Women's Garden Cycles Bike Tour

DVD Still Available from Microcosm! Get it!

womensgardencycles — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 23:29:37 +0000

Just Done: Another Homemade Batch of DVDs

Order Here: http://microcosmpublishing.com/catalog/videos/2864/

Bike Ride Across Nebraska!

womensgardencycles — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 16:15:57 +0000

Hey all!

Its been a long time since I’ve written anything here, but I thought I’d let cyberspace know about the cool organized bike tour that Liz and I are about to embark upon — The Bike Ride Across Nebraska. Its the 30th BRAN and this year its theme is “space cowboys”, also inferring, I assume, the presence of cowgirls. Well, we’ve got our technicolor boots and western wear ready to go! The route changes every year and we’re pretty lucky to be going through one of my favorite places in the state — Carhenge — a truly mystical place where extraterrestrials may be telling us something about the fate of fossil fuel energy.

Photos, sounds, words from the tour to come! – Kat

A Bikeable Feast

womensgardencycles — Sun, 16 May 2010 17:31:23 +0000

http://abikeablefeast.blogspot.com/

Please check out this woman’s bicycle adventure around the United States! She’s taken a year long journey visiting farms and community gardens sites across the nation to learn about sustainable agriculture first hand. Incredible insights and a wonderful journey! She’s on her way back but her blogsite is well worth a visit!

Cycling onto more events!

womensgardencycles — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 22:39:24 +0000

Howdy! I hope the winter has kept your spirits up for an exciting Spring and Summer. I know I’m elated to begin farm work and be in touch with the seasons, the elements, and witness the wonders of seeds sprouting into food once again! Better yet, the Garden Cycles, has been nominated in the local, upcoming 2010 Phoenix Bikes Bike Show especially thanks to our dear friend, Susan Ellsworth. Phoenix Bikes does great work in not only bikes but youth empowerment as well. Another is with the New York Restoration Project in New York City. They’re a nonprofit in which some of their community gardens were a part of our film and they also helped direct us to some inspiring folks who we interviewed. They have an event and we’ve been invited to show our film. We’re a little short of three years since we took the tour, but right when I think the film has finished with all the attention, we get word of another event. I can only imagine all the other small scale showings of our film without our knowing, but it’s exactly what we’d prefer as it models the smaller scale version that we envision for our food system. As I mentioned earlier, I’ll be farming with my friends at the Blue Ridge Center this season but will try to stay connected to update our site and hopefully not get too distracted with a busy summer. Below is more information on the two events to come! To the waning days of winter or do I speak too soon?!

Larita!

2010 Phoenix Bikes Bike Show!Hello Friends of Phoenix Bikes,

I’d like to invite you to the Phoenix Bikes 3rd Annual Bike show! It is going to be an incredible event with good food, good drinks and some truly awesome auction items (like 4 commuter bikes, bike art, bike clothing of every size & style and so much more).

At the show, Phoenix Bikes will unveil artwork made by local artists that was inspired by seven Extraordinary Rides. Some of the rides that will be featured include a ride in which 3 women biked from DC to Montreal to learn about community gardens and to make a documentary film on the issue. Another is a rider working with Doctors Without Borders, who biked across Southern Sudan to help treat the crippling effects caused by the Guinea worm. The artwork is meant to inspire people to get out onto a bike and into the world!

So please come and make sure to buy your tickets early!

WHO: You, your friends, family & Phoenix Bikes
WHAT: The 2010 Phoenix Bikes Bike Show, featuring Extraordinary Rides!
WHEN: APRIL 8, 2010 from 7-9pm
WHERE: NRECA (National Rural Electric Cooperative Association) 4301 Wilson Blvd, Arlington VA
HOW: By Bike, Metro, Foot or Auto

See you there!

Phoenix Bikes Bike Show 2010

Third Annual Gardeners Gathering: Growing Good Health!

On March 27, 2010, New York Restoration Project (NYRP) and 250 community gardeners, teachers, and families from P.S. 5 Ellen Lurie School will celebrate our neighborhood gardens and green spaces by exploring the many ways they help us live happy, HEALTHY lives.

Keynote speaker Ethne Clarke, Editor-in-Chief of Organic Gardening magazine, will kick-off the event with her unique perspective on the importance of green space and gardening to health.

