With four days left until the July 12 Community Planting Day, nearly 20 young adults from Friends of the Urban Forest’s (FUF) Youth Tree Care Program joined John Bela and 10 other volunteers to continue work on the garden. According to its web site, the Friends of the Urban Forest’s Youth Tree Care Program “trains economically disadvantaged youth in planting and tree care, encourages young people to engage with their communities and introduces them to careers in urban forestry.”

After consolidating more piles of soil, the FUF crew continued raking out the stone ground covering from yesterday, which was graciously donated by Lyngso Garden Materials. The FUF crew will join us on at the Community Planting Day to help plant the seedlings into the garden.

The afternoon brought on relentless heat, sunshine and humidity, but Victory Garden Manager John Bela and team were still hard at work as they laid matting and covered it with gravel to create a wheelchair accessible section of the garden. This part of the garden, closest to Larkin Street, will host the stage for the Soap Box. The Soap Box is being designed by Scene2, a full service studio specializing in three dimensional media with big clients such as Banana Republic, ESPN, KGED-TV and Old Navy. During Slow Food Nation, the Soap Box will provide a platform for farmers, food producers, young chefs and many inspired stewards of the earth to stand up on their “soapbox” and speak to a public audience for 10 or 20 minutes. This is just one of the many free events at Slow Food Nation.