Kelowna garden project grows food for children in need

Kelowna garden project grows food for children in need

Food For Thought’s first annual Birdhouse and Butterfly fundraiser gave locals a chance to purchase hand-painted items to beautify home gardens and raise funds for the not-for-profit that ensures children in the Central Okanagan don’t go hungry.

“We have seen children coming to school on a Monday morning having not eaten anything all weekend which is just unimaginable where we live in the Central Okanagan,” said Cheryl Hoffman, Food For Thought project manager.

Food For Thought offers breakfast programs in Lake Country, Kelowna and West Kelowna, and its backpack program that sends children off for the weekend with a bag of healthy food has more than doubled.

“Over the last year I can say that our volunteers have never worked harder and our community has never worked harder to meet the increasing need,” said Hoffman.

“With Kelowna increasing, [as well as] the cost of food, it’s just become more challenging, so we are now growing food.”

At their garden on Helen’s Acres in the heart of Kelowna, they have harvested fresh lettuce, basil, radishes and soon peas to add to students’ lunches. The garden space was a pandemic project that has proved to be fruitful.

“Because of COVID there was nothing that we were doing [like] travelling, participating in other things so we spent a lot of hours in here,” said Marilyn Block, Food For Thought volunteer.

“It’s just amazing to see how much this garden has grown since mid-March and putting the [food] in the backpacks and is amazing as well,” said Barb Carpenter, Food For Thought volunteer.

The funds raised through the latest fundraiser will help build more accessible garden boxes to produce even more food for the growing number of children who go to school with light lunch kits.

The garden boxes can be dedicated to anyone who wishes to make a donation, for more information visit their website 

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Published at Sun, 20 Jun 2021 01:35:53 +0000