Following the keynote, we will share an exciting overview of NYRP’s 2010 garden-based programs and resources. Next, participants will break out into workshops focused on a variety of garden and health-related topics.

Workshops include:

- Preserving Your Healthy Harvest – Learn about the health benefits of lacto-fermentation and make your first batch of pickled vegetables. Participants will take home a jar of the vegetables they helped pickle. Taught by Jeffrey Yoskowitz.

- Grow up in the Garden: How to Engage Youth – Are you a teacher? A parent? A youth leader? Learn fun activities you can enjoy with your family, your neighborhood, and your school. Come away with new ideas, connections, activities, and a garden game. Taught by Rachael Brody and Vera Fabian.

- Easy Seasonal Cooking with Chef Louisa Shafia: Join the author of Lucid Food: Cooking for an Eco-Conscious Life, as she shares with you her favorite early spring ingredients and surprising, simple ways to make them into healthy and beautiful meals. Take home recipes to share with your family.

- Feed the Body, Feed the Soul: Meditation and Yoga in the Garden – We go to our gardens for healthy food, but we can also find spiritual nourishment. Learn how yoga and meditation can enrich your garden experience. Participants will take home a yoga mat. Taught by Maxi Kozler.

- Seed Starting - Certain types of seeds are best started indoors. Learn how to start your vegetables and flowers from seed, prepare your garden soil, and care for your young seedlings. Participants will take home a planting tray with seeds and soil. Taught by Jason Sheets.

- Talkin’ Trees – Participants will enjoy a special debut presentation of Talkin’ Trees—an interactive gameshow that highlights tree care as well as the many ways trees benefit our lives and make our city a more livable, breathable place. All participants will receive a Tree Care Toolkit including a bucket or hose, hand tools and gloves. Taught by Akiima Price and Omari Washington.

- Swindler Cove Park and Riley-Levin Children’s Garden Tour – Love parks and gardens? Live or go to school in Washington Heights or Inwood? Explore the habitats, plants, and children’s garden that make up NYRP’s Swindler Cove Campus. Take home a native plant identification guide. Led by Dennis Rosario.

Next, participants will reconvene to enjoy lunch, continue visiting educational exhibits, and to socialize and network with fellow gardeners, educators, and NYRP staff and AmeriCorps.

Following lunch, participants will enjoy a series of short documentary films related to urban agriculture and health. Faces from the New Farm will be our feature presentation. Faces follows Liz Tylander, Lara Sheets and Kat Shiffler on a more than 2,000 mile bicycle journey in search “the new American farmer.” From Washington, DC to Montreal and back, the trio interview enthusiastic gardeners in urban areas, youth involved in food justice, new immigrant farmers and a new generation of back-to-the-landers. The film features The Food Project, Nuestras Raices, The Germantown Community Farm, The Intervale Center, and many others redefining the word “farmer”.

Finally, we’ll close the event with our annual raffle including cookbooks, event tickets, and potted spring flowers.

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Garden Cycles makes an appearance at Hungry Filmmakers

womensgardencycles — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 17:53:47 +0000

Anna Lappe with filmmakers at the Hungry Filmmakers event

Hey all!

After making my transition from working on the farm at Glynwood for the past 10 months, I attended the Hungry Filmmakers. An event co-curated by Shelley Rogers, filmmaker of “What’s Organic about Organic?” and Cathy Erway at the Anthology Film Archives on December 15th. Other documentary presenters were: Curt Ellis and Ian Cheney of “King Corn” who showcased their upcoming film, “Big River” and “Truck Farm”. Severine von Tarschner Fleming of “The Greenhorns”, “Grown in Detroit” by Manfred and Mascha Poppenk, and Sara Grady who presented a work in progress piece on climate change and the food system were other folks showcasing their important work. It was a humbling experience to be in company of well regarded filmmakers and such great work. Anna Lappe, of the Small Planet Institute, was there to ask questions to each of us based on our films. She did a fine job considering there was little time left before everyone headed out to Jimmy’s No. 43 for food and drinks. I wish Kat and Lizz could have been there with me to share great company among folks who have done a great deal on getting information out to the media about all the layers involved with the food movement. Whether it’s food access for low-income, a young bourgeoning farm movement, links between climate change and our food system, and a bike tour, it was explored here at this event.

