The Vinton Youth Garden is pretty much done for the year.  We have cleaned everything up, but there is still some lettuce enjoying the cold weather.  It is covered, but I’m sure they would prefer it a few degrees warmer!

 

To keep the kids interested in gardening over the winter, I have planned a few events.  We will  meet once a month at the Benton County Extension office to do a project.  Next month we will be painting clay flowerpots, in January we will plant some tulip or daffodil bulbs in them (they are chilling in my fridge as you read), and in February we will meet to pick what the kids want to plant next year.  And, either in January or February, we will have a popcorn party with the popcorn the kids grew and picked.  They will get to shuck it and rub it off the cob and then pop it themselves.  It is sure to be a great time.

 

This month, we met to make cards.  The kids could do thank yous, Happy Thanksgiving, Christmas or whatever kind of cards they wanted.  I had a bunch of scrapbooking stuff for them to use, although it was very hard to find vegetable rubber stamps at the local hobby stores.  I’ll start looking sooner next year!

 

They had a great time.  I had gotten white and off-white notecards and envelopes in two different sizes and 12 in a package.  I think between the five kids they used most of two of the packages!

Lauren and Olivia….

Striking a pose….

Millie stamping away…

Nash was helping with the glitter glue…

Lauren, Olivia and Cali are working away….

Cali knows what she wants to do…

Nash getting into things with the glitter glue….

The finished products… drying since glitter glue was the main ingredient!

My mega-helper, Martha, had the kids write out what they liked and didn’t like about the Garden this year, and what they wanted more of next year.  She is going to use the “good” for a flyer to hand out to get more kids interested.  I think the “bad” is to help us to help the kids next year!

She also brought along the loufa we had grown so the kids could peel it.

She had some in water so the kids could see how it became a sponge.

It was pretty darn cool!

We had some visitors at the beginning of the “meeting” from Buchanan county.  Joe, Jess and Roxanne stopped by to see how our Garden grew.  Roxanne is the Extension Administrator for Buchanan county, Jess is the Food Service Director at one of the Elementary Schools in Independence and Joe is the “Super Volunteer Extraordinaire”.  They came down to check out the layout of the garden and see if they could steal some ideas for their gardens in Independence.

Joe had a good time peeling some of the loufa.  He took some of the seeds, too, to grow in our northern neighbor’s gardens.

A rousing success and I can’t wait to see what they do with the flowerpots!

Dig it!

Posted under Autumn, Youth Garden

The Garden is starting to wind down.  We met on Monday and I was worried the cold, rainy wind would keep the meeting short.  I planned on making sure the kids picked what needed picked and then get the heck out of there and back to the warmth of home.  It turns out, Mother Nature was kind to us.  The sun came out and the wind wasn’t quite as cold.  While I pulled weeds….

The kids were busy harvesting.

They picked quite a few tomatoes.

The watermelon is still producing.

The pumpkins are looking great this year.  This one is hiding, but huge.

An even bigger one is waiting for Halloween.  The pie pumpkins are keeping it company.

We have planted loofa, the stuff that you can use in the bath, the last couple of years, but this year we finally have some!

Martha is going to look at her notes and see when we can pick them to dry them out.

Once the kids had all the veggies harvested, Martha had them stringing beans…

I think they are hoping to dry out the beans completely and then plant them next year.

Before everyone else got to the Garden, I was busy planting some lilies and one new hosta.  One of my neighbors was changing up her yard and was going to get rid of them.  I put some of the lilies at the “Welcome to Urbana” sign in town, but put the rest into our flower bed.  The bed is looking pretty good.  The mums and sedum are blooming and we still have some hosta flowers.  The cannas are still going strong, too.

Hopefully it will all make it through the Sunday morning cool snap!

Dig it!

Posted under Youth Garden

Last week was the Benton County Fair.  The Youth Garden kids picked some of the Garden produce and entered the Open category of the Fair.  They did pretty good for their first time.

 

They got second for one using six to nine items in a display….

….and they got first for five items in a display.

 

Way to go, kids!  We’ll enter even more displays next year!

Dig it!

Posted under Youth Garden

A year and a few days ago, Lori, one of our volunteers, and I were discussing how great the garden looked. A few days later, 110 mile per hour winds blew through town.  Needless to say, we have agreed not to mention how nice the garden looks this year.  I’ll let you decide….

The west veggie bed has tomatoes, zucchini, watermelon and gourds

The raspberries ended up below part of the neighbors tree.  It didn’t even phase them….

