of soil. Learn more and register for events HERE.

​Did you know our Community Garden Network (CGN) hosts free classes? Max Mandler and Tamarya Sims have been our most recent guest teachers. Max led a workshop on tool repair, and Tamarya taught about growing herbs and making homegrown herbal tea. Check out more of our recorded classes in the VIRTUAL WORKSHOPS on our website. Follow us on FB to find out about upcoming classes.

Knowledge is a resource, and that's not all the Bountiful Cities CGN shares. We were able to secure approximately $3,700 from Buncombe County Parks and Recreation to purchase 10 rodent-proof composters for area community gardens, and will be purchasing and distributing those in July.

Also, we have been awarded $10,000 from the Pisgah Health Foundation to restock our free Tool Library and Seed Library, and to provide direct resourcing to five area community gardens. Finally, the CGN has added a Technical Assistance section to the monthly CGN newsletter, which Co-coordinator, Lydia George writes in response to common seasonal garden challenges, and every newsletter is now translated into Spanish by our partners at Cenzontle and distributed in both English and Spanish each month. 

If you would like be part of our CGN listserv please contact Isa@BountifulCities.Org
 
The workshops highlighted were presented in partnership with the City of Asheville

​Bountiful Cities is continuing to get plant donations to distribute in our community. If your garden has some open space stop by the Lucy S. Herring Elementary Peace Garden  or check out the FB page to see what is being offered this week! These organic veggies were donated by Southern States Cooperative. Thanks!

​Bountiful Cities is excited to be supported by, and partnering with the Asheville Bread Festival! Thanks to a generous contribution from the festival, Bountiful Cities has been able to fully fund our outreach to community gardens, and have an impact on the amount of food those gardens have capacity to grow this year. We are also fully funding our efforts to install solar power in the Pearson garden! We look forward to all the bread baking and gardening in our future together!

​Bountiful Cities Windfall Collective Nursery is continuing to grow a wide selection of edible, medicinal, pollinator, and native plants.  New varieties of summer crops are coming up, be sure to check our webstore for updates to our inventory! If you're part of the community gardens and haven't gotten a chance to use your gift card yet, be sure to visit our webstore here or contact Alex at alex@bountifulcities.org to put in an order with us.  We'll continue to have new varieties throughout the season, and are happy to take specific requests of plants not yet in our inventory.  We'll also be having regular appearances at various plant sales this year, stay tuned to find out more. Look forward to growing with you!

Hardly anything grows faster than a weed! Did you know a morning glory vine can grow more than an inch a day? That means 7 inches in a week! SO come one come all to dig in the dirt and help out at these volunteer workdays! Sign up to hear about weekly volunteering opportunities HERE.
​Lucy Herring Elementary School Peace Garden (formerly Vance Elementary School) in West Asheville.  Tuesdays 11-12:30 Thursdays 9:30am-11am Please contact  jordan.diamond@acsgmail.net to for questions and to RSVP
Shiloh Community Garden  - Saturdays 10am - 2pm Contact Lydia George lydia@bountifulcities.org for more info
Peace Gardens and Market 10-noon on Saturdays 
Fairview Road Resilience Garden - 5-7:30pm Wednesday evenings, 10am-noon Saturday mornings  If you would like to attend please RSVP using this link 
Root Cause Farm is hosting volunteer opportunities on Wednesdays and Thursdays 10-12. Folks can sign up here!

Bountiful Cities has had several spring plant sales to  support  our gardens and (with lots of community participation!) these sales raised much needed money for infrastructure and programming in the gardens! Over $2500 so far!  The Bountiful Cities Windfall Collective Nursery is continuing to sell plants throughout the season. Please check out the on-line store on our website for summer and fall plant needs! We appreciate all the help including some wonderful plant donations from Gaia Herbs! 

Bountiful Cities Nursery is budding with new growth and exciting developments this spring!  We're changing the name of this program to Windfall Collective Nursery, one that encompasses the larger vision of the project and efforts towards supporting the growth of a thriving community.

