NELA Transition News | September 17, 2012

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North East Los Angeles Transition News September 17th, 2012 NELA Transition is a community group working on positive changes in our community as we face global warming, peak oil and economic decline. We share our skills working on projects which increase our local resilience and strengthen community connections. Our members are located in the Los Angeles neighborhoods including Pasadena, Altadena, Highland Park and Eagle Rock. nelatransition.org Notes from the Throop Learning Garden by January Nordman What a month we’ve had at NELA Transition/Throop Learning Garden! And what an exciting path lies ahead! Things are heating up in the garden; huge harvests, new friends, and deepening roots. First, we enjoyed very good yields from the garden, averaging 50-75 pounds of tomatoes, eggplant, squash, beans, greens, sunflowers, herbs, and pumpkinsevery week! The produce was enjoyed by our garden volunteers and the Throop congregation. We had enough abundance remaining to donate to Union Station for their food program. Sunday lunch at Throop always had a plate of fresh sliced veggies from the garden. This bounty came in spite of the persistent heat wave. Hearty thanks goes to all our volunteers who helped with midweek water and irrigation: Michael, Therese, Jean, David, Qrys, Mari, and Mimi. Thanks to your efforts the garden continues to thrive. We were honored on August 28th to offer a garden tour to our 3rd District councilperson, Mr. Terry Tornek. Therese, Michael, Qrys, Rev. Tera Little, and January were in attendance. Councilman Tornek commended us for providing a fine example of urban agriculture that demonstrated food production, water catchment and conservation, civic resiliency, and a lot of spirit. He offered to partner with us on future endeavors. Rev. Tera Little, the new pastor at Throop Church, has been integrating the garden into the church service. We often provide flowers or veggies for placement on the altar. September 9th marked the Unitarian Universalist honoring of water at all UU churches around the country. Rev. Tera offered a spirited, heartfelt homily about the water cycle and our part in it. She asked that two garden volunteers (Therese & January) take part in a water ceremony. Each congregant added a cup of water to a large container, while speaking of their heart connection to rivers, lakes, oceans, and aquifers. After the service, many folks came outside to the garden to encircle the olive tree. We expressed our gratitude as we offered the collected water to the thirsty tree. Then lingered to talk and bask in the beauty of the moment. Such spirit inspires us for the upcoming garden dedication. We anticipate that it will occur in early November. Therese, Michael, Rev. Tera, Christine, and January will meet September 12th to determine the date, possible speakers and activities. Christine has offered to design a brochure and get out publicity for the event. We’ll get the date posted as soon as possible with the hope that you can all attend. Our garden grows as we grow. Our community widens and deepens as we simply show up for each other and the challenges at hand. Who knew there could be such joy in working the earth together? Much gratitude to all of you. Future Events: October-Lawn Conversion on Los Robles patch(TBD) November- Garden Dedication (TBD) Weekly- garden maintenance 8-11 Sundays Needs: Small boulders for landscape, materials for permanent benches Repair Cafe Sept 16 we had the third Repair Cafe which was a huge success as far as numbers of items repaired, number of Time Bank exchanges made, number of new relationships nurtured, level of consciousness raised and barrels of fun had. Approximately 65 people attended the Repair Cafe and the 8 sewing machines were kept busy, the jewler made umpteen repairs, a surprise jewelry polisher stayed busy, so many knives and tools were sharpened by the two men on whetstones. We had sweater darning, massage for volunteers and a Time Bank Orientation and video as well as a bountiiful Really Really Free Market where the great majority of things added to the table were taken by someone else enjoying the sense of abundance in the Gift Economy. There was a stencil station and the Repair Cafe logo was artfully applied to tees and bags. Thank you to all who volunteered to make this event so successful. Next Repair Cafe Oct 20. Make a note! Follow facebook Repair Cafe Pasadena or NELATransition.org or Arroyo Time Bank.org for details of location and time. Repair Cafe is now a member of the Repair Cafe Foundation. visit Repaircafe.org if you would like to host a repair cafe to engage folks with skills to share them, contribute to less landfill, less manufacturing, less consumerism, less CO2 emitted, and create more community spirit and more altruistic blissful feelings.         