FRIDAY, September 20, 2019
Palmer Park (near Splash Park)

Health Expo 9am-1pm
Walk or Hustle Starts at 11am

This year's annual “Strides for Seniors” Walk starts at 11 AM on Friday, September 20, at Detroit’s beautiful Palmer Park. There’s also a health expo, featuring many local organizations, from 9 AM to 1 PM
Spearheaded by St. Patrick Senior Center and Detroit Area Agency on Aging, the event is to raise funding and awareness so the Detroit-based senior centers can continue their essential work. To lend your support, simply register, show up and walk one mile or three. 
There's also a hustle dance option!

To pre-register go to www.stridesforseniors.org. 

Small steps can prevent diabetes. 
Becoming more active and losing a moderate amount of weight can help you change your risk of diabetes. The Diabetes Prevention Program will help you take steps to prevent type 2 diabetes.

​Having a parent or sibling with type 2 diabetes increases your risk for also having diabetes. If you think you’re at risk or have been told by a doctor that you have prediabetes, consider joining the Diabetes Prevention Center’s Diabetes Prevention Program at Palmer Park! 

Participants will be a part of a small, supportive group led by a trained lifestyle coach. You’ll learn about healthier eating habits, ways to be more physically active and other behavior changes over the course of 16 weekly one-hour sessions. The group will continue meeting monthly, completing a full year of the Diabetes Prevention Program. 

This program will be offered at no cost to participants, but we are requesting participation in a research study. Attend the information session to learn more.

To learn more about this life-changing program, attend the information session on Wednesday, July 10, from 10-11 a.m. at Palmer Park Community House.
The first session of the workshop begins Wednesday, July 17, at the same time and location.

​To register or for more information, visit ReadySetPrevent.org or call 800-482-1455.

​"The Garden Blog: A Family Grows in Detroit" will follow one of our new garden bed renters and her family on their first bed-rental experience this season at Palmer Park.

Beautiful Pests
​By Amy Kuras

Because of my work schedule and my kids’ schedule, my garden time often comes late in the day, sometimes late enough that I’m racing dusk to get my chores done. It’s a very peaceful time to be there – golden light on the meadow, kids joyfully shrieking through the splash park, and the normal bustle of this busy city oasis beginning to slowly wind down. 

A few weeks ago, I was puttering around in the garden when I saw something out of the corner of my eye. I was scared at first, fearing a mean dog, but it was instead something so much better -- a deer! looking for food in the wild meadow that surrounds the garden. I know some people hate deer, because they are pests and will clean out months of hard garden work with a few minutes of munching –and believe me, I put the deer netting we were offered on my raised bed just like everyone else did. 

But for me, a deer sighting is magical. I grew up in the city, and I never saw a deer until I was 24 and working as a reporter on Grosse Ile, a small island in the Detroit River. It’s still exciting and rare for me to spot them, and I relish their grace and loveliness and intelligent soft eyes. I knew they lived in the park, but I’ve hardly ever seen one. This time, there were two. 

I haven’t been this close to one of these beauties. I was worried they might challenge me for my plants or something (again, city kid, I’m completely unfamiliar with wildlife, but ask me about cats!) but instead one of them, a female, kept munching milkweed and tall grass just outside the clearing of the garden area. Every now and again we’d look at each other for a few minutes, me delighted, her wary. She’d stare and then, flipping her tail like an irritated cat, she’d go back to her meal and I’d go back to my weeding. 
​
Since we started this garden project, I keep thinking about the idea of something sparking joy. The garden has been an unalloyed spark of joy for me on many levels. And that night, it was the joy of communing with a wild and beautiful creature, both of us engaging in our evening chores. It’s one of the things I hope I always remember, and one of the many gifts from the garden I’ve already received. 

​Amy Kuras is Research and Policy Program Manager for Detroit Food Policy Council and member of People for Palmer Park.

​"The Garden Blog: A Family Grows in Detroit" will follow one of our new garden bed renters and her family on their first bed-rental experience this season at Palmer Park.

