How did Stephanie and her Family meet Susan & Charlie?

Stephanie from Stephanie Holistic Coaching grew up in the South of France where life is known for the Provençal cuisine and for the delightful scents of lavender, rosemary, thyme, garlic, basil, and freshly pressed olive oil. She grew up in a homestead farm, where her family had enough olive trees to press their own olive oil (still does it nowadays), had a vegetable garden, learned to cook homemade Provençal dishes, baking, and was raised with the French culture of eating fresh whole foods, using herbal plants, and knowing about their health benefits. When she moved from South of France to the Carolinas in 2010 she really wanted to grow her own food again, teach her future children how to garden, and immerge them into the culture inspired from her own childhood.

As the years went by she practiced growing in pots, bought a tower garden for her backyard, along with a compost bin, and learned about the importance of compositing. Stephanie was wondering how she could improve her gardening skills, until in the Fall of 2020, while looking for high quality soil locally, as well as where to buy organic bay leaves for cooking, she met online Susan who invited her to her house in South Charlotte at that time, to harvest as much as bay leaves she wanted. 

Stephanie did not know that Susan and her husband were living their lives by the principals of permaculture. Upon her arrival, she and her family were welcomed by two wonderful and generous people, and met Susan & Charlie. She witnessed a suburban backyard reconverted entirely into a vegetable garden. If you are familiar with the Carolina's type of soil you know it's all red clay. This garden had none of it. It was squishy as she was walking on it, spongy, rich in black soil, and covered with an abundance of food growing. She was amazed about the outcome and deep inside wanted to know more about their growing techniques. She left from that place with her trunk full of grocery paper bags filled up with bay leaves (enough for the next 50 years at least), but also with turmeric plants, holly basil plants, raspberry plants and more. Not knowing yet at that time... It was the beginning of their friendship.

A year passed by when Stephanie reached out to Susan to ask her about a gardening question. From that conversation Susan invited her, her family, and some of her homeschooling friends to come visit their new homestead farm, named "Little Peace Of Heaven" located about 1h away from Charlotte, NC. 

Since, along with being passionate about Functional Holistic Health, Wellness & Chronic Stress Reduction, Stephanie has been developing a community of like-minded people wanting to learn about permaculture gardening, health, wellness, nutrition, cooking and about supporting each other. 

It is why Stephanie has created Garden Of Life Community Projects to build a community and support each other in gardening using permaculture, composting inspired from the wisdom of ancestral practices!