Heartleaf Project

 

To create a sustainable future for all our children by understanding and strengthening relationships with food, health, energy, the environment and each other

 

 

The Heartleaf Project is a mindful collaboration between a small business, an internship program, community partners, a sustainability outreach project, and a farm.  Dante’s Garden is a business that processes and sells organic food at markets and events.  The internship program teaches hands on life skills in a therapeutic strength focused environment.  Community partners perform education and research or engage in farm focused production activities.  5 Oaks Farm is an organic permaculture demonstration farm where everything comes together.   The entities collaborate to generate a self sustaining, evolving community resource that engages, educates, empowers and employs a diverse population of people.  The goal is to create a sustainable future for all our children while reconnecting people with their food chain, health system, energy system and each other. 

 

The demonstration farm enlists partners from organic agriculture, sustainable building, alternative energy and alternative healing to create an inter-relational space that is a working model of best practices in these fields. The internship program engages youth who have experienced life within the foster care system.  They participate in farm life while learning life skills and organic food production from planting and tending through harvest and sales.  Interns are also trained to build, utilize and maintain alternative energy systems.  The outreach component involves a collaborative partnership within the farm community to research and develop sustainable food service practices to be utilized by Heartleaf and partners and demonstrated at festivals and markets.  The Farm plants seeds of hope that grows community and harvests ideas.