Second Week of Teaching at Lakewood!!

Today the vegetables in the garden looked awesome!

The lettuce is about ready to harvest!

Olivia and I planted some raddishes.

We also planted beets!

The Cherry Tomato's were ready to harvest!

Last week Olivia and I planted some bean seeds and they were already sprouting!! So Exciting!

A close up of the bean seeds!

Edible flowers that are pretty tasty!

The students had a lesson on seeds today! First, we looked at three different types of seeds and observed some similarities and differences. We used our senses of sight, smell, and touch to observe the seeds. And we looked at their texture, shape, weight, and color. They absolutely loved planting their own seeds! We used some plastic cups and each student got to plant one seed. Then the teacher took the planted seeds back to their classroom.

The students tasted the edible flower! They thought it was so cool that they could eat a flower!

We also tasted the cherry tomatoes! They were very yummy!

The students left very happy! 

By: Kate Farley
Eckerd College Senior

Stories to Share in the Garden

It was gloomy day at Lakewood’s garden but that did not let that stand in the way of our happiness to be back in the garden.  

Besides the kids coming out at the end, my favorite part of the morning was talking with my fellow peers and getting to know them better. I feel lucky to be in a group that is so passionate about horticulture and enjoyed the conversations that we were having. Along with discussing worldly views on culture and religion, my peers expressed how they felt connected to the Edible Peace Patch project through their various experiences.

We mainly focused on pulling sedges out the mulch walkways which is really therapeutic as well as a time committing task. Luckily, I was with a group that had interesting conversations, making the work go by fast.

I found a really cool mushroom with a black cap growing in one of the beds which I thought deserved to be in our blog.

The children came out right before it was about to rain. We didn’t get to do the assessment but we did get to give them a tour of the garden. The students were very excited to get to taste the baby tomatoes!

I really appreciate having an enthusiastic group of students and getting to work with motivated people who tell awesome stories.  

Julia Melton

The Season Starts Again...

  To live, to survive on the earth, to care for the soil, and to worship, all are bound at the root to the idea of a cycle. -Wendell Berry

  One can still feel a bit of the cold from winter, the weather keeps jumping back and forth from hot to cold, unable to make up its mind it seems. Yet the length of the days are consistently getting longer and thus the sun is gifting more energy to the plants and us. Already quite a bit that was saved from last season is growing and near or ready to be harvested, including some cauliflower, lettuce, and some gorgeous (and very delicious) little tomatoes. We shared some of the tomatoes with the kids, and had reactions ranging from "delicious" to pure disgust with the flavor (I didn't much like tomatoes at there age either). One bright kid noticed the seeds in his tomato and decided to keep it so to plant the seeds later.

                     

   It was a lot of fun getting to see the kids I had spent so much time with last term, and while they can be a handful at times, I am really glad I get to spend time with them and see them light up with understanding of the cycles and workings of the garden. I also love that these kids love bugs almost as much as I do! This garden is a special place that grows a lot more than just plants, and I look forward to doing a lot of growing in this new growing season!

- Noah Schlager

Better than any argument is to rise at dawn and pick dew-wet red berries in a cup. -Wendell Berry

Day one of Spring 2012

     And we're off to another great semester! 

Today, we resumed our weekly work in the garden along with lessons and classes. I worked the very chilly 8-10am shift with Kate and Erin joined us to go over all of things that need to happen this week. Despite our nearly numb fingers and toes, we enjoyed the refreshing air and the irresistable beauty of the Peace Patch garden. Among the various goals for this semester, we discussed planting more fruit than we have in the past, as the kids are largely more excited about growing fruit than vegetables (no surprise there..). We also had fun tossing around ideas for dishes to make from the food we will eventually harvest....tomato and basil hummus anyone?

I always envy kids' superior resilience in the face of cold weather. Here's our beautiful group of kindergarten students, energetic and ready for time in the garden! 

Sunflowers growing in the Three Sisters Bed, looking lovely.

Just a few of the tomatoes growing on the very large tomato bush. 

Far left bed: Eggplant and Broccoli; Middle bed: Peppers, Parsley, Cilantro; Right: Cauliflower.

So excited to see the Eggplant coming in!

Our main task for today's shift...a newly planted bed of Garbonzo beans, Garden Beans, and Providers.

Kate assessing our class'slevel of science/gardening knowledge through  the classic red light-green light game.

I'm so excited to be back in the garden again this semester and to be a part of such an important and life-changing movement. I know the rest of the semester will only prove to be more exciting as we move forward with planting and working with the kids.

Until next time,

-Olivia

Finishing Touches

The Edible Peace Patch at Lakewood Elementary has finally become operational. After many hours of hard work by many ambitious volunteers, the Garden is ready for production.

Aesthetically, there is no comparison

And the same goes agriculturally.

These new beds will hopefully contain far more nutrient rich soil and will promote healthy growth among the various crops.

Even the sunflowers will have better soil, proper organization, and greater protection.

As we can see, they are taking it very well.

With all of the beds finished, sand sloped appropriately, and mulch spread, we were finally able to start planting.

This involved some careful note-taking in order to know what was where and the notes were then organized into a whiteboard chart for ease of use.

(left of bottom half nearest school and top following to the right)

Some of the crops, such as the tomatoes and some sunflowers, were left planted from the previous garden:

Others were transplanted in fresh new beds:

Collards,

Peppers (left), Parsley (right top), Broccoli (middle), Cilantro (right bottom),

Eggplant (left), Romaine Lettuce (right),

A few mystery greens (likely a form of Collards),

And yet others received drastic upgrades to their pre-existing homes:

Pineapples,

lets not forget about those Sunflowers.

Even the compost, mulch, and soil starter piles reaped the benefits of the renovation.

Some plants from the old garden were even able to be harvested in order to provide for future generations of superior crops.

The Edible Peace Patch here at Lakewood has sure come a long way, but the real exciting part is still to come.

Everything Coming Together

Even after lots of progress on the beds over the previous week, things were looking a little barren around the Peace Patch. In fact, the Garden almost resembled a mine for a while. Recently, however, things have been brightening up.

More renovation meant more supplies and we got a lot of it.

Some of the materials came from local businesses: shrimp, wood, topsoil, coffee grinds, etc.

And some of the materials came straight from the ground

After all the beds were caught up to speed with layers up through fish, mulch and topsoil, they were ready for shrimp.

On top of this were more coffee grinds, some good compost, seaweed, more mulch and topsoil, all stacked like lasagna with good topsoil from the old beds mixed between each layer.

We also spread/sloped the sand and spread mulch over it.

The pineapples were happy to have their home cleaned up

And a long trough was created in which to hopefully grow a wall of giant sunflowers.

We even moved the compost off of the fence to the far side of the Garden and built new frames for seven of the beds.

Luckily, on Wednesday and Thursday this week we had some extra help around the Garden.
A whole class of Eckerd College students volunteered at the Peace Patch and made a big impact in the volume of work we were able to complete.

Slowly but surely, the Peace Patch is coming together.