Continue the Conversation: Awakening the Dreamer
Sustainable Solano would like to share a video that a friend, Kristian, made! It certainly highlights the most meaningful moments and makes us reflect on how moving of an experience this was for us.
Announcement: Looking for Demonstration Food Forest Keepers in Fairfield and Vallejo
Would you like to become a demonstration food forest keeper?
Would you like to convert your thirsty lawn into a thriving food-producing ecosystem fed by the laundry-to-landscape greywater system? Do you enjoy sharing your knowledge and resources with your community? Are you interested in sustainable landscaping, edible gardens, and especially permaculture? Do you own a house in Vallejo or Fairfield? Would you like to be a part of a growing permaculture community in Solano County?
If you answer “yes” to all of the above, you can be a good candidate to become a demonstration food forest keeper in 2017!
Imagine a thriving, vibrant eco-system in your front- or backyard! A few fruit trees surrounded by native and Mediterranean plants, berries, perennial vegetables, flowers, with enough space for your annual favorites.
How does this work?
We’ll design and facilitate an installation of a Seed Plot on your property. You provide volunteers (your friends and family make the best team: you learn and work together, and then you celebrate); we provide design, plants, material and expert advise, all free for you. During the installation, your laundry will become a classroom for “How to Install a Greywater System” hands-on workshop, and your yard will be open for public workshops. You then share with the community the progress of your Seed Plot for at least next 5 years: we’ll take pictures of your growing and evolving Seed Plot and advise you on maintenance and future design, while you let community in once or twice a year for a tour of your Food Forest.
We’ll have an open application process; the preliminary dates are February – March 2017 for Vallejo and June – August 2017 for Fairfield. You’ll be able to download the Application Form from our website. The Application includes a very detailed study of your proposed location for a Seed Plot and a legal part that defines parties’ roles and responsibilities.
Every application will be evaluated by our Advisory Board – a group of people with a Permaculture Design Certificate and experience in designing and building permaculture sites. The Program team will visit your site for an extensive survey and a conversation with you and your family about your potential Seed Plot.
To learn more and to meet the Advisory Board: please attend Benicia’s demonstration food forests guided tours in January – May 2017 and landscaping classes in February and March. For more information, email info@sustainablesolano.org.
Awakening the Dreamer, continued: Game Changer Intensive
Join us in co-creating a world that works for everyone. Whether you were with us for the Awakening the Dreamer Symposium, or you want to learn more about how you, with your own unique values, skills, and concerns, can commit to creating the change you want to see, a good place to start with with the Game Changer Intensive. Offered by Pachamama Alliance, it is a seven-week online course designed to educate, inspire, and equip you to be a pro-activist leader, a game changer in your community.
Sustainable Solano is partnering with Pachamama Alliance and Solano County libraries to offer, in conjunction with the online session, regular meeting spaces for residents of Solano County to meet, build, and support our communities together. If you are interested in registering, please submit your interest here. Pachamama and Sustainable Solano will contact you with more information according to the respective cities that you live in. For any additional information, please contact info@sustainablesolano.org.
Benicia Walk in a Food Forest Series Continues
We are pleased to announce the speakers for the remaining tours in 2017! All tours begin at 10 am on Saturdays and usually last about 2.5 hours. Each tour includes an indoor talk about permaculture /urban food forests, secondary water and water saving techniques, and an outdoor part where participants explore the existing food forest under the guidance of an experienced professional. Tours go rain or shine, so please plan accordingly and bring your rain gear and warm cloth. The tours are free, but you do have to register to receive the exact address. Registrations are coming soon.
January 28
David Shaw from Santa Cruz Permaculture will lead a tour of the “Barley’s Backyard”
February 28
Lydia Neilsen from the Regenerative Design Institute will lead a tour of the “Greyhawk Grove”
March 25
Our very own Kathleen Huffman, who is completing her permaculture design certificate with Toby Hemenway at the Permaculture Skills Center will lead a tour of “The Curious Garden”.
April 22
Jessica Bates from the Food Forest Farm West will lead a tour of the “Marina Place Food Forest”
May 20
You will have a unique opportunity to see all seven gardens in one day. Stay tuned for more details of this exciting and informative day!
To learn more about the program and seven demonstration food forests in Benicia.
2017 Preview from Executive Director Elena Karoulina
Dear friends of Sustainable Solano,
As I am looking back at the eventful and transformative year of 2016, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to all people who helped co-create Sustainable Solano: the Board, our volunteer leadership team, our funders and supporters, and all of you who made a personal commitment to make a difference, to participate in something bigger than ourselves, to nurture heart-based initiatives for the good of the whole.
In 2017 we will continue to refine and shape the vision for the organization, to deepen our understanding of our current situation and to develop strategies to help making Solano County more environmentally and economically sustainable, socially just and personally fulfilling place to live and work.
We will continue with meaningful conversations in the community, beginning with a seven-week “Game Changer Intensive” offered by Pachamama Alliance as a follow up to the Awakening the Dreamer Symposium. Everyone can participate in this program! Our goal is to provide opportunities for face-to-face meetings in Solano County allowing us to deepen the connections we felt so profoundly with each other at the Symposium and to engage with each other in new and existing initiatives that facilitate change at the local level and beyond. Learn more and to register.
Our sustainable landscaping efforts will continue with monthly tours of Benicia demonstration permaculture food forests, installation of demonstration gardens in Fairfield and Vallejo, and a series of talks and workshops in Benicia, Fairfield and Vallejo – watch for regular updates on our calendar.
We invited professional landscapers, both established and new, to explore our Land Caretakers Program. Sustainable Landscapers Association of Solano County is forming now – please email info@sustainablesolano.org if you are interested in learning more.
Calling all the players in Solano local food movement to get to know each other and to join our efforts to create a robust, healthy, inclusive local food system in the county. We are planning to have a Solano Local Food Summit in the spring of 2017. If you are interested to learn more, please email info@sustainablesolano.org.
For cooking classes and talks on healthy, local food throughout the county, please check our calendar regularly (and let us know if you would like to promote your efforts of brining wholesome local food to our communities through our website and newsletter).
I am looking forward to see you at these upcoming programs and events. Please let me know if you have suggestions, ideas or questions. I wish you a peaceful and restful holiday season!
In gratitude,
Elena Karoulina
Executive Director
Sustainable Solano
“A Walk in a Food Forest” – The Living and Learning Garden
Over a dozen people, from San Francisco, the South Bay, East Bay, as well as those within Solano County converged at The Living and Learning Garden this past Saturday to see the progress this food forest had made since it’s installation nearly six months ago in April 2016. There were permaculture students, landscaping professionals, homeowners, and interested people and gardeners all meeting and mingling, under gracious hosts Leslie and Stacy’s care.
Ryan Johnston of Permaculture Skills Training Center started off the morning with a somber, humorous, educational and inspirational talk on how we can make a difference starting with small steps, and how the yield of a permaculture garden is really connections, community, ecology, and sustaining and restorative to the soul and the environment–but that the food that comes from a food forest can be quite delicious too.
The talk then moved outside to point out the greywater installation, ingenious workarounds to use secondary water (such as fitting a pipe perfectly snug in a crack in the driveway), plantings and strategies to create a healthy system that incorporates not only the plants and water, but also edges for people to interact with neighbors. And of course, problem shooting issues brought up by individuals.
“This talk was so great,” said one attendee, “That I’m going to definitely go to the next one too.”
We hope to see you there as well. November 19th, at “Birds, Bees and Beyond,” one of our more established food forests, nearing two years old. The speaker will be permaculture expert John Valenzuela. More information and registration can be found here.
