-Growing food: We grew over 1200 pounds of organic produce this year for families who rent garden plots, volunteers who work in our community beds, and customers at our affordable produce market here in West End. We also acquired two new garden lots to expand our production space in the year ahead.

-Growing community: Part of our vision for growing community is to create real opportunities for young people. We hired four youth interns from the West End community to plant and till the soil, harvest crops, train and lead volunteers, and consult with other gardens throughout the city. We also hosted court-ordered youth from Birmingham Family Court in O.U.R. Gardens (Outstanding Urban Renewal), a meaningful community service opportunity and monthly discussion group to reflect on our futures together.

-Education: Planting workshops, cooking demos, hands-on gardening with kids, and weekly volunteer trainings share knowledge about gardening, composting and cooking with people of all ages. As one neighbor recently said to a friend while visiting the garden, "It's amazing! I had no idea you could just make dirt like that!" 

-Health and wellness: WE Gardens hosted the Summer Solstice Celebration and the Collard Green Cook-Off as free community festivals this year, showing attendees how we can grow, eat, and live healthfully on the fruits of the land while highlighting local health and wellness practitioners, local businesses and craftsmen, artists and musicians.

-Sustainability: Our produce is all natural, raised without synthetic pesticides or chemical fertilizers. We have expanded our composting operation this year so that now, our soil is 100% made in Birmingham, nurtured without outside additives beyond the compost our "Soil Man" Myron cooks up. 


 
We are grateful for many WE Gardens partners and supporters including the Community Church without Walls, the Community Foundation of Greater Birmingham, Colonial Properties Trust, Princeton Baptist Medical Center, Whole Foods, Cafe Dupont, Little Savannah, Mix, Jefferson County Family Court, Real Life Poets, the Underground Cooking Academy, Healthy Kids Healthy Communities, India Henson Yoga, Sage Wellness, Golden Temple, Growing Power, Women in Agriculture (Project Hopewell, Inc.), Greater Birmingham Community Food Partners, Hemphill Elementary School, and the numerous other supporters, volunteers and donors who make this work possible. Thank you for your support!