Growing Up in the Garden
FAMILIES TURN TO THEIR OWN BACKYARDS FOR HEALTHY LIFE LESSONS
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Shani Drake with her children Desean and Jenevieve Photo by Linda Smolek
wo children gently plant strawberry seeds in a bed of soft earth while their mother waters the persimmon tree nearby. It is therapeutic, restorative, peaceful. During these uncertain times, many families have turned to their own backyards to create a haven of fruits and veggies while gaining healthy life lessons and skills. In the backyard of their ArdenArcade home, Shani Drake and her two children, 5-year-old Jenevieve and 12-year-old Desean, have created a vibrant plot of earth teeming with Mexicola avocados, fava beans, strawberries, elderberries, rosemary, sorrel and purple potatoes. “Desean is one of our biggest inspirations,” Shani says. “He has food allergies so we like making fresh foods not from packages.” Desean agrees. “My mom makes good recipes,” he says. “Like watermelon berry mint salad with Peruvian cherries.” Shani was recently featured in a YouTube documentary called “Sacramento Garden Tour: Shani’s Urban Food Forest” in which she explains growing up in South Sacramento without access to unprocessed, unpackaged foods. “People are lacking in nutrition,” Shani says. “So what we do here is incorporate a lot of people who come to watch us garden for our own family.” By inviting neighbors to stroll through their garden and take samples of plants, Shani hopes to inspire a healthy lifestyle throughout the neighborhood. Although their garden has been growing since before the pandemic, Shani says her family made some changes to their eating habits to
TMO By Tessa Marguerite Outland Farm-to-Fork
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POC AUG n 20
