Mary Rose's Garden: Saturday Morning at the Temple Terrace Community Garden (Feb 16 2013)

Saturday, February 16, 2013

Saturday Morning at the Temple Terrace Community Garden (Feb 16 2013)

Today I went to the Temple Terrace Community Garden- just like every Saturday morning. Today was a special occasion- there was a new sign honoring Cheri Donahue for her support of the garden.
Here is the new sign:

I am in the middle with the sunglasses.

After the sign celebration, I discovered a new food: Brussels Sprouts greens

I'm going to cook them just like collards and have them with my ham steak (from A Simpler Place in Time) tomorrow. Think it will be yummy!

Do you know how Brussels sprouts form? You pull off the leaves and from the bud on the stalk- a little sprout emerges! Here is how the stalks looked after the leaves were removed:

I learned this while hanging out at our 'Thieves Garden' outside our fence. The very best thing about a community garden is the people that you meet. Steve McBride is always ready to share his gardening expertise- our soil wouldn't have been half as good as it is without his knowledge of lasagna layers. Today he told me that we were having a frost coming on Monday morning and we discussed the best way to protect my tender new shoots. One of his favorite Florida gardening solutions is Spanish Moss- it makes great layers in the garden- it makes a great fertilizer tea- and today I learned that it makes great frost protection for shoots close to the ground. Travis Malloy works harder than anyone in the garden and I don't remember a work day without him there. His family donated our shed and helped us get it into place. Today, we learned that he made his canoe available to TTCG members- which should be fun and great exercise. I am personally indebted to Carrie and Nancy who tirelessly helped me build the layers of my garden. I couldn't handle a wheel barrow full of composted materials and they filled up the wheel barrows more often than not while I was putting down layers of the more easily carried brown materials. Every time we turn around, there is someone new who has something valuable to offer and wants to help. The people in the garden are the greatest treasure. We talked about continuity, helping the local schools educate children on building gardens, growing a living fence at our new garden at Greco Middle school, and Travis presented his plans for the new plots at the Riverhills garden.

Thanks to all the help from the people I've met, my garden is thriving.
Here are some of my photos this morning from my plot: