Missions Update Page 5 Blessing Box: It is our best guess that around 20 people a day either visit or are “blessed” by our Blessing Box. Ways you can help: • Pick up a few extra items next time you are at the store and place them in the Blessing Box. • Take a box of food from the Wesley Food Room and place items in the Blessing Box at your convenience. If this is something you would be interested in contact Carrie or Zeke. Community Garden: As many of you know, Wesley worked in conjunction with the Arkansas Hunger Relief Alliance and Carnall Elementary to place a Community Garden on the grounds of Carnall Elementary. Last winter we harvested over 1,000 pounds of turnips which were distributed to students and families of Carnall and placed in Blessing Boxes around Fort Smith. In May we planted a 1/2 acre of sweet potatoes which will be ready to harvest in September. Harvesting Event information to come. Wesley UMC Newsletter Backpack Program: With school beginning in just a few weeks, we will also be restarting our backpack program which supplies weekend food items to food insecure children at Carnall and Cavanaugh Elementary schools. We do not have a start date to begin yet, however, bagging will take place Wednesday evenings at Cavanaugh UMC. Bagging typically only takes about 30 minutes if we can have 5-10 people bagging. Ways you can help: • Help bag items. • Deliver bags each week to one of the schools. Farmers Market Produce Pickup: Unfortunately due to COVID-19 we decided to not begin our Farmers Market Produce mission this summer. Our hope is that we will be able to pick it back up next year as it does provide fresh produce to those who normally would not receive any. Ways you can help now: • Grab some fresh produce next time you are at the grocery store and place it in the Blessing Box. • If you have a little extra produce from your own garden, consider placing some in the Blessing Box. The best vegetables to donate are: tomatoes, squash, okra, zucchini, potatoes, onion, carrots, cucumbers August 2020
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