summer diary 22 of 2012. info@kidsgrowing - green thumbs · 2017-03-01 · uses wood, massive...
TRANSCRIPT
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ABOUT US
Green Thumbs Growing Kids offers food growing and environmental edu-
cation programs in 4 inner-city schools and 2 park sites. Our programs
take place in the east downtown Toronto neighbourhoods of St. James
Town, Cabbagetown, Regent Park and Moss Park. We reach over 3,000
children from these neighbourhoods each year as well as youth and
adults. Our gardens are about kids and their grownups, plants and their
people - from all over the world!
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At Rose Ave. PS, a new garden bed was built that is now in process of becoming a Hugelkultur bed. A Huge Wha-a-a-t? you ask? Hugelkultur uses wood, massive amounts, in a garden bed. What happens is that the wood fibers break down into cellu-lose, a porous mass that holds enormous amounts of water, and releases it to plant roots as they need it, watering from below. Water con-servation methods like this are going to be more and more im-portant as climate change causes unpre-dictability in supply of
rainwater and even municipal water systems. In the photo, a Grade 6 team is filling the bed with topsoil, following a layer of fresh manure on top of the logs. In the previous photo you can see the logs, and the lovely decorating done with kindergarteners, with the help of the Branksome Hall Service Learning team.
“Hugelkultur bed”
Much more
garden fun to
come...
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“Hugelkultur bed”
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Table of Contents
Summer Summary and the team Page 4-5
Our Harvest season Sneak peaks Page 6-7
Winchester Garden Page 8-9
Rose Avenue Garden Page 10-11
Plant Faces Page 12-13
Rain Water Catchment System Page 14-15
Community Tips and Recipes Page 16-17
Summer Wrap up Page 18-19
More garden fun (Earth block beds!) Page 20-21
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Summary : Summer 2012
Summer 2012 was a luscious experience for youth summer staff from Green Thumbs Growing Kids and the community. In between running or planning garden programs, our summer consisted of lots of meaningful garden work including weeding, suckering jungles of tomatoes, fixing rainwater catchment and compost systems, and planting seeds for fall harvest, which was done with joy beneath the heat of the sun, knowing that the community would enjoy the fruits of our labour. There was something valuable to remember in all our experiences, even having to clear out an entire leaky, maggoty composter, just to mix the browns and greens. the semi-success of rotten milk spray in treating the relent-less powdery mildew that got to ALL of our squash and cukerbit plants, and the sow bugs that fled from the piles of vermi-compost we were harvesting.
Su
mm
er
In
te
rn
s
Kryslyn
Mohan Anita
Wong 19
Marigolds are easy to take care of and they keep away garden pests!
Planting Marigolds around tomato plants are highly encouraged.
Fun Facts!
There are many bees in our garden to keep our plants pollinated and healthy. When near a bee, remember to BEE silent, BEE still and BEE careful!
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What we learned most of all is really how to reach out to the community and cultivate a sense of belonging in the garden. Our approach was mostly “shout-outs” to passerbys, though we did design some posters that seemed to reach a few people, despite not having focused our time on perfecting and distributing them. We also attracted guests with activities for children, pre-harvested bags of herbs as hand-outs, and most of all... FOOD! We served Callaloo soup, pesto, lemon mint cookies, lemon anise hyssop cookies and candied mint leaves at our drop-ins! Our intention was always to attract as many people as we could into the garden, with no judgements, and to share the joy of learning and harvesting from the gar-den, as well as enjoying a sense of community and sharing abundance.
5
Su
mm
er
In
te
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s
Anna
Kan
Alicia
Penny
The most glorious moments were equally memorable, like the first red tomato we found, that Alicia had dreamed about, the discovery of bitter melons and pattypan squash, and most of all, the experiences we shared with members of the community
6
Sneak peek into our
harvest season
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Yummy recipes
Squash can be used for cooking. Fry them with onion, garlic and oil and add turmeric
Cook bitter melon by frying it with onions
Use oregano to treat coughs and colds by squeezing it into any drink
Use dry dill and basil for soup
Fry Green tomatoes with milk to make chutney
Boil potatoes and sweet potatoes sprouts to make a hearty drink
To make bland soup use squash leaves with onions
green chilli and tomato makes really good roti
Make squashed soup with squash leaves, milk, fish and spinach
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“sage is good to make tea
for colds, menopause and
it’s the best for winter!”
“rub oregano on your
chest for colds and
coughs and bruises”
Community tips
“marigolds boost your immune system”
“celery juice
and tea is good
for anxiety!”