We have harvest!!
By Amy Kuras

One thing I have learned about gardening is that a lot can happen in a little time, and sometimes there’s a lot of waiting and then bursts of frenzied activity.

​Case in point: We put in our cold crops in late April. And we waited, and waited, and worried about what to do when it was time for the hot crops to be planted when the cold crops hadn’t even begun to really take off yet. Thanks to some great advice from Molly and some surprisingly meticulous garden planning from me (let’s just say “meticulous” isn’t a character trait one typically associates with me) I figured out how to find good spots for the hot crops without crowding out the cold crops. So we planted, and watered, and hoped.  That was May 18, the first day the garden officially opened.

We had a long-standing plan to head to DC and Maryland for a family reunion the following weekend, because it was Memorial Day. I slogged through the mud to look over the garden the day we left, May 23, and was happy to see a little bit of growth in just the five days since we’d planted. We got back late the night of Memorial Day (May 27) and finally moseyed over to check the garden on Tuesday evening.

Well. Mother Nature apparently held quite a Memorial Day party because things have just exploded. The lettuce plants doubled in size, the band of lettuce seeds needed a third thinning because the seedlings were all crowding each other out, the peas and broccoli grew a good couple inches, and beans and cucumber seedlings were starting to push above ground. The beets and carrots are starting to look well established, too. Teaches me to come to the garden without anything to bring home a harvest -- I pulled up the deer netting, had my husband hold out his shirt, and began piling lettuce into it!

It’s amazing what a little sun, a lot of rain, and good soil can do.

However, not all is perfection. I’d planted Brussels sprouts down the middle of the bed, because they take a long time to mature. Unfortunately, half of them look great but half have died, as have some of my kale plants and all of my collards. It’s disappointing, but realistically I’m the only one in my family who would have eaten a bunch of it anyway. More room for juicy tomatoes and snappy beans, right?

​Amy Kuras is Research and Policy Program Manager for Detroit Food Policy Council and member of People for Palmer Park.

​"The Garden Blog: A Family Grows in Detroit" will follow one of our new garden bed renters and her family on their first bed-rental experience this season at Palmer Park.

The garden is open!
By Amy Kuras

This past weekend, I and all my fellow Palmer Park gardeners kicked off the season in style. On a day that started out pouring rain and ended up sunny, warm and beautiful, we planted our beds, helped a contingent of volunteers from Home Depot spread wood chips, and probably ran our site farmer, Molly Leebove, ragged with all our questions.

The gardeners are as diverse as the people who use Palmer Park for any number of things; families,
singles, and groups like Yoganic Flow and GirlTrek. Some of us are experienced gardeners, some are
brand new, and we’re planting everything from arugula to zucchini.

For my family and I, this garden represents something we’ve long hoped for in a place we already love.
When my husband Paul and I moved into our house in Greenacres 17 years ago, I immediately planted a
vegetable garden and learned how amazing food can taste when it was picked mere minutes before
hitting your plate. I kept it up for a few years, but lost my mojo when my daughter Maggie (who now
goes by Max) came along in 2004 and when my son Will arrived in 2008. By the time I was thinking I
might want to start up again, the big maple tree in our backyard had grown enough to keep the whole
yard in shade for almost all of the day. I managed to eke out a few tomatoes and get an herb garden
going, but generally any really productive growing was not happening.

When I was a kid, I remember my dad belonging to a community garden, where you could rent a bed for
the summer. I work for the Detroit Food Policy Council, which has close ties with the urban agriculture
community, but my inquiries about such a thing here in Detroit came up empty. I’d resigned myself to
getting my fresh seasonal veggies at the farmers market. Then, late last year I heard about the Rent A
Bed program. To say I was excited is an understatement. We already love Palmer Park and spend a lot of
time at the splash park and on the trails when the weather is nice. I attended the annual meeting to find
out more and signed up on the spot!
​
We joined Keep Growing Detroit’s Garden Resource Program, took their basic gardening class, and Molly
kindly let us start planting all our cold crops early. At our kick-off meeting in mid-May, I dragged my kids
over to see the bed. “WE HAVE BABIES!!!” I cheered, seeing the band of lettuce seeds germinating into
little microrgreens and the peas Will had planted slowly unfurling themselves toward the sun. This was,
to my teen and tween, about the most embarrassing thing a person has ever done, but I didn’t care. We
were even able to harvest some lettuce from the plants we’d taken home from KGD and had our first
official salad from the garden (okay, with a LOT of store bought lettuce as well) at Sunday dinner.

