AfricanKelli

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Did you know 1 in 3 children in Arizona is considered “hungry?”  This is simply unacceptable to me.

Remember when I tried to get that community garden off the ground, so to speak, in central Phoenix? Well, a few lessons were learned in the toil. Namely, taking earth that’s been happily growing Bermuda grass for decades and trying to transform it into fertile soil for vegetables requires a lot more than a bunch of volunteers and hand tools. Perhaps a commercial grade construction crew could have done it, but we couldn’t. We, meaning me and probably more than a hundred volunteers in the last two years, spent countless hours digging, weeding, pulling, pushing and aching as a result. The bumper crop of okra was a mild success but the true gem of the garden is the orchard. The 75 fruit trees don’t mind a bit of Bermuda at their heels. With regular irrigation, they are thriving.

In the next year we should see a crop of citrus, apples, cherries, plums and figs. The trees cost about $20 a piece to get into the earth. They require little care and will soon be mighty producers of fresh fruit — a luxury in this community.

This got me thinking.

My little church isn’t the only one on irrigation in central Phoenix. Nor are we the only faith community with grandfathered water rights, lots of space, a desire to be more social aware, and home to community-minded folk. What if we paired the Valley Permaculture Alliance (I’m a board member) with the Association of Arizona Food Banks and the local faith community? What if we asked each church, synagogue, mosque and faith center on irrigation to plant 5 fruit trees at an expense of $100? We could partner the churches with a permaculture volunteer who knew something about planting trees and a food bank willing to get the produce to hungry families in the Valley?

Even better, what if we grew enough produce that there was a glut and we were able to send fresh fruit created from earth and water that was otherwise going to feed Bermuda grass to hungry bellies nationally?

Oh, we can. And we will. The national gleaning system, which the Association of Arizona Food Banks is a part of, will likely see truck-loads of grapefruit, oranges and lemons sent to northern states in return for trucks of potatoes and grain for desert bellies. The best part of this community project is that no extra water or space is needed. Fewer than 10 volunteer hours a year are required and a simple investment of $100. I don’t think we could make large-scale community changing work any simpler.

Here is where you come into play. Do you attend a church or other faith center in the Phoenix area? Do you have irrigation? Are you interested in helping see this project come to light? I’ve got the permaculture guild and the food banks on board. My church will be participating. I’ll be volunteering. I’d love it if you would too.

Interested?

~K

I didn’t take my camera to dinner…

I had dinner last night at a friend’s house in a older section of Tempe. Imagine walking up to a garden gate to find a treasure on the other side. Peach trees overloaded with fruit, dogs lounging in the shade and yapping underfoot, a container garden, pots of dried and fresh flowers, and chickens. A large deck, with a hole cut in the center to accommodate a huge mulberry tree strung with tiny white lights, holds a few benches and a long table with a tiny chandelier hung above. The table was set with a handful of odd chairs and held hundreds of tiny white peaches, already plucked from another tree. Around the bend of the yard was a pool of fish, pets kept only to keep the mosquitoes away from the irrigated yard.

Entering the home, you push through a large glass door that has been painted by a local artist using native themes. The walls are plastered and the kitchen is painted a bright orange. Letterpress lithographs are framed on the walls — celebrating academics from the nearby university and their accomplishments and speeches. A bunch of handwoven baskets crowds above one kitchen cabinet. A stack of handmade ceramic  bowls teeters on a low kitchen island shelf. The saltillo tile has been cut into flower patterns and the rusty color is beautiful against the bright walls. The living room walls have tiny native plants painted here and there. There is a painted hummingbird in one alcove and a giant phoenix rising from the ashes above the doorway to a library overwhelmed with books.

I couldn’t dream of a more incredible home and I saw all of 1000 square feet of one portion.

It was at the kitchen table where I met three other friends last night. We sat, enjoying hummus and a block of French cheese with bowls of chips and crackers, and plotted how we are going to create meaningful programs for those interested in creating similarly spectacular gardens in the Phoenix area. Before last night, I couldn’t have even imagined a space so incredible within a 2 minute drive of my tiny home. After the dinner meeting, I couldn’t dream of not having a home just like it.