Basil in Hindi
is pronounced
“tulsi”
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Weight
(g)
July 18: Produced harvested
from Spruce court
10 Herbs
10 Herbs
1500 Gourd unknown
300 Red callaloo
14 Red ccallaloo with sour leaf
25 callaloo lettuce mint thyme
43 Lettuce mint basil sour leaf
220 Tomatoes lettuce, sorrel, callaloo
89 callaloo
50 tomatillo
7 Pepper
70 Tomato
63 Tomatoes thyme
74 callaloo sour leaf
250 echinacea, sour leaf, thyme, mint
391 Bitter melon
681 Potato
1204 Gourd
Sprucecourt
Timothy
Bun-Bun
At our
children’s
program
8
Win
ch
es
ter
ga
rd
en
Weight (g)
TOTAL 2329 g
July 31: produce harvest-
ed from Winchester
341 Sage, tomatoes, mint
65 Dill
99,77,40,44,92,20,
18,10,14,31
Red currents
6 Dill, lettuce, kale
250 Kale , lettuce
34,6 mint
273 Banana pepper, basil, let-
tuce
184 Banana pepper, lettuce,
chive, mint
26 Lettuce
10 Basil
12,16 Banana pepper
62,50 Carrot
91 Kale, lettuce
65 Kale, sorrel
20 kale
330 tomatoes
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. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Rain water
catchment
“IT WORKS!” - Anna Kan
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Rain water
catchment
Small Change Fund – Urban Roots Youth Catching Rain
Wow, what a dry summer up until last week. Our youth worked on the rainwater catchment system at Winchester Public School and “it was somewhat of a difficult task,” says Alicia. “You had to have muscles!” Thanks to a grant by Small Change Fund, all of the rainwater catchment systems in our school gardens are getting a makeover.
From our blog post:
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Weight (g)
TOTAL 6435g
August 14: produce harvest-
ed from Winchester
95,
138,495,500,380,211,
104,43,76,38,216,87,
tomatoes
292 Marigold, basil, cilantro, dill,
sage
75, 10 peppers
30 Dill + chives
95 Dill, lemon balm, kale, moth-
er wort
545 Green tomatoes, yellow bana-
na pepper
265 Green tomatoes and red, ba-
nana peppers
830 Squash leaves, green toma-
toes, celery
1153, 25 Kale leaves
146 Basil and tomatoes
511 Cherry tomatoes
532 Chives tomatoes, peppers
83,25 Kale leaves sorrel
Weight (g)
TOTAL:
1865g
August 23: produce harvested
from Winchester
89 Bitter Mellon, banana pepper
119 Herbs
12 mint
7 mint
25 Tomatoes, garlic, herbs
100 Herbs
1000 Tomatoes and garlic
39 Basil
76 Garlic
122 Tomatoes
42 Lemon balm
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Weight (g)
TOTAL 233g
July 19: produce
harvested from
Rose
17 Mint
23 Herbs
2 Herbs
22 Lettuce and herbs
61 Mint
43 Garlic
8 Mint
52 basil
Weight (g)
TOTAL 325 g
July 12 : produce
harvested from
Rose
17 Mint
23 Herbs
2 Herbs
22 Lettuce and herbs
61 Mint
43 Garlic
8 Mint
52 basil
Ro
se
Av
en
ue
P.S
.
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Plant faces!
The finished products!
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Plant faces! Kicking off the summer with creativity, kids at our Sprucecourt morning program are having so much fun! This ‘plant face’ activity kept everyone alert during the tasty garden tour as they collected materials along the way.
Being a “hands on learning”, I always enjoyed arts and crafts in school. Creating an example prior to our kids program, I loved choosing different textures and colours for my plant buddy. It reminded me a lot of my own journal and my entries that incorporate random items stuck in such as leaves or bracelets. Maybe I even had more fun than the kids especially being fascinated by the handy double sided tape.
Not only were kids educated in plant identification for the leaves they chose, but they expressed their creativity with the arrangement of their precious plant parts and adding to it with crayons or pipe cleaners. Everyone had fun exploring Sprucecourt garden and touching the different textures of plants.
It’s never too late to make your own plant face, or plant bud-dy at home…so hop off your computer, and get creative!!!
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Weight (g)
TOTAL:
522g
August 16: pro-
duce harvested
from Rose
9 Mint + lemon balm
38 Mint + parsley
70 Mint
28 Mint + basil
43 Mint + basil
29 mint
24,30,50,31,2
2,14,134 BASIL
Weight (g)
TOTAL 1910g
August 2: produce
harvested from Rose
20 Basil, sour leaf
10 Peppers
60 Lettuce
420 callaloo
173 Bitter melon leaves
38 Basil
82 Basil and thyme
66 Spinach
66 Herbs (basil, parsley
etc)
9 Mint
75 basil