Hello Steem Community! My name is Brooke Porter and I’m excited to be joining you!
When pressured to write a introduction I turned to my housemates and this was their response “Brooke is the goddess incarnate. When she is not making empanadas, she is carrying a basket full of chard in her left hand and drinking from the mate gourd in her right. She is pretty much excellent at all things, but especially photography - whoa”. I don’t know about the whole goddess part but the mate is definitely on point.
(This is me hanging out with my chicken Baby Tush)
My heart dabbles and dives into many different passions; herbal medicine, permaculture, social justice, urban farming, languages, photography, backpacking, reading, swimming, and a good gourd of mate.
At a time when our planet is faced with rapid climate change, ecological degradation, and social unrest I view growing my own food and medicine as a revolutionary act. Joanna Macy really gets to the root of what drives me in this life when she states,
“Until we can grieve for our planet we cannot love it—grieving is a sign of spiritual health. But it is not enough to weep for our lost landscapes; we have to put our hands in the earth to make ourselves whole again. Even a wounded world is feeding us. Even a wounded world holds us, giving us moments of wonder and joy. I choose joy over despair.”
A little about my home:
My housemates and I have a pretty magical thing going on. We reside in Berkeley California on a urban homesteading project called the Queen Farm. We are a house of dreamers, activists, cuddlers, foodies, shower singers, and young late twenty somethings rooting ourselves in the world of ecology.
This is our garden
We have honey bees, six chickens (named after great queens such as; Cleopatra, Beyonce, and Richard Simons), a herbal medicine garden, a ton of fresh fruits and veggies, a greenhouse, and a small mycology project where we grow edible shitake and oyster mushrooms.
(These our adorable chickens when they were babies. Yes, I tried taking all kinds of cute baby chicken photos including a chicken riding a stuffed llama.)
The inside of our home has turned into a house plant refuge center. We nourish unwanted street plants and the plants friends abandon back to life. As you can see they have slowly began to take over our home.
My life as a teacher:
My students are often my greatest source of inspiration and joy. I teach permaculture and gardening to over 300 hundred Kindergarten-5th grade students in a public school in the Bay. Their deep fascination for the Earth and passion to engage with a wide range of materials, including things such as climate change truly gives me hope for the future (especially after this year's election).
Our garden classroom has covered a wide range of materials. My students have made natural dyes, herbal teas, saved seeds, named all the worms in the worm bin, built a cob bench, fallen in love with the baby rats found nesting in our compost pile, learned about local indigenous herbal medicine, built beehives ( who would have known that letting my students use power tools the first month of school would get me so many cool teacher points), and much more!
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(Here are some of my adorable students harvesting mulberries, making recycled bottle planters, and getting slightly carried away with face painting at our Earth Day Celebration)
Baba Dioum the great Senegalese forster once said that "In the end we will conserve only what we love; we will love only what we understand; and we will understand only what we are taught."
I can only hope that as an educator I inspire a deep love for the Earth and all her beauty.
My Life as a Photographer:
My passion for photography and approach is deeply rooted in my love for social documentary photography. As an independent photographer the images I seek to create explore visual narratives of timeless storytelling. I strive to capture the human spirit and seek to illuminate authentic moments of connection and translate them into art. I have a background in both analog and digital photography. My passion for this medium has also influenced my work life. I run a photography business where I shoot births, portraits, and weddings. You can see my work here.
http://www.brookeporterphotography.com
(This is me hanging out with my medium format camera at my favorite childhood beach. My sweet Mama took this picture)
Well, I’m going to leave it at that for now! I want to thank my dear friends @AnwenBaumeister, @ItchyKitten and my partner @JaredWood for encouraging to share my writing, art, and mutual love for the homesteading. I look forward to getting to know you Steem community!
Welcome to Steem.com
Welcome to family :)
Welcome to Steemit.com
"named all the worms in the worm bin" - LOL that is amazing
"I don’t know about the whole goddess part" - you are definitely the goddess incarnate
I'm so happy you're sharing your life on Steemit. Much love <3
OMG I love your pictures and your little farm. You look like you have a wonderful life. I will keep up with your posts. Did you use that cool camera for these pictures? @nezbong
Nez, Thank you so much! No unfortunately most of these pictures were taken with a digital camera. I will be sure to post some film photos soon :)
Welcome to family :) Follow me back and I will surprise you on August 1 ;)
Welcome to Steemit @brookeporter :)
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Welcom to steemit community!!