The vining plants are doing well, but I have no idea which ones are the zucchini and which one are the pumpkins.  There are some watermelons and gourds in here, too.

Oh… and then the extra tomatoes… We should have plenty!

We planted popcorn again, although it got in a little later than last year.

Here is a shot of the mulch that I sweated half of my body weight helping to move….

…and, no, it didn’t stay off.

The eggplant…

Martha and the kids did the planting while I stayed out of the way and pulled weeds, so I don’t know what this is.  I think it’s cucumber…

These, I know… pole beans growing on last years’ Our Iowa magazine’s tall corn contest stalk.

Brussel sprouts…yum!

They are a little bug-bit, they should be pretty tasty….

The broccoli is already bolted…

The peppers are coming along nicely…

The cabbage leaves are getting huge!

I’ll guess pumpkin….

We have two different “beds” of potatoes.  One in the raised bed…

…and some in a container…

Basil…

The kids learned that they need to pull off the flower-head to promote the growth of the basil plant.  It will make it more bushy.

I was told this batch of parsley had a swallowtail caterpillar on it a couple of weeks ago.

This bed has bush beans along with a rogue tomato plant.  It is growing from seeds from last year’s tomatoes. This bed had been under the top of one of the pines for a couple of weeks.

Beets!

The peanuts got eaten down and they don’t look like they are coming back.  Although the pigweed looks like it is enjoying the soil.

After the peas were finished, Martha and the kids planted some Dragon tongue beans.

They were given to us by an AmeriCorp volunteer at the beginning of the year.  Melissa is spending much of the summer helping out in Southern Iowa.

Kohlrabi

The flowerbeds… the hostas need shade, so we planted some cannas around some as an experiment:

Not sure it is working against the heat, though.

Small mum already blooming.

The peonies are keeping our flamingo company.  His companion took off in last year’s wind storm.  We have yet to get a postcard…

The City put in the faucet this year!  It has been fantastic being able to put on a sprinkler instead of hauling five gallon buckets over half a block.

There is always the weeding to do.  The picnic table area had some unwanted trees growing.

I left the coneflowers….

…and the toad lilies…

It looks a LOT better now, although we still need to straighten out the frame.

We have a “friend” living in the yard, too.  A groundhog hole appeared within the last couple of weeks.  A live trap will hopefully work to relocate him.

The apple trees are small, but still alive!

…and we even have a couple of apples!

We are using this….

..to keep the weeds down here….

That’s Phil in the above photo…. He is a huge help with the weeding.

Lori, Nash and Martha planted Cilantro

Of course, then you have to water.  Check out Nash’s solution to getting water in the sprinkler can….

…Lori moved in to cut off the sprinkler and help him fill the can.

Cali and Carol (mom to Cali and Nash) are taking a break.  I’m sure they are talking up the garden.  Maybe they’re trying to get more volunteers to help weed!

We meet Monday afternoons (2:30 when school’s out, 3:30 during the school year) and it has been mighty hot this year. I make sure I have the most important “tool” for the garden filled in my truck every week.

The Benton County Fair is coming up in a couple of weeks and the kids are going to submit a plate of five vegetables in the Open category.  It will be submitted on Wednesday, the 25th and the Fair goes through Sunday, the 29th.  Come out and check their entry.  And while you’re in town, swing on by the Garden and check out their hard work.  Feel free to take a complimentary weed home with you, too!

 

Dig it!

 

Posted under Youth Garden

The Vinton Youth Garden is in full swing!  We got an early start with radishes, lettuce and spinach.  There are still a few radishes hiding out….

…and some lettuce hasn’t completely bolted, but it is on its way…

The kids have been busy planting all sorts of vegetables….

Peanuts.. that the rabbits have figured how to get to, despite the netting

….peas….

…kohlrabi….

….potatoes…

… the kids are also trying potatoes in a tub (planted later)…

….bush beans…

…onions (near), garlic (far) and oregano (farthest)… the space is where lettuce used to be…

….pole beans….these are going to climb last year’s remains of the giant cornstalks we got from Our Iowa magazine…

….broccoli….

….eggplant….

….peppers… these include bell and jalapeno…

…I think these are cabbages…

….tomatoes…  33 of them at last count…. we are using black plastic sheeting for weed control around the plants…

….and several mounds of squash and zucchini, gourds, watermelon and pumpkins….

 

I have been busy putting flowers in the ground in our “hosta bed”.  The problem with the hosta bed is that there is very little shade for the hostas since last year’s wind storm took out two of the trees.