Hungry Filmmakers, December 15th NYC

womensgardencycles — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 20:15:43 +0000

Garden Cycles Presents: Faces from the New Farm

Our trailer is being shown today in New York City at the Hungry Filmmakers event. If you are in NYC and want to see a tid bit of our film along with some other great documentary films that are out to challenge our food system, go check ’em out:

Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Anthology Film Archives
32 2nd Ave
New York, NY 10003
Doors open at 7:00pm. Screenings begin promptly at 7:30pm.
Tickets $10.00 at the door.

Hungry Films and Hungrier Filmmakers

Thurs: Film Screening on Mount Desert Island

womensgardencycles — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 19:44:58 +0000

Liz and Kat will be presenting “Faces from the New Farm” Thursday, October 22nd at the Common Good Cafe in Southwest Harbor, MDI, Maine at noon, with farm fresh food and a discussion to follow.

Film Available from Microcosm Publishing! Order Today!

womensgardencycles — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 00:59:53 +0000

Hello!

We are excited to announce that Microcosm Publishing is now distributing our film! So if you’re hankering for a copy, or know someone who is, please click the appropriate buttons on their website and make that purchase happen! Each DVD is a handmade work of original art!

Thanks!

- garden cycles crew -

Upcoming Screenings in Maine

womensgardencycles — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 00:26:53 +0000

Howdy Garden Cycles Fans,

Please excuse us for the inactivity on the website — we’ve been on the move and on the farm for the last few months. Lara is apprenticing at the Glynwood Center in Cold Spring, New York and Liz and I are all the way up in Durham, Maine at New Leaf Farm. We’ve been settling into long days in the fields and in the washroom, up to our ears in salad mix — golden arrowroot, deertongue, claytonia (boy do we know a lot about greens!) — and just picked our first greenhouse tomatoes.

We’re participating in the Maine Organic Farmers’ and Gardeners’ Association‘s Apprenticeship Program — a first class organization that matches newbies with seasoned farmers plus classes and workshops galore. Excitingly I’ve begun to put together a series of podcasts for MOFGA, free downloadable versions of their farm training workshops that should be available on their website in the near future.

Also for anyone in Maine, Liz and I are doing several presentations of the film, “Garden Cycles Presents: Faces from the New Farm”. Check it if you’re around here.

Tuesday, July 14th at 7:00pm at local art and theater house Frontier at historic Fort Andross in Brunswick, Maine

We’ll be presenting along with the Maine Farmland Trust. “MFT’s executive director John Piotti will give a presentation highlighting the ongoing efforts of Maine Farmland Turst to keep Maine farming alive and thriving. Brunswick poet Gary Lawless will enhance the evening by throwing in a handful of poems related to farming; and finally, you will have a chance to see a unique film, “Faces From The New Farm”, shot by two local farm apprentices working at New Leaf Farm in Durham, who cycled from DC to Canada and back and made a film about food producing farms.”

Also enjoy a photo show by Bridget Besaw, showcasing Maine farms and farmers.

Also, catch up at a very exciting conference coming up the Portland, Maine area:

Rooted in Community will be screening our film on Friday evening, July 31st from 9-10 at Maine Community College in South Portland!

“The Rooted In Community National Network (RIC) is a national grassroots network that empowers young people to take leadership in their own communities. We are a diverse movement of youth and adults working together and committed to fostering healthy communities and food justice through urban and rural agriculture, community gardening, food security, and related environmental justice work.”

… and we’re honored to take part! — Kat

Film Screening & Discussion

womensgardencycles — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 18:05:46 +0000

Hey All!

Hope you all are eagerly awaiting for spring to arrive. Attached you’ll
find a description of our film showing, ¨Garden Cycles Bike Tour: Faces
from the New Farm¨, at Dumbarton Oaks as a part of the DC Environmental
Film Festival this Thursday, March 19th, 2009. If you haven’t seen our film yet, now is the chance to view and with free admission. Thank you all for your support!

RSVP by March 17th to: landscape@doaks.org or 202-339-6460

Event Info:

Dumbarton Oaks, music room – March 19th @ 5:30pm

(registration begins @ 5pm)

- the garden cyclers