'Be Generous With Your Garden' Initiative Started By 8-Year-Old; Girl Puts Growing Season To Good Use

Gloria Grattan, 8, is a third-grader at the Elizabeth Barclay School in Brockport. She started the food donation initiative "Be Generous With Your Garden" where she encourages growing more fruits and vegetables in the garden than what is needed in order to donate the excess to the needy. The idea started when Gloria donated 40 pounds of food and $300 dollars to the Brockport Ecumenical Food Shelf last Thanksgiving.

Gloria's mother, Jenny Grattan said that her daughter first got involved into food donation drives when she was just a toddler at three years old. While she told her daughter that non-organic produce cost less, Gloria looked at her and questioned why they should eat better than those in need. Gloria enjoys gardening, a hobby she shares with her grandparents.

"Eggplant, zucchini, butternut squash and tomatoes, because grandpa always grows too many tomatoes," Gloria stated the vegetables she plans to grow, as reported by Democrat & Chronicle. She plans to donate them to the Brockport Food Shelf and Refugees Helping Refugees in Rochester.

Jenny launched the "Be Generous With Your Garden" page on Facebook. The page contains pictures of Gloria and her donation efforts in the past year. They also launched a crowdfunding page on You Caring where they set up a goal of $500. There are currently two fundraiser supporters and the page has managed to raise $125 as of this writing.

The funds accumulated will go to the efforts of Gloria "growing a few gardens and donating the harvest to those in need" this summer. The crowdfunding page also stated that Gloria will also be accepting donations from the community members garden and from the extras of the CSA. On the fundraiser update section, Jenny wrote that they will be purchasing their CSA share from Kirby's Farm Market in Hamlin.