Group trust was what we learned on this beautiful day at the Riverfront. Working in a group is what will make us have a successful time this summer. We will be spending a lot of time together as we learn, teach and have our farmers market. We, the Grow Hartford crew got the chance to understand proper communication and skills needed to work and function as a team using leadership, and being a team. -Jerica

GROW Hartford with Angel

Angel, in the white shirt on the left of the web, helps Clivens, with the rest of the crew, to pass successfully through our web challenge! Hi my name is Angel I am part of the GROW Hartford crew. Yesterday Teresa,Micaela and I were in the green house. The green house is like a big tent that we, the GROW Hartford crew, hang out when is raining. So yesterday we were putting some some sunflowers in plastic pots for the garden sale and for our garden too.

ropes course cooperation!

Back at the site, we have already been able to use techniques for communication, trust, and real teamwork that we practiced at the riverfront ropes course. In this picture, the crew is lifting Shannon through the "spider web". After a lot of effort and cooperation we were able to successfully complete this challenge! -micaela

Hello!

Hello, my name is Micaela Cadena. I am very excited to be working at GROW Hartford for the summer. I am from New Mexico but have been living in Connecticut for 4 years while going to school. This past weekend, I finally graduated from Trinity College here in Hartford. My degree was in international studies and human rights. Someday I want to go to law school and live again in the southwest. I am really happy to be doing urban agriculture and am learning new things everyday. In this picture, I am sitting on the ground and my sister, Mireya, is sitting on the table. She was here visiting from New Mexico to see my graduation. Together we were selling plants at the Knox Parks Plant sale. The GROW plants were in some way planted or cared for by the GROW crew or our community volunteers. That day, we sold many plants and were able to tell a lot of people about the GROW program and about our upcoming Laurel St. Farmers market. Jerica Sandiford In this picture we had a Knox Parks had a plant sale. I got the chance to work at our station working with the plants and the people who wanted to buy them. It was fun and exciting because I never worked a plant stand before. I was proud of myself because I was working efficiently, while having fun. It was interesting because I didn’t know that so many people were going to come. We sold most of what we had. It was nice to see what we started satisfy the customers with something that we enjoy working with.

Flip it Over and Hang on!

This past Saturday we took on the lower elements challenge course at Riverfront Recapture. It was great!

The crew taking a moment to relax in our outdoor classroom. 

Teamwork!

It's the boys turn after Theresa and Luz and Shannon rolled this huge stump about 25 yeards, It was Angel, Clivens and Rickion, heave the final ho up the hill where it will serve as a table.

Welcome GROW CREW to the First Week!

Clivens, Clifford and Theresa (left to right) work to clear brush and trees for a new outdoor classroom area. This was our first week with the new GROW crew and it looks like it is going to be a busy and rewarding season!

Thumbs Up from Moylan Masterminds

Honey, Aldwin and Jercia planted cosmos, Tithonia, marigolds, nicotiana, sweet annie and zinnias in front of the garden. They are helping to make this areas flower-full for the farmers market this summer. This is the second week for these kids and I am looking forward to two more awesome weeks in the garden with them. These students are worm crazy! We also planted spinach and beans!

"I've never been dirty before and I love it"

These are words will echo in my head for a long time. New and enthusiastic gardener Roberto (here with the mile-long smile!) shouted this out last week after weeding the bed that we planted seeds into this week. Here they, Roberto, Edward, and Nancy from Moylan Masterminds, are planting flowers for the garden.

Muddy hands and knees 

Mud, Mud and More Mud!

Moylan Elementary School Students good and muddied after a day at GROW It is definatly spring here in Hartford and the GROW season is underway. GROW Hartford has partenerd with the Molyan Elementary School Masterminds, an afterschool program, for the next month. These fourth graders will be comming every week to help out in the garden and discover that their favorite foods, everything from fried Okra to ice cream comes from the earth. We had a blast on Friday planting tomatoes and weeding. It was really muddy in the garden from the latest deluge, but that didn't stop these students from digging up worms and trying to catch the spiders scurrying acros the plastic mulch. While they learned that tomatoes will grow fruits just like the ones in the stores, I learned that a muddy flooded garden is not a problem at all... -Shannon