Farmers Kelly Kiefer and Jeff Schreiber met while working at Outpost Natural Foods in Wauwatosa. Jeff was in the city for the winter after working as manager of the CSA at Wellspring, a non-profit farm-based education organization. Kelly had just graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee with a degree in Sociology and was off to pursue a five month internship as a farm-based educator in New York State. She was delighted to learn about Wellspring – who knew there was such a place so close to where she grew up? It worked out that Kelly went to work with Jeff at Wellspring when she returned from her internship in New York. There, over the next three years, their love for farming and each other grew. "In 2011 we started Three Sisters on Kelly's family's land. The name has a double-meaning. Kelly does, in fact, have two sisters, but they currently live elsewhere. At farmers’ markets, I am often asked if I am the ‘fourth sister’!  The other meaning is a nod to the ‘three sisters’ planting of the Native Americans. In this planting, corn, beans and squash worked together harmoniously: the squash sprawled along the ground, crowding out weeds; corn popped up through this "mulch;" and the beans used the cornstalks as a trellis. It is a simple and elegant example of working with nature, rather than against it. While we don't necessarily plant our corn, beans and squash in this way, we take the ‘three sisters’ as a metaphor for how to go about the work we do,” says Jeff.

We’re prescribing outdoor activities to help you connect to nature in Milwaukee! Check out Episode 2 of our Nature Prescriptions video series with Jamie Ferschinger, Riverside Park Branch Manager, where she suggests bundling up and relaxing outside.

The alarm goes off at 6:35 a.m. It is morning, but it sure seems like it is still night.  I lay in bed a few minutes longer convincing myself that my alarm clock is correct and that the time registering on the clock was not magically changed by wily elves while I was sleeping.  It is not this hard to get up in summer. Sun, where are you!? When the internal dialog finally concludes, I roll out of bed to face the day…and my dog who is ready for a run.

If you ask any of the Center staff, each person probably has a handful of programs which are their favorites. These are the programs that make us want to come to work each day. One of my favorite programs is the High School Outdoor Leader Program. This program – dare I say it- sometimes makes me want to be in high school again.