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Greetings from Church Out Serving
Eric Haverkamp, board chair, and Tony Stam, a member of the leadership group at Church Out Serving, harvesting cabbage in October 2020. (ASHLEY TAYLOR, The Simcoe Reformer)

Dear Indwell – Hambleton Hall,

Greetings from Church Out Serving!

Just writing to send our thanks to you for another year of partnering together to bless our community. We appreciate your gift of land and utilities that enables The Gathering Food Gardens to grow fresh and healthy vegetables, to share with our neighbours who are food insecure.

2020 brought an unprecedented need, along with the Covid-19 pandemic. Many neighbours were experiencing interruptions of employment, along with isolation, that affected their ability to put food on the table.  Church Out Serving was invited by Norfolk County to be part of a local emergency response, and our food programs were able to expand—almost quadrupling—to help many residents, including seniors and young families.

What a blessing it proved to be, that our own gardens were able to supply many of the fresh ingredients needed for our food programs. By year’s end, 8,387 fresh meals, 3,408 frozen meals, and 3,021 food hampers were shared with 2,300 local residents—all the way from Jarvis to Langton, and Wilsonville to Port Dover.

In 2020, The Gathering Food Gardens harvested an amazing 12,609 vegetable servings at all of our sites, from 16 kinds of vegetables:  lettuce, green/red/golden onions, beans, cucumbers, zucchini, cabbage, sweet potatoes, beets, tomatoes, peppers, broccoli, peppers and carrots!  The five garden beds at Hambleton Hall contributed 3,513 vegetable servings to the total yield!  What a blessing!  (Just a side note – the Hambleton Hall beds of beans and cabbage were just incredible this year!)

Thanks again for joining with us to make such a difference for many of our neighbours in such a difficult year. We pass along their gratitude to you, too, because we often heard appreciations and saw tears from those we served. How beautiful that we were able to show Jesus’ love and care, and offer them some peace and stability in this uncertain season.

We thank God for you!

Send a note of encouragement

Now more than ever, it is important that our tenants feel connected with others, even if they cannot be physically connected. Send a note of encouragement to be shared with our tenants who are feeling isolated at this time.

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