NELA Wants You! Since our beginnings, cofounder Eric Einem has been our newsletter editor extraordinare. Eric needs to step down from this position and we are hoping someone reading this has been thinking about the shortcomings of human industrial civilization and is feeling moved to be in action. If you are so moved and editing our newsletter is appealing please contact either Eric(relaxify@gmail.com) or myself (dcutter@aceweb.com). Eric has been collating and formatting submitted articles once a month. Eric will help get whomever steps forward started and of course you'll be free to evolve the newsletter as you would like to.   Throop Learning Garden Work Party Sunday, September 23rd, 8am – 11am Throop Memorial Church. 300 S Los Robles Avenue, Pasadena Work party most Sundays from 8A - 11N. Permaculture landscaping, water-wise gardening, native plant use, and more! Bring sunscreen and hat/gloves if you have them.   Time Bank Garden Group 'Barn Raising' Saturday October 6th 9:00am - 2:00pm Greg has sheet mulched his lawn and now he needs our help combating stubborn grass by adding more mulch and planting native flora. Other projects include clearing brush and trimming back unwanted growth. We will be preparing the grounds for a creativity event the next day and Barn Raisers are invited. Time Dollars will be paid. There will be a potluck lunch. Please bring utensils and a dish to share. Where: Time Bank member Greg's home in Altadena, 523 W. Loma Alta Dr. The house is at the back of a common driveway directly in front of Thurin Ave. Please RSVP to gregjmarquez@gmail.com For more information about the Garden Group, visit their Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Time-Bank-Garden-Group/307555635935664   Conscientious Projector Conscientious Projector is committed to bringing films on Social Justice and Sustainability to the public Conscientious Projector will hold its usual FREE second Thursday of the month 7 pm documentary film at the Armory Center for the Arts. At the Armory Center for the Arts 145 N Raymond Ave, Pasadena Thursday, October 11th, 7:00 PM October's film will likely be Heist, Who Stole the American Dream? http://heist-themovie.com/ For more info on Conscientious Projector films contact martycoleman@pacbell.net   Repair Cafe October 20th Next Repair Cafe Oct 20. Make a note! Follow us on Facebook or NELATransition.org or Arroyo Time Bank.org for details of location and time.   NELA Transition Meeting Sunday, October 21st, 5:00 to 7:00 PM Presented by NELA Transition NELA transition Steering meeting is always the third Sunday of the month 5-7 pm. You are welcome to join us Sunday October 21st in planning our month for transitioning from oil dependence to local resilience. Please rsvp to people@nelatransition.org for location and directions.     Seeds of Hope and Freedom - Vandana Shiva Tuesday, October 30th, 7 PM Vandana Shiva – world-renowned food activist, environmental activist, and social justice activist – is coming to Los Angeles this October! At Loyola Marymount University in Westchester/LA 90045Registration announcements will be forthcoming but this is a “save the date” notice. To have the Environmental Change-Makers notify you when LMU opens the registration period, leave your contact information here http://transitionla.wufoo.com/forms/vandana-shiva-seeds-of-hope-and-freedom/We anticipate that in this year of the election about GMO labeling, there will be considerable interest in hearing Dr Shiva’s talk. Throop Learning Garden Dedication November 11th, 9:00 - 11:00 AM As the one year mark approaches from the day we broke ground into that rock-hard earth carpeted with Bermuda Grass we have scheduled an official public dedication of the garden on the encouragement of Councilman Terry Tornek. He and the Mayor will speak. There will be a blessing by the new Pastor Tera Little and a reception to follow. All are welcome. If you would like to help with baking for the dedication or would like to participate in another ways for this festive event, contact Therese Brummeltheresegbrum@yahoo.com   Upcoming Retreat by David Cutter As I sit down to write this, the fall sun is setting over Pasadena. The calls of the wild parrots ringing out through the evening air. I'm reflecting on all the things that NELA transition has achieved over the last two years and I'm impressed. In the steering meetings we've been discussing the need for some reflection time and I'm happy to announce that NELA will be having a fall retreat. Saturday, November 3rd we will gather to reflect meditate, frolic, learn and plan, though not in that order. We even have a retreat committee. The location will be announced soon. We're inviting any NELA member who feels called to step into a leadership role no matter how small that role might be. I mean whatever you have in mind, it can be really really micro small and we'll appreciate having you with us. NELA has a lot of balls in the air right now. We have some exciting partnerships with the city of Pasadena in the works, the ongoing critical work of community building and of course the ever vexing problem of our Energy Descent Action Plan. We need you to bring your shining faces and strong hands to help in all of these efforts. There's lots of projects to choose from so if you feel moved to build some community, we'd love to have you.