Please Remember To Share Your Blessings!
Many of us, especially in the United States, are well into the growing season now, perhaps already wading through knee deep rows of squash, peppers, and eggplant. If we aren't already harvesting our own produce, we certainly soon will be.
As you anticipate that first bite of a freshly picked tomato, and make room in your pantry or freezer for quarts of home canned veggies, I hope you will also make plans to share your blessings with the needy in your community.
In an earlier blog I talked about the program, "Plant a Row for the Hungry," that operates nation-wide in the US, encouraging farmers and back-yard gardeners to plant extra crops for donation to area food banks. Or you donate some of your fresh produce to a church or community food pantry, or soup kitchen, or a community agency that provides food to families struggling financially. Receiving a gift of food frees up money to pay monthly bills or provide other family necessities.
As my garden started to produce a few weeks ago, I anxiously awaited the day I would be able to harvest enough to share. The veggies were only coming in here and there, but one day, when I looked in the basket of veggies on my kitchen table, I realized that over 3 days I had accumulated enough yellow squash to share! I was able to donate 15 pounds of squash to a local agency. I'm sharing this story, not to brag of a good deed, but to point out that what you donate doesn't have to come from a single harvest. Believe me, it will be given away and eaten well before it starts to go bad!
After waiting and planning all winter to start our gardens, after all the labor, after all the anticipation of harvesting our own fresh veggies, it might be difficult to think of giving away even one tomato, but I encourage each and every one of you to give something from your garden this year. If you only give a bowl full of tomatoes, at least a few people will be able to enjoy those tomatoes. If you only give one pumpkin, at least someone can make a pie, and a child will have a jack-o-lantern this year.
Whatever you give, however much you give your contribution can relieve the burden of others.
Please contribute a portion of what you grow to an agency that can put it in the hands of the hungry and the needy. And may God bless you for it!
Michelle
Your donation can be tax deductible. Check with your food pantry or Food Bank to verify.
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3 Comments
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Comment by PiscesGirl on June 26, 2009 at 11:24pm - This is a really neat idea! I hope that those recieving the food like zucchini, because that's what I always end up drowning in! :)
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Comment by chris w on June 26, 2009 at 12:14am - I'm hoping to have some to share but after our huge hail storm I'm not sure what will be left (our growing season is usually short but is extra short this year - just hit 50 degrees at night last night, might get colder again.) Our church does a 'farmers market' - we put extras out, people take what they want and leave what they can. Your suggestion is perfect for this time of year - I was just reading in the paper that this is the time of year that food banks need help around where I live. Next year I just might have to plant more! (Or maybe I'm looking for an excuse to plant more!)
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Comment by sandra anderson on June 26, 2009 at 12:07am -
fantastic!
I planted a few rows to share....makes me nervous though, if my crops fail, so will my donation!! But I'm more of an optimist, so knee deep produce wading, here I come!!
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