Along with our selection of edible, medicinal, indigenous and pollinator plants, we will be offering a variety of useful plants and handcrafted creations from the Bountiful Cities community.  Our new offerings will include natural dyes, block prints, herbal preparations, arts, crafts, and more. Supporting resource sovereignty and local mutual aid efforts will also be a large focus for us, stay tuned to find out how to get involved!

Our web store is up and running, we have lots of spring veggies, herbs, and flowers sizing up. Click this link to find out more.  Sales start this week, feel free to reach out if you have any questions or specific requests.  We look forward to growing with you this season!"

Join the Bountiful Cities Community Garden Network for a free virtual screening and discussion of the documentary "Gather" on Thursday March 11th from 5:30-7:30pm. This documentary looks at the reclamation of land, and how sharing knowledge of growing, harvesting and cooking traditional foods has helped strengthen different indigenous groups in the USA by connecting with their cultural identities. It's a movie about the importance of food sovereignty, the connection between food, land, culture, health and history. The movie will be starting promptly at 5:45, but please be sure to log in to the Zoom link at 5:30, so we can check in and introduce the film, and we will be having the discussion portion over Zoom after.
Register in advance for the Zoom meeting here:
https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZUrcO-hrTwiEtIWeE3m3XGpdb-XuwwnXx_I
Facebook Event Page:
https://www.facebook.com/events/421583965814453
This event is presented for the residents of the City of Asheville in partnership with the City of Asheville. 

Our goal in the next 3 months is to raise $7,000 to broaden the support for community members and fully fund the Community Garden Network Assistant position for 2021.Find out about this community effort HERE, donate here. ​

Root Cause Farm will be hosting once-a-month Sanctuary Space work days throughout winter.  People can use this sign-up sheet to volunteer! Sanctuary Space Work Days: March 14th 2021 3 - 5 pm

Dr. George Washington Carver Community Workday
WHEN: Friday, February 26th from 2:30-5:30pm
WHERE: The park is located at 30 George Washington Carver Ave, next to Stephens-Lee
We will be focusing on mulching pathways, light tree pruning, and clearing invasive plants. There will be a hands on demo of each pruning technique as well as a tour of the park. This will be a recurring event every fourth Friday of the month.

Please wear a mask to this event and maintain social distance practices. Stephens-Lee is not open to the public so we won’t be able to use the bathrooms there. You might see children in and out of the facility, but they are only open for the learning pods program for right now due to Covid-19. We will have some extra tools for folks to use as well as hand sanitizer, but any gloves, loppers, pruners or weeding tools you can bring are much appreciated.

These community workdays  are being presented in partnership with the City of Asheville.

For the most up-to-date information, please visit the Dr. George Washington Carver Edible Park Facebook page Come give your time and support to Asheville's first edible forest ecosystem! We look forward to seeing you!"

Vance Elementary Peace Garden (Now Lucy S. Herring Elementary Peace Garden)
FEAST @ Home Cooking Videos:
Jordan Diamond, the FEAST Garden Coordinator at Lucy S. Herring Elementary, has launched FEAST @ Home: a series of cooking videos that teach kids how to make yummy, easy snacks using a new veggie every week. Each week for the next 6 weeks, Jordan will upload a new video to the FEAST Peace Garden YouTube Channel. Videos and a recipe will be shared with teachers every week so they can incorporate them into their weekly lessons and share with families. Students are encouraged to follow along and make the recipes at home (with adult supervision!). If you have a child that doesn't attend Lucy S. Herring Elementary but you would like to use these videos for your Home School routine, contact Jordan.Diamond@acsgmail.net to be added to the email list.
Herring Peace Garden Workdays:
Fridays from 1:00- 2:30 pm
Join us for socially distant garden workdays! BYO mask and gardening/work gloves and RSVP to cathy@bountifulcities.org or jordan.diamond@acsgmail.net
Produce Sharing:
Know someone who needs access to fresh produce? Visit the Lucy S. Herring Elementary Peace Garden or Hall Fletcher FEAST Garden on Tuesday afternoons and check out the produce sharing tables! Thanks to a generous, weekly donation from Mother Earth Food, we are able to share produce with the community through our school gardens. Join each garden's Facebook page to see updates each week.