Kyle has blogged a little bit and coached me on how to start a blog. That's how you have this to read! Thank a bunch, Kyle! You saved me a lot of time.
Jenna participated in a LSS (Lutheran Social Services) conference. She told about our garden and another VFY house told about their garden. This inspired the VFY in Manistique to start a garden.
I love a positive ripple effect!
What to do when you show up to garden and get rained out? Play a rousing game of Spinning Uno! Great way to get to know team members better and to meet others who are hanging out at the house!
The Norway Spring
While waiting for the alpaca farm to open (see previous post), we explored the incredible variety of plants at The Garden Place's greenhouse in Norway, MI. They had 50 varieties of tomatoes alone! When Valeria Zanoni (that's her with Noah in the photo above) heard about our project, she generously donated several very healthy plants -- a variety of tomatoes, Brussels sprouts, Swiss chard, peppers, cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage, cucumbers, and squashes. Plus, she provided botanical handouts. Thank you, Valeria! So many good people out there!
Shop U.P.! http://www.thegardenplacemi.com/
Meet Kramer!
Oops! Ran out of room! To expand the garden towards the most sun would have required significant fill dirt to level a slope. Also that area is used in the winter for stacking snow as it is cleared from surrounding parking lots and driveways, so rabbit-proofing fencing would need to be moved prior to winter. Instead, our "expansion crew" cleared land and we planted summer and winter squash just outside the fence. The squash vines will be able to cascade down the slope beautifully.
We planted lettuce (mixed leaf) in one of VFY's window boxes and filled a couple of other window boxes with basil and nasturiums. We got started clearing a spot to plant pumpkins.
A team member's friend donated slats from miniblinds; we turned those into row markers so we can clearly see what is planted where.
VFW staff provided more paperwork as needed, plus paparazzi services.
June 5 some of us toured the Downtown Marquette Farmers & Artists Market. Questions and observations were awesome. In response to a comment about all the talent and creativity present there, a team member reasoned, "With all this creativity right here, I don't see why we need famous people." Cool. We watched a demonstration of impregnating logs with shitake mushroom spores. We also learned health benefits of and how to preserve and prepare the mushrooms. If you haven't been to the market yet, check it out at the Marquette Commons 9am-2pm.
Earlier this month we planted plants listed in a previous post. Plus, we purchased and planted the following seeds in the garden:
Last week we pulled weeds and removed rocks (shall we call this Stony Knoll?) Dirt was flying!
In February 2010 Lutheran Campus Ministry (LCM) of Northern Michigan University (NMU) received good news from the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA) national office -- their Campus Ministry Division had just been awarded a grant from the Hunger Awareness Education funds. The approved project is called "Seed Money for a Ground Breaking Proposal".
