We were very thankful to receive the Joan & Regis Duffy Foundation (Gardening Together Fund) from the Community
Foundation of Prince Edward Island this year. As the province shut down, it was hard to imagine what this summer would look like, especially for our Bigs and Littles. We wanted to be able to offer youth an opportunity to get outside, and grow their own food, while spending some quality time with their mentors!
With the help of the grant we were able to buy six 4X4 garden boxes from Habitat for Humanity, along with some compost, and seeds- a big thank you goes out to Island Grown Sod for donating enough topsoil to fill our boxes! Food insecurity is a growing issue on Prince Edward Island; therefore we hope to continue creating a space where youth can feel comfortable to learn new and valuable gardening skills. We hope to better prepare our garden boxes for 2021, and make our community garden a yearly tradition for our Bigs and Littles.!
We love the individuality of each box – one of our Big & Little Sister matches have planted a salsa box and another has added artwork to the wooden frame to make the box their own. Seeing the boxes when we pull into the office parking lot every morning is one of our favourite parts of starting the day!