• Mallorie Shellmer

• Katie Rains

• Dottie Breaux

• Rebeca Potasnik

—cumulatively, more than 25 years GRuBbing—

This team is endorsed (and adored) by Kim Gaffi, co-founder of GRuB.

May There Be Gardens is GRuB’s annual build-a-thon event and fundraiser for the GRuB Garden Project.  

On Saturday, May 2, we’ll be joining 10 other teams to build community gardens at a location where GRuB built gardens 25 years ago!

Will you join the GRuB All Star Team by making a donation of $25 (or more!) in celebration of GRuB’s 25 years in our community? 

Your gift is a meaningful investment in another quarter century of GRuB’s mission supporting families and individuals on their food-producing, hunger-reducing journeys - and so much more. 

Our team reflected on what we believe GRuB will make possible over the next 25 years:  

GRuB is the Master Gardener of Community. It provides the foundational ingredients for our community to flourish. Besides teaching us resilience and how to literally feed ourselves by building relationships with soil, seeds, and the garden’s bounty, GRuB teaches us how to truly care for each other. People touched by GRuB learn how to cultivate kindness, and our community at every scale—from our self-talk to our relationships with family and friends, from workplaces and classrooms to neighborhoods and governments—can benefit from more love and kindness.— Rebeca Potasnik

My favorite thing about GRuB has been seeing so many incredibly different people connect to its mission. Whether you're into growing food, growing people, or growing community - there's a part of the work for everyone! In the next 25 years, GRuB can keep creating opportunities for connection between people around the stuff that matters: how we relate to and access food, ways to empower ourselves and others, and building an All-Star community.  - Mallorie Shellmer

GRuB shows the kind of care and follow-through you see in a well-tended garden—what’s promised is what grows. The committed management team plants clear purpose and procedures, thriving with a rotating support staff that tends each program throughout the year. Sustainable development work cultivating grants, nurturing generous donors, and welcoming volunteers keeps the GRuB mission flourishing. Strong systems of accountability like sturdy trellises, provide the documentation to substantiate funding and encourage continued giving to the mission. It’s the best stewardship I have seen in all my years of bookkeeping.- Dottie Breaux

GRuB is the reason I put down roots in Olympia after graduating from Evergreen in 2008. (Seriously, I have the journal entry to prove it!) On a field trip with my TESC class the previous fall, I tended Bonnie’s raspberries and became enamored with a place, a mission, and a community of people who were refining the recipe for GRuB’s magic. And that was before that amazing farm house was built, and a gorgeous community kitchen created opportunities for people to enjoy eating the food they grew together. From 2013 to 2018, after years of sporadic volunteering and admiration from afar, I had the pleasure and honor of serving as the first Executive Director after GRuB’s dynamic founder duo, Kim Gaffi & Blue Peetz. The recipe they had co-created was a simple, structured, intentional way of working together in the world, on the land, with each other, and across differences joyfully, accountably, and with great care. Along with Rebeca, Dottie, Mallorie, and countless GRuBbers, we tested that recipe in new ways, with new groups, and found that the magic always appeared. A little bit of that GRuB magic leaves people feeling more seen, more connected, and walking a little bit lighter, even on the hard days. Years ago, Kim said to me that there’s a whole universe in every family.  I can hardly imagine the ripple effects of all the universes that have been transformed by that GRuB magic over the past 25 years. With so much that is wrong in the world today, I am especially thankful to everyone who has lent a hand or shared their wealth in steadfast support of the powerful mission to grow healthy food, people, and community.

- Katie Rains