 

There are now some black-eyed susans, coneflowers, obedient plant, irises, daylilies and carnations among the hostas. Along with the weeds….

 

We planted some cannas around some of them to see if the cannas would provide enough shade for the hostas.  With the warm weather this year, it is a race to see if the cannas can grow fast enough to shade the hostas before it gets too hot for them to handle.

The Vinton Streets Department is working hard at taking out the old sidewalk and putting in a new, smoother one….

There is still plenty to get done on our almost half a city block of paradise (in progress).  The To-Do list includes:

We have to move this plot of peonies in a few months….

….there are some tulips out in the middle of the lot that need to be dug up and moved to a safer spot….

….put tomato cages on the plants…

….place railroad ties in place so we can plant strawberries in the bed….

…fix or replace the pergola so we can put in trumpet vine or other vine to provide shade for us and shelter for the birds…

…move the mulch from the piles to the hosta beds…the mulch is from the wind storm remnants in town…

…and then there is the lot where I plan on putting in the Monarch Way Station.

We will be putting in coneflowers, monarda (bee balm), butterfly weed, milkweed and joe pye weed.  I would also like to get a few trees, including birch, that are host plants for all types of butterflies.  Along with putting some walkways in for people to wander through the lot.

And there is always weeding.  You are welcome to help out.  We meet at 2:30 on Mondays until school starts up again (then we meet at 3:30 through the growing season).  Come on out, meet the kids, help pull some weeds and I’ll even let you take home a hosta!

 

Dig it!

 

 

 

Posted under Youth Garden

While having four city lots for a garden is wonderful in June and July, it is a lot of work when it comes to fall cleanup.  Especially when the kids are all in school with after school events… or stuck at home recovering from a virus.  And, in order to get some sleep before my alarm goes off at 12:30 (yes, that is A.M.), I try to leave at 4:30.  That means there is only so much that can get done. Although, we managed to get quite a bit pulled up.

 

The picnic table area had some of those volunteer trees growing, so I chopped them down and threw them in the back of the truck.  I also threw in some of the stuff we had pulled previously.  It filled up the truck bed pretty quickly.

Martha and Kaitlyn started picking the gourds and pulling up the vines. When I filled the truck up, I headed over to help.

We managed to get quite a bit done, but there is still plenty to do.  Of course, there is always something to do in the garden!

 

And there is always something to look at, too.

Hopefully, next time we will get even more done!

 

Dig it!

Posted under Autumn, Youth Garden

The State provided cleanup help to Vinton in the form of some Anamosa State Prisoners. Last Friday and again on Monday, they were helping at the Youth Garden.  They took the brush that was about 6″ in diameter and smaller and fed it into a chipper. 

 

The view is a lot better than last week…

 

 The Garden is starting to look like we can get (somewhat) back to normal.  Lori, Martha and I were at the Garden today spreading the mulch around and weeding. Martha is already looking forward to when the kids can take the extra produce to the Farmers’ Market!

Dig it!

Posted under Youth Garden

I stopped by the Garden on Tuesday when it was really, really hot and really, really humid to pick some beans.  I was surprised to find that the evergreen top had been removed from the raised beds.  A couple of posts had been broken off, and some plants were squished, but it already looked better.  Or at least less hopeless.

I didn’t get the beans.  I was too sweaty from moving the few things I did in that 115 degree heat index.

It sounds like the cleanup of the brush at the Gardens will be completed by Monday or so.  I can’t wait to see what it looks like!

Dig it!

Posted under Youth Garden

The storm took most of the mature trees in Vinton on Monday. That includes the trees around the Garden.  The following photos are in the order I took them:

Dig it!

Posted under Youth Garden

I must say the Gardens look a whole lot better this year than they did at this point last year.  That is mainly because we didn’t get started until late May or early June last year and we were playing catch-up all year. This year we started early and we have managed to keep it looking pretty good.  So far!

I spent the better part of three hours weeding the little bed next to the concrete slab. We had put a lot of annuals in it, but it also had dianthus (a biennial) and some roses that got transplanted from the Peony Pit. There were also some columbine that apparently seeded. Edwon and I then mulched around the flowers to keep the weeds down and keep it looking good.

This area had some raspberries and asparagus that I planted on the hottest day of the year last year. Needless to say, the plants didn’t make it. The weed patch has won this round, but take heed, weeds!  I will win the war!

The raised beds are doing very well again this year.

Here’s to keeping it looking this good in another month after we get really, really tired of weeding!

Dig it!

Posted under Youth Garden