For those of you who might not know, The Girls Club has a yearly fundraiser called “The Willow Awards & Gala”. We throw a big party, give awards to our friends that have been very supportive that year, and it’s a way to say thank you to ALL our friends. Plus… it’s a party!!!

This year, two of our awardess are women we met on our trip to New Orleans last April. Jana Napoli (Founder) and Baty Landis (Executive Director) of The YA/YA, Young Aspirations / Young Artists. Jana showed us around her beautiful studio right in the French District, and Baty told us about the anti-violence coalition she started in New Orleans (one of the inspirations for our Power Of Peace Coalition!!).

Jana (and friends) are a part of The New Orleans Biennial this year. This is the largest biennial of international contemporary art ever organized in the United States, and will open to the public in museums, historic buildings, and found sites throughout New Orleans. Her site is a warehouse turned gallery. On PIETY Street. Isn’t that awesome? Piety! As Jana said, “New Orleans is classy!!”

And I am here to help, in any way I can. I got here this morning and already I have helped mount a hurricane of pictures, nail (with a nail gun!!) drawers for The Flood Wall, cast my hand for a sculpture that will come out of a rooftop, and ruined my new jeans. But that’s okay; I ruin my clothes painting at The Girls Club studio all the time.

I will be meeting with girls from The YA/YAs soon. A couple of our friends from April are coming to New York with Jana and Baty for our Gala. I am here to give them and their parents any information they might need and answer any questions. The Girls Club is used to traveling, but for some of these girls it will be the first time on a plane without their parents. They are going to spend a weekend with us, joining us for our NOLA Soul Saturday Performance Series. They are going to have so much fun!!

I’ve got to go. But before I leave, here is something I have learned today. It is better to travel and get to know the locals, instead of spending all your time in touristic areas. Instead of looking at all the beautiful houses New Orleans has, I am about to have a delicious bar-b-q dinner in the backyard of one.

Welcome back Bioneers girls!! I hope you had a good time and learned a lot. I can’t wait to learn more about what I can do to help!!

I am sitting in the lobby of the hotel we will be staying at. Beautiful, cozy, elegant. Complete change from San Fran., you’ll be able to see a different way of traveling.

I arrived at around 4pm and my first stop was to meet Lyn at Janas home, right in the historic district!! Beautiful building surrounded by more old buildings. With the terraces outside the windows, the ones you will recognize from any NoLa picture you will ever see of this neighborhood. We then went to go meet a couple of people from the YaYas. That is an awesome organization, and I am so looking forward to working with them. You will soon see me working everyday to make sure that it is a fabulous experience for us (The LESGC) and them (The YaYas). We want to create a mural that we can maybe display in The Super Dome/ Super Love. Any Ideas?
From there, we went to Janas moms house to relax and meet her friends. We had a fabulous Guatemalen dinner (not very New Orleans, but goes to show the mixture of people in our country)I was so tired that I took a nap right there on the carpet. When I woke up, we went to a place called Rock and Bowl, such a fun place. But the days traveling had us so tired, that came back to the hotel to sleep.

Today, we went around some of the places that got hit by the hurricane. You drive around NoLa and don’t really see much of anything. It can lead you to think that this is all hyped up media. Which I think a lot of people think. But it only hit specific areas, you go from one block to another and see a distinctive difference. And even in places that got hit, you see differences. Old buildings that were here for generations are completely gone, newer buildings fared better. These are all things you will discover on your own.

We will be here to learn and to help in any way we can.

Todays the last day of Texas, for me at least. This was fun, but I’m glad. It’s too cold and I am exhausted!! My schedule has been so filled; up at 6am, work through the day, and going to bed at 11pm (at least). At least I was staying at a cool hotel, with that sleep number bed thing. If you want to know, I’m a 35. Not enough sleep, but when I do it’s good sleep. Still can’t tell you what I am doing here, I still have to flush it out. But I will soon!!!