​Amy Kuras is Research and Policy Program Manager for Detroit Food Policy Council and member of People for Palmer Park.

Charlotte Mason Community School presents their
RUN FOR EDUCATION!
5K Walk/Run in Palmer Park
Saturday, May 11, 2019
​
Registration at 8am at the Palmer Park Community House
Walk/Run starts at 9am
Suggested donation $25

The Charlotte Mason Community School supports educational justice for students in the City of Detroit. Students grow in a love of learning that extends beyond the classroom, for their good and the good of their communities. You can learn more at the Charlotte Mason Community School.

People for Palmer Park announces that it is a proud Community Partner for the upcoming 2019 Rocket Mortgage Classic, and we join the City of Detroit in welcoming the PGA Tour to the historic Detroit Golf Club for the first time, June 24-30, 2019.

VOLUNTEER OPPORTUNITIES DURING THE TOURNAMENT
From June 24-30, 2019, The Rocket Mortgage Classic (RMC) will bring 156 of golf's greatest players, as well as an international television audience and visitors from around the world to our city, the Detroit Golf Club and to the neighborhoods adjacent to Palmer Park this June. 

As a backdrop, volunteers are an integral part of the operations of all PGA Tour events. More than 100,000 volunteers annually contribute countless hours helping orchestrate more than 120 tournaments in all aspects from admissions and guest services to marshals and scoring.

Interested in learning more about volunteering? Visit the RMC Volunteer Registration site for more information. Spaces are limited, so be sure to register early as committees will be filled on a first come, first served basis.

• Please note that the Rocket Mortgage Classic is run by the PGA Tour. People for Palmer Park is a community partner and cannot register you to volunteer.
• Full details about the tournament, tickets and other news can be found at the Rocket Mortgage website. Or contact Noelle Johnston at njohnston@intersportnet.com or at 313-329-5699.

RENT YOUR HOME TO VISITORS DURING THE TOURNAMENT
ADDITIONALLY, The Rocket Mortgage Classic has partnered with Rent Like A Champion to provide private home listings to players and their families to rent for the week of June 24th. Rent Like A Champion is the largest vacation home rental website specifically for sporting events nationwide and has worked with professional golfers at PGA events around the country, helping to provide the comfort and convenience of a private home during tournaments.

• If  you are interested in your home being included on this listing for the 2019 Rocket Mortgage Classic, please contact Denise Wright at denise@rentlikeachampion.com or at 855-244-4263 for more information. 

As more details unfold in the months before the tournament begins, People for Palmer Park will continue to share more ways you can get involved and be a part of the excitement!

The People for Palmer Park are helping put together the first of what is hoped will be MANY free handball workshops at the newly renovated Palmer Park Handball Courts. 

The historic courts reopened with a ribbon-cutting ceremony on October 13, 2018. Passionate members of the Michigan Handball Association from the surrounding communities worked diligently for many months prior to raise the funds needed to get the courts back to a playable state after many years of neglect. These players in turn partnered with PFPP and the City of Detroit and its Parks & Recreation department to bring these courts to a whole new generation of handball enthusiasts.

The group together with PFPP Recreation committee is looking to hold
FREE 4-week introductory Spring workshops 5/18-6/8/2019:

Kids aged 12 & up Saturdays 10-11am 
Adults Saturdays 12-1pm

To help us gauge interest, please send an email if interested--along with any questions or suggestions-- to Stewart Shevin at sshevin@comcast.net.