Ritual Circle 1

The Garden Ritual

by Garden Project
Opening Circle
Francisco baked a garden squash/sweet potato pie with coconut crust for the garden group and selected the first piece as his offering.

Our Huerto Project Coordinator, Monica Masini Aguilera, led us in an indigenous ritual of thanks for the wonderful resources that Pacha Mama has given to us -the earth, the water, the sun and the air.
Monica explained all of the items used in our opening circle and ritual.  Part of the ritual was selecting items brought for the offerenda or offering to mother earth.

Each one of us selected the best of our offerings creating a beautiful gift
Francisco Nava- Our first Inspirador!
 

Francisco has been instrumental in making Huerto Coxala de Creando Cambios, our community garden in San Juan Cosalá, a teaching experience for our ChangeMakers young women and the community at large.

Read More about the making of Huerto Coxala on his blog:  Travels in Mexico
 
mascot post 2

Soruya – The Garden Mascot

by Garden Project

Meet Soruya, the garden mascot for the ChangeMakers / Creando Cambios garden/orchard in San Juan Cosalá, The garden has been named Huerto Coxala, and Soruya lives in the lot next door.

Huerto Coxala is a project aimed at demonstrating to the SJC community that we can build something important together with community members as ChangeMakers. The girls and their families are provided tools and knowledge about how to grow their own food and medicinal plants, and the process contributes to their developmental learning about how to care for themselves. They, in turn, teach others.

Francisco Nava shares his experience and teaches the young women about gardening and Irma Rameño has donated the garden space. A grant from the Lake Chapala Garden Club and donations from expats have provided the resources necessary to begin this community project, under the leadership of Mónica Masini, our ChangeMakers Project Coordinator.

Berengena Babies

Week 2 – Conscious Garden Design

by Garden Project

Our second week at the ChangeMaker’s huerto/garden in San Juan Cosala brought some new community members who wanted to participate:  Jaime Compatzin and his son.
Jaime and his family own a floral shop in San Juan Cosala, so plants naturally were or interest to him.  He also wanted to expose his son to a huerto and the art of growing plants.

Today our lessons were Conscious Garden Design, Seed Germination and Soil. We discussed which plants the group wanted to plant, if they were in need of full sun, partial shade/sun or full shade.  We also discussed if the group wanted a large community garden plot or individual plots.  They unanimously chose a large community garden design.

So many questions to be answered! How deep?  How long? How many seeds?  How much distance between plants? How do seeds germinate?  Under what conditions? How often to water?  How do you know if a plant needs water or is getting too much?  Do we water now or wait for the rain?  
 

We discussed it all as we worked!

See the complete Week 2 blog HERE

Watch for the video by Francisco coming to our facebook page soon!  We could really use “seed money” right now to purchase tools, hoses, gloves, and other gardening essentials! We are currently working with one shovel!

To Donate
Stones

Creating Change in San Juan Cosala

by Garden Project

Francisco Nava and ChangeMakers have teamed up on a second garden project in San Juan Cosala.

“Monica Masini, Program Coordinator for ChangeMakers asked me if I’d be interested in teaching the young ladies of the program organic gardening. When I learned of ChangeMakers and their goals and mission, I immediately said “yes”.

And so we met on a beautiful parcel of land in San Juan Cosala, loaned to us by Irma Remeno Garcia’s family. Our first meeting was one of introduction and vision sharing.We spoke of past gardening experiences. We spoke of needed materials and what the young ladies would like to learn. We spoke of schedules, timelines and work/family responsibilities. Then we got to work clearing stones and boulders from the recently plowed plot of land where our sustainable garden work will happen.

We are only now just starting to plant the seeds of knowledge,hope and change. We are in need of donations: garden tools, gloves, wheel barrels…anything you can think of that one might need in a community garden.”

Watch Us Grow! http://fcoandbradsmexicotravels.blogspot.com/