Journeywork collaborates with neighborhoods, schools, and congregations to give people the tools to enhance the ecological value of their landscapes. They grow and source plants, provide design guidance, and engage volunteers to help people improve the habitats they steward. They foster community dialogue, education, skill-building & sharing through workshops, consultations, and client work. Journeywork meets people where they are and seeks to revitalize the land, one lawn at a time. Their mission is to restore the land together, joyfully.
Please be sure to check the event organizer’s website for any last-minute changes or cancellations prior to attending.
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Solutionary Living Series: Earth Day Celebration with Judy Wicks & Journeywork
April 22 @ 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
Free
This is a free event. Please sign up so we can gauge our crowd.
Donations are graciously accepted so we can continue offering programs like this to the community.
10% off Taqueria Cresta with your Fallser Club ticket!!
Live Music by Jeff Alexander
From flower pots to meadows, we will discuss how you can add essential pollinators to your world.
Judy Wicks will talk about her personal commitment to sustainable living and why she turned her yard into a meadow.
Backyard Biome Design will give a presentation about their work creating Judy’s meadow and other important sustainable land projects.
Paige Menton from Journey Works will explain her community outreach method to get you started on your path to pollinators.
Lizaette Apy will share her experience of keeping bees in her small Germantown backyard.
Plants for sale by John Janick with Good Host Plants and Margaret Kramaric with 2 Hounds Flower Garden
No Mow Solutions for Your Yard
The Fallser Club and Solutionary Coaching present the first event in our Solutionary Living Series.
A Solutionary ( coined by Zoe Weil) is someone who makes decisions and life choices by considering what would do the most good and the least harm for themselves, other people, animals, and the environment.
You wake up on a beautiful spring weekend to the sound of birds, and then, overpowering the robins and sparrows, is the endless droning of lawnmowers and weed whackers. Why do we have lawns? They were at first a symbol of wealth and only became commonplace after the Industrial Revolution. But lawns are an invasive species! They require large amounts of water consumption and chemicals to keep pristine and green, killing off the beneficial insects (bees!!), and endless mowing contributes to unnecessary carbon emissions.
Judy Wicks and Paige Menton will offer you alternatives that are easier to care for and better for the environment. Native plants attract beneficial insects and other pollinators and are drought-tolerant.
Our lives depend on our little pollinator friends. There is no us without them. Come enjoy Earth Day with friends, listen to live music, and hear about alternatives to traditional lawns. Learn how to turn your yard into a meadow, add a few pollinator garden beds to your yard, or add some native pots to your stoop. No matter the size of your property, your budget, or your gardening expertise, you can make whatever changes work for you. We will have native plants for sale.
Judy Wicks
Judy Wicks grew up on the outskirts of Ingomar, Pennsylvania, where she developed a love for nature and an appreciation for the role of small businesses in community life. After earning a BA in English in 1969, she spent a year as a VISTA volunteer in Chefornak, Alaska, where she experienced a culture rooted in sharing and cooperation. This insight deepened during the 1990s when she worked with Zapatista revolutionaries in Chiapas, Mexico, to establish a fair-trade coffee initiative. Her work with small farmers in Chiapas and Pennsylvania helped shape her vision of a global economy based on self-reliant, sustainable local economies connected through fair trade relationships.
In pursuit of this vision, Judy founded the Sustainable Business Network of Greater Philadelphia in 2001 and co-founded the Business Alliance for Local Living Economies (BALLE), now Common Future. She is best known as the founder of Philadelphia’s landmark White Dog Cafe, a pioneer in the farm-to-table movement, which she ran for 26 years. Under her leadership, White Dog gained national recognition for its commitment to local food sourcing, sustainability, and community engagement. The restaurant set industry standards by purchasing only humanely raised meats, sustainably harvested seafood, and fair-trade products while also implementing eco-friendly practices like composting, solar heating, and 100% renewable energy use.
