CIPI Young Mothers

We have been doing a lot of exciting things with the young mothers at CIPI the last few weeks, and their favorite activity so far has been building their own square foot garden! To get them excited about the garden we had an activity where we used fruits, vegetables, and peanut butter to make fun snacks. On the left is Debbie with one of the young mothers and her vegetable face, and on the right, I am pulling out a very exciting item...peanut butter! They went nuts over the peanut butter. They were also super excited about the fresh food, and they would applause whenever I pulled a new fruit or vegetable out of my bag! The next week we wanted to start on the garden, but it looked like it wasn´t going to work out. However, one of our volunteers, Sam Brady, (in the picture below, explaining the gardens to the girls) worked super hard to make sure it worked out. We wanted the young mothers to feel like they owned the project, so we brought the supplies, showed them what to do, and let them do it. They were so excited, and they really worked hard! The girls dug out a spot for the garden, sifted sand, made a rock wall around the garden, put in posts, tied string to partition the garden into sections, and planted and watered the seeds. While we were working the girls told us that this was their favorite activity so far, and that they liked to work more than they liked to do crafts or play games. The girls are so much fun, we have loved getting to know them all!