Great post
Welcome to Steem @brookeporter I have sent you a tip
Thank you! Where can I find your tip?
Welcome to Steemit @brookeporter :) Nice post, i will follow your account, please follow me at @khunfarang
Welcome to Steemit. I hope you enjoy your time here, its a great community :) Nice post, i will follow your account, please follow me at @youss
Welcome on Steemit! You got some lovely pictures in your introduction! And look how cute those little chickies look :3 feel free to check my intro also ^^ Now following you, follow me back @pandapoef thankyou ;)
Thank you! I look forward to being apart of the community!
Nice intro!! Welcome to steemit! Have fun!
Thank you!
Hey! You made a great choice joining this awesome community. You’re going to have a great time here. Keep Steeming!
Love the photos!
I enjoyed your post very much and your chicks are so cute, following from an Aussie suburban homesteader.
Christa! Thank you! I look forward to see whats going on on the homesteading front on your side of the world!
Hi and welcome to Steemit, I wish you luck on your journey here.
Can I suggest you look into the #minnowsupportproject - a place for newbies to get help and support as they set out across Steemit. We have voting bots, a follow train where you can get followers and much help, support and advice.
Drop in to chat at https://discord.gg/v3GpU4N and tell aggroed I sent you
We are close to 2000 members. The 2000th new steemian to sign up and register will win SBD from me!
Glad to have you join us! Any plans to take the homesteading to a bigger scale and get 10 to 50 acres in the future?
@Captain-nemo! I would love to at some point! Its hard to afford land here in the bay but you never know what might come your way!
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Amazing story! I love that you are not only growing food but future gardeners and world-changers! I can relate to much of your journey as a film student who started an urban teaching farm in Austin, Tx after my front yard garden started connecting me with the community. What I love about urban farms is that you never know who may be inspired by simply walking past it! Onward and upward. Stoked to learn more about your adventures.
Thank you! I look forward to hearing more about your adventures as well! Working with the children gives me so much joy! Its amazing what the next generation has to offer. They are fearless in the garden! The other day I found them eating raw collard green tacos. They took a collard green leaf and wrapped a nasturtium leaf inside of it lol
Epic little raw chefs! Sounds like a great taco, could be the next big thing! Haha. Kids just get it when it comes to the garden and many things about life in general. Whenever I found myself teaching kids gardening I felt like they were actually teaching me. Be well!
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Welcome to steemit
Welcome to steemit @brookeporter! Your life looks fascinating and definitely something that I can relate to. Steem on!
Hi @natashahall I love your recipes! I hope to share some of them with my students in the fall! This year when I taught a lesson about the history of cacao we made a very similar raw fudge ball recipe!
Welcome I like your style and photography you'll go far . Peace
Thank you! I look forward to sharing more!
Aww! That little chick on the alpaca toy! I died. Love all the stuff you're getting into, you magical creator you! <3
Thank you so much! Look forward to getting to know you all more!
Welcome to the Steemit community, I hope yo u be very successful.
Welcome to Steemit! You'll do great here!
Hello and welcome to Steem! :-) Followed. Follow me back 😘
hi, welcome to the steem world
Welcome and Thank You for being with us!! Following your Blog now
So excited to be joining this community with the likes of you! I'm super into what you are into! I spent a good deal of time working with place-based, culturally-relevant, eco-centric curriculum in the Ecuadorian Amazon with Achuar indigenous kids. It was my first great passion. Now that I have a daughter of my own, I am starting to dream up the next wave of how this passion for teaching will run through my life. I imagine we would have a lot of thoughts to jam on this subject and I look fore to hearing more about your education work! Also, super digging this quote you shared:
“Until we can grieve for our planet we cannot love it—grieving is a sign of spiritual health. But it is not enough to weep for our lost landscapes; we have to put our hands in the earth to make ourselves whole again. Even a wounded world is feeding us. Even a wounded world holds us, giving us moments of wonder and joy. I choose joy over despair.”
Badass. Keep on being a Goddess, @brookeporter - OWN IT!