Malik from the archive / Shop Small, Eat Local

Another from the archive, again found while digging around for stock. This is Malik, grandson of Ruby, the delightful (and super healthy) woman I photographed a couple of years ago for Regions Bank. Ruby then had a plot she tended and she taught Malik and his friends about gardening. She said she only made him meals with Real food (and she herself only at raw veg). That takes serious commitment and strength to pull off!

And speaking of healthy food and local produce, I should mention a new, Birmingham-based project that launched at the new year. My friend (and great-name-haver) Carrie Rollwagen started a new writing/life project called Shop Small. She's committed this year to give up chain stores and only to buy locally. Going into the project, it seems she has no agenda to prove or disprove. Carrie seems honestly curious about the merits of keeping it close to home or saving a couple of bucks by buying big. She explains it infinitely better than I could dream to, so check out her blog.

Never lacking in commitments, Carrie has also teamed up with our friend Elisa Muños (who is, herself, one half of popular bicycling blog Bike Skirt) to produce a weekly-ish podcast called Shop Small, Eat Local. Surely you can guess the topics. I'll add a link to the iTunes podcast directory once it is listed, but you can already subscribe to the podcast at this URL (copy link and add to podcast subscriptions). If you're not into that whole subscription thing, Carrie will be posting Shop Small, Eat Local to her Shop Small blog. Yet another reason to check it out.