Beyond the restaurant industry, Judy launched initiatives to support sustainable local economies. She founded Fair Food Philly to connect local family farms with urban markets and operated Black Cat, a fair-trade gift shop. In 2015, she established the Circle of Aunts & Uncles, a microloan fund providing low-interest loans to entrepreneurs lacking traditional startup capital. Responding to the climate crisis, she founded All Together Now Pennsylvania in 2019 to build resilient, just, and regenerative regional economies. After retiring from organizational leadership in 2023, she passed the torch to her successors, who rebranded the initiative as PA Fibershed to focus on sustainable regional textiles.
Currently, Judy and her daughter, Grace, are creating a sustainable, solar-powered homestead, transforming a two-acre lawn into a thriving meadow, orchard, and vegetable garden. The homestead will serve as an educational and community gathering space. Throughout her career, Judy has received numerous accolades, including the James Beard Foundation Humanitarian of the Year Award and recognition from Oprah Magazine, Inc., and Conde Nast Traveler. Her book Good Morning Beautiful Business won the Nautilus Book Award for Business Leadership and has been translated into Chinese and Korean.
About journeywork
Paige Menton
Paige has been growing flowers and food for over twenty years. She took David Attenborough’s A Life on Our Planet as a call to action and founded Journeywork to offer people hopeful, energizing ways to respond to climate change together. She has a permaculture design certification, has taught gardening to children for several years, and is the land manager at Gwynedd Friends Meeting. She is a former elementary school teacher and has a master’s in environmental education. She grew up in the Cahaba River watershed, now lives near the headwaters of the Wissahickon, and enjoys birding in both of those places and everywhere else.
Backyard Biome Design
At Backyard Biome Design, we specialize in native landscape design and installation, offering sustainable, eco-friendly solutions for traditional landscapes. Our designs focus on enhancing local plant communities, providing habitat and food for pollinators and wildlife. Using resilient native plants, we create low-maintenance, seasonally blooming gardens that thrive in harmony with the environment, contributing meaningful ecological impact, no matter the size of the space.
Julie Britton
Julie’s love for nature began in the rich forests of North Jersey, which inspired her to earn a degree in Evolutionary Anthropology from Rutgers University. Her academic journey also led her to Kenya, where she deepened her understanding of conservation and the natural world. Over the past 10+ years in Philadelphia, Julie has continued to expand her expertise by studying horticulture and ecology at prestigious institutions like Longwood Gardens and Mt. Cuba. Currently she is working towards her Pennsylvania Master Naturalist certification. As a horticulturist, she combines her knowledge of ecosystems, sustainability, and design to create beautiful landscapes that foster a healthier, more balanced environment.
Miles Christenson
With a diverse background in the arts, Miles perceives nature not just as a landscape, but as a vibrant palette from which to craft beautiful and diverse gardens that endure over time. His many years of field experience has led him to create innovative and sustainable landscape management solutions to offer quality service. The deep love and connection to nature inspires his designs and keeps his hands dirty in the field.
Jeff Alexander
Jeff Alexander is a seasoned and dynamic musician. His specialties in guitar and vocals showcase Jeff’s personal influences from artists like Jimi Hendrix, Tommy Emmanuel, Ritchie Kotzen, and Al Dimeola, with his unique flare. He delivers recognizable songs that are proven ‘crowd-pleasers’, and incorporates climactic originals.
Jeff has organized, played in and collaborated with multiple Philly-based bands, cataloging original and cover songs. He has been featured on film, wedding bands, played in local festivals such as Roxyunk Porchfest and currently hosts the monthly open mic at The Fallser Club. Currently, Jeff resides in East Falls and focuses on his solo acoustic performances that punctuate his ability to make one man feel like an entire band. Follow Jeff on Instagram at @Funkandvibe to learn more about upcoming gigs.
By Car or By Train
The East Falls Train Station is a short walk from the Fallser Club. Parking in East Falls is no problem! There is ample free on-street parking near the East Falls train station driveway at 3610 Midvale Ave and a paid municipal lot three blocks away at 4100 Ridge Ave. Midvale Ave and Ridge Ave are both well-lit!