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Wishing Our Community a Happy Holiday Season!

From all of the board and staff at the Community Farm Land Trust, we wish you a happy holiday season and peace and joy in the new year! Thank you for all your support this past year.

• We are so grateful for all the community members who attended, sponsored, donated, and partnered with us for our events this year—our Annual Meeting, the 25th Anniversary Farmtastic Tour, Farms Forever and LOCALvore, and the Matchless Makers’ Market!

• It is an honor to work in partnerships with the businesses and organizations that support our work through grants, projects, sponsorships, advertisements, and events. We are better at what we do because of you!

• We heartfully appreciate all those who donated to our organization through in-kind donations or financial contributions.

• A special thanks to our monthly supporters, yours is the gift that keeps on giving!

• Thank you to all who helped to share our posts, events, news, and more! You help us build our community and educate people about the mission of our organization and to us, this is invaluable!

• We are so fortunate for all our local farmers who work tirelessly all year to bring food to our tables, smiles to our faces, full bellies in our homes, and warmth to our hearts. Wishing you all some rest and rejuvenation over the next few months.

Wow. What a great event! The spirit of the holidays was abound and it was heartwarming to build community with so many people that day. There was a wide variety of vendors selling everything from stained glass, body care products, art, jewelry, local apothecary and medicinal products, seasonal items, and more! Thanks to everyone who came out to support local artists and makers, Matchless Brewing, and in turn the Community Farm Land Trust. We raised approximately $1000 for the Community Farm Land Trust that day from vendors and sales at Matchless Brewing!

Our hearts are so full from being in community that day with all of you. Joy and good tidings were spread through purchases made, conversations shared, hugs received, and cheers with beers. Thank you to Matchless Brewing for partnering with us for this event! They have been a continual supporter of our work through events, donations, and advertising in our Fresh from the Farm Guide over the years.

CFLT Gives Back during the Holidays

**Thanks to Fletcher Ward for the photos that day!

CFLT Staff and Board Members spent the day before Thanksgiving together with family and friends to volunteer with our community partner, the Thurston County Food Bank (TCFB). The holidays are a busy time of year for our local food banks and in order to get everyone through the door in a timely manner they need all the help they can get. Board co-chairs, Rachel Freidman and Marcie Cleaver, joined staff members, Carol Linnebur, Natalie Martzolf and her son, Zander, and Jeanine Toth and her friend, Emily Ritt, for a day of giving back to a cause near and dear to our hearts, increasing food access and food security for everyone in our community.

We know how our farms play a vital role in our local food banks, providing them with their excess produce, meat, cheese, and more! Farms donate via direct donations to the food bank as well as participating in their gleaning program where volunteers help harvest extra fruit and vegetables at local farms. It was fulfilling for all of us to see another side of stabilizing food security in our community.

They recently changed their model to a grocery shopping atmosphere where clients can come and shop for items creating more dignity in the process for individuals and families. However, because of the volume of people they needed to serve that day, the food bank had volunteers helping to distribute food at a variety of stations throughout the food bank. Many kudos to the staff and volunteers that ran a well-oiled machine at the downtown food bank that day and every day.

Thank you to TCFB for welcoming the Community Farm Land Trust as volunteers. It was a good glimpse into how many hands it takes to bring food to the TCFB’s clients’ tables- from our farmers and local businesses that donate food to the countless volunteers and staff sorting through donations, and getting it on the shelves for consumers.

This is not light work and we encourage everyone to volunteer some time at your local food bank! They work so hard to feed our community and always need help. We look forward to volunteering more in our community and partnering with organizations such as the Thurston County Food Bank in our work to eliminate hunger in our communities. There are many ways to get involved with TCFB—-donations of food, money, or by volunteering at the warehouse or in one of their numerous programs-Gleaning, School Nutrition, Summer Lunch, and more. To learn more about how you can volunteer with the food bank, please follow the link below.