The Master Gardeners of New Orleans
Collaborative Partner at HGM&F and are doing great things on the farm.  They are available most Saturdays to answer questions about their raised vegetable beds and can help guide vegetable and ornamental plant growers to information they need to be successful.

Vintage Garden Kitchen Returns!
This week you can enjoy sample of fresh homemade soups from the ARC. All of the soups are created by Leo Tandecki, the Vintage Garden Kitchen Chef for ARC Enterprises. Leo believes in using fresh local ingredients from area farmers markets, their own on-site garden, or from local grocers. Everything is hands-on from choosing specific vegetables, harvesting, and time spent making from scratch (no shortcuts) delicious healthy soups that are sure to please.

Backyard Apothecary Natural Products.
Khulu Kevin Buckner creates and sells quality handmade products that range from healing massage oils, a miracle-working hair food leave-in conditioner to naturally safe products for infants and toddlers. Khulu began healing work and studying herbal healing in 1996 at Flynn’s Herbal College in New York City. Khulu then traveled to Zimbabwe where he studied as an apprentice with a Nyanga (traditional Healer) in the township of Nkulumane and in 1999 received certification from ZINATHA (Traditional Healers Association of Zimbabwe). After returning to his h ometown, New Orleans he started his own healing practice and product line the Backyard Apothecary.

Books to Prisoners
Books To Prisoners (BTP) is a Seattle-based, all-volunteer, nonprofit organization that sends books to prisoners in the United States.  BTP believes that books are tools for learning and opening minds to new ideas and possibilities.  By sending books to prisoners, we hope to foster a love of reading and encourage the pursuit of knowledge and self-improvement.

Founded in the early 1970s and sponsored by Left Banks Books, BTP receives 600 to 800 requests for books each month. Volunteers work two evenings a week opening letters, finding books in our collection that correspond to the request, and wrapping and mailing parcels.  Because of continuing backlog of requests, prisoners sometimes wait up to six months to receive their books.

Prisoners request a variety of books.  Most prisons accept paperback books only.  The most popular requests are dictionaries, thesauruses, African American history and fiction, Native American studies, legal material, GED materials, and languages (particularly Spanish.)  Other common requests include fiction, vocational-technical manuals, politics, anthropology, art and drawing, psychology, and health and fitness.