We are planning so many great events for the upcoming year with the Phoenix Permaculture Guild (which now has a new and fancy name — Valley Permaculture Alliance), including a series of gardening classes that will start with a dirt backyard and during a several month process, be transformed by teachers and participants into functioning gardens. Not just gardens that grow gorgeous flowers and pretty herbs. Gardens that provide fresh fruits and vegetables in neighborhoods of our city where these luxuries are as hard to find as savings accounts and college educations. We’ll seek out families who are interested in gardens but don’t have the know-how to make it happen and we’ll create a community around the project. Ideally, we’ll replace bags of fast food with plates of homegrown goodness.

I was so fired up about the work at hand, I had a hard time sleeping. Pair this with a native foods cookbook I’m going to work on in conjunction with mesquite and carob milling, and tree day — where we’ll see thousands of fruit trees planted in the Valley — and you can feel my excitement.

If you live in the desert Southwest and are interested in gardening but feel intimidated, let’s talk. I’ll resort to my favorite personal tagline: if I can do it, so can a trained monkey.I’m telling you — there is little else I find as rewarding as taking my tiny (and I mean TINY) piece of land and making it productive. Plus, the fruits of the labor are delicious.

-K

The saguaros are in full bloom this week — an annual event in the Valley. The crown of silky white flowers make me smile; even these desert warriors like to feel pretty once in a while.

~K

Come to find out, I didn’t have nearly as many tomatoes for a canning day as I had planned. Also? I didn’t have any more canning jars or the energy to start an extensive project. I was sidelined late last week with an inner ear infection that was by far the most painful experience I’ve had in a very long time. So, instead of laboring in a hot kitchen this weekend, I used my tomatoes for a much quicker project and used my time curled up on the couch with Netflix and a certain furry friend.

Kili (Kilimanjaro) is just about the sweetest dog you can imagine. We spent most of the weekend together while her parents were away. She did not like the sound of the blender, but did enjoy the copious amounts of cuddle and snuggle time afterward.

As for the salsa? It was fresh, easy and I threw in whatever I could find, including those tomatoes and some cilantro from the garden. I’ve decided life is just better with copious amounts of home grown condiments and boisterous puppies. And antibiotics. And Advil. And Diet Coke.

I’d better stop there.

~K

One of the most fulfilling aspects of gardening is the progress. Remember these 23 baby tomato plants that went in the earth in January?  And then here we were in March where I was shouting, “Oh! A tomato hedge! I have a tomato HEDGE!” Little did I know.

Then I convinced Matt to build a teepee for the tomatoes, thinking this would help keep things in order. How naive! I really should have read a book for four about tomatoes before spending so much time playing in the garden. I didn’t know about trimming back the bushes to keep the tomatoes off the ground. Or anything about suckers. Instead, after our attempt at wrangling chaos with the teepee, we’ve let things go a bit wild.

A month ago, we had our first tomato. She was a big one. An early bloomer. A leader in her field. But little did we know that her delicious flavor would pale in comparison soon enough. The swarms to follow have been earthy, sweet, lush and the scent of freshly picked tomatoes cannot be beat. Just being near the tomato plants this time of year makes me want to dance in circles. I feel like a cross between Julie Andrews and a wild hippie when doing so.

Wild, I tell you. Today, the hedge has grown up to the front door and I’ve got tomatoes — homegrown, organic, lovely sweet delicious OH MY GOD THIS IS WHAT THEY ARE SUPPOSED TO TASTE LIKE tomatoes — coming out of my ears. Now, remind me again why I didn’t start gardening 10 years ago? The best part of this tiny little garden is that I know without a doubt that if I can reap this bounty of a harvest from “borrowed’ HOA land in a condo complex in Phoenix, Arizona — you can grow a farm’s worth by comparison. (I’m making two assumptions there: 1. you have more than 3×4 feet of land to your name. And 2. You don’t live in an oven. With caliche soil.)

This mighty progress is translating to canned tomatoes this weekend. I’m also having friends over for homemade pizza too. My thanks, again, to Finny for inspiring me to take on new hobbies that seem so Herculean, but end up so deliciously fun. (See: knitting, sewing, canning, swearing.)

~K