We have gotten delicious food every day we have been here. But while everyone is drinking coffee from paper cups, yours truly is drinking out of my reusable and earth friendly traveling coffee mug. When I was packing I reminded myself to pack that, I didn’t want to cause more waste than necessary.

Today I am leaving Texas, but I am not coming home. I’m going to NoLa!! Whoo hoo! I am meeting Lyn to scout out the area for our trip in April. Hopefully, I will meet The Yayas, see our hotel, pass by the Super Dome, go to Bourbon Street, hear some music, see some art, meet some people. Hopefully hopefully. I am so excited to do this!! And it’s such and important thing we are going to do down there. I hope you girls realize that.

I’ve got to go. I’ve got to give a presentation on all I’ve learned this week.

BTW: Eva!! You did a fabulous interview on Lou!! She’s awesome right!?!?

So it’s my second morning in Texas, and things are going well. Basically I am taking classes to learn how to design, plant and upkeep a garden. Don’t worry girls you will hear about this project soon. It’s very drizzly, cool and basically damp.

I just gave my first power point presentation. For those of you that don’t know, like I didn’t, it’s basically giving a presentation with a visual bulletin board. The Girls Club is so cool that I feel like I was talking about us for hours. And I am sure I forgot a couple of things.

I’ve got to get back to class. Will write again soon,

Luna

Hi girls!!! I’m in Texas!! WHy am I here? I’m getting training for a project I will be working on with you ladies. Can’t tell you much but think flowers, designing, nature, and conservation.

I got here yesterday to a surprisingly chilly day. I thought Texas was warm!! Met everyone who I will be working with, and then we went to The Lydon Johnson “White House”. It isn’t something am interested in, but we met his daughter Luci Johnson. She was awesome, we had dinner with her and she had the most fabulous stories. She is very environmental, just like her mom, Lady Bird Johnson. She is the founder of The Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, where I will be training. Luci Johnson was very happy to learn that we try to be as earth friendly as possible. I told her we try to use mugs instead of cups to cut down on waste and she was so happy.

Today is a very muggy, drizzly day. We came to the Wildflower Center, which is beautiful and we are learning about each other. I must say, The Girls Club rocks, we do so many cool things!!

Will write again soon,

Luna

A couple of days ago we, the “older girls”, went around San Francisco meeting other organizations that do similar work as The Girls Club. One of our stops was La Cocina, a VERY green organization that provides kitchen space for women trying to get their catering businesses off the ground. A lot of women in the area run businesses out of their homes, which is not only illegal but isn’t conducive for growth. La Cocina provides them with a state of the art kitchen for a VERY small rental fee. What I admired the most was how green it is, as the rest of San Fran is. Every thing is environmentally forward. Everything is compostable, recyclable or, of course, ingestible. Right now, they are working to get solar panels put on their roof, so that their space is completely self powered I think The Girls Club can add some of this to our space. Get ready to hear me annoy you all about composting!!

I also wanted to thank, on behalf of every single Girls Club girl member and staff, Woody and Laura. We have enjoyed Bioneers so much, and we have learned more than we could ever imagined. We plan on taking all this information back with us; opening peoples hearts and minds to how much damage we are doing to the world and how much we can do to fix it. The Girls Club rocks, and we have shown everyone here at Bioneers. We have met everyone, from Eve Ensler to Van Jones and put our message “DO SOMETHING PEOPLE” out there as only true New Yorkers can do.

Once again, Thank You Woody and Laura, we really appreciate the opportunity to have our heart completely moved. Now we are ready to spread the knowledge. Once again we might need your help. Can we maybe, possibly, hopefully borrow your Bio-Bus for a cross-country visiting tour of girl groups so we can spread this very important message? And would Laura possibly want to join us in New Orleans for V-day, where the feminine youth of New York can make our voices heard? We become green megaphones, we need to get more people aware!

Some of the older girls are working on a short documentary about Coney Island. This is me getting some panning shots of The Cyclone. We are getting people thoughts on the development going on there and any memories they have of Coney Island. Do you have any memories?