Saturday July 27th the St. Roch Faubourg Neighborhood Improvement Association held its annual school supply giveaway and gave away 200 backpacks filled with school supplies to local residents. And the NOLA Artist Incubator’s Magical Mobile Art Cart was in attendance for the festivities!

Since starting the garden and more recently, the completion of the new beautification project and neighborhood sign on St. Roch Avenue, the organization has developed a great relationship with the neighborhood association. When we were asked if we’d like to be a part of their annual book sack giveaway, we happily agreed to add to the activities!

To prepare for our involvement we started collecting seeds from the garden and showed up with all the materials for children to make upcycled planters the evening of the event.

Due to rain at the start of the giveaway we had put all the tables and chairs away. As soon as the sun came out, we pulled out a canvas as a blanket, set up our supplies, and the children were engaged in our activities!

“It felt more intimate, exclusive, and in tune with our environment to create outdoors and on the ground”

Since all the chairs and tables were wet, we worked on the spread out canvas. It felt more intimate, exclusive, and in tune with our environment to create outdoors and on the ground. Children shared pallets of paint, mixed colors, and really took their time on their planters. We pulled seeds directly out of dried sunflowers from Galvez Garden and planted them in tin cans. Our paint was from previous activities and as we were painting on recycled tin cans, the project was 100% sustainable. Being a part of this program was directly in line with our mission of creating a network of makers for a more sustainable and equitable New Orleans.

We are so grateful to the St. Roch Faubourg Improvement Association for including us in the event and truly thankful for all the work they do for the community.

We look forward to participating again next year and hope everyone’s plants sprout into beautiful sunflowers!

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The Magical Mobile Art Cart was made possible with support from Entergy and the Arts & Culture Grant. Programming Made possible with support from New Orleans Culture and Recreation Fund.