Garden with Friends

It's always inspiring to hear success stories. Ours has a name with a heart-warming ring to it - Jillian.

She came seeking a job to grow food for people in their yards without yet having the practical knowledge to do so independently in 2019. She is extremely coachable and learned to grow quickly. Her true talent stems from her inexhaustible curiosity about the natural world and her playful ability to inspire others to explore it as well. During the quarantine, we were deemed essential workers and demand for our garden installation, maintenance, and harvest box subscriptions grew 4-fold. Jillian handled it gregariously filling bellies and making friends with every masked neighbor. At one point she simultaneously managed 8 GNG gardens from La Jolla to Del Cerro while acting as our lead elementary educator in 4 schools and cultivated the bulk of the harvest for the 180-box bi-weekly food distribution.

The kids call her “Jelly Bean”. She has the most lovable, engaging, child-like spirit, so she was famous while teaching them how to grow and learn in the outdoor classroom because she is more than a mentor. She is an exhorter, friend and playmate.

Since leaving GNG she has developed her own growing urban farming business which shows her determination and passion. Every Thursday she allows people to work alongside her at a garden she co-created at San Diego Urban Timber in Chula Vista at 610 Bay Blvd. Follow along @gardenwithfriends. It’s a garden club to grow food for the community. Everyone is invited. She also is well-known for the farmers markets she curates providing space for kindred farmers, food artisans and natural craftspeople to share the best of them. It has been so rewarding to see our mission of converting consumers to producers and feeding our neighbors accomplished in and through Jillian.