IMPORTANT NEWS!!!

Greetings all!! I've just been accepted into a wonderful fellowship program - the IATP Food and Community Fellowship (http://foodandsocietyfellows.org/). This fellowship will fund my community garden work in the Lower Ninth Ward.

What this means for Live Lyve Raw Vegan Cuisine is that, beginning June 1st, we will no longer deliver weekly meals. Live Lyve Raw Vegan Cuisine will continue to provide delicious energy-filled food at $150 minimum for catering orders. A menu of tasty selections will be posted on the blog - livelyvenola.blogspot.com - soon. We will continue to do pizzas. We are working on a pick-up arrangement, and will let you know when it is finalized. I will also be doing raw vegan preparation workshops soon, and will be available for consultations and demonstrations as well.

The community garden work is extremely important to me because 1) the Lower Ninth Ward is my home. It's where I was born, where I returned to help with the recovery, and where I live/work/raise my daughter now. It's one of the worst hit neighborhoods in New Orleans, yet one of the most neglected. When I returned to New Orleans in 2007, I decided that my life would be a contribution to my community. I had no idea my contribution would be community gardens, but that's where my path led. I found that community gardens can help to alleviate so many of our neighborhood's issues. Through community gardens, we can have a place for neighbors to come together in a safe, beautiful environment (community building); we can make abandoned lots purposeful (neighborhood revitalization); in a "food desert", we can encourage and support the CULTURE of growing so that people feel empowered to grow their own food again (cultural preservation and food access). I am very passionate about this work, so much so that I started an organization (the Backyard Gardeners Network) with that mission. I am thrilled to have this opportunity to focus my time on developing the projects and my own effectiveness as a leader/visionary. To find out what's new with the Backyard Gardener's Network, check us out on Facebook at facebook.com/backyardgardeners.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to share this wonderful food with you, and I look forward to continuing to serve you in this changed capacity.

Have a beautiful day!!