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Preparing For My Urban Kinder-Garden Workshop

I’m on the left coast this week conducting an Urban Kinder-Garden Workshop with Miss Avalos’ Kindergarten class at Kester Ave Elementary School in Sherman Oaks, CA.

Miss Avalos is tying the garden into the curriculum for her students.

Art
The first part of the project was having her student paint the containers, which helps them to express themselves creatively.

Science and Language Arts
“One of the cool things is that it also teaches about seasons and weather,” said Miss Avalos. “We are getting everything that is in season.”

Her class will be keeping a plant journal and talking about the parts and life cycles of the plants.

“Also the idea of taking care of our earth. We can do something local. We don’t have to waste fuel to get the food to us,” said Miss Avalos.

Team Buidling
The workshop and garden will also help the kids with their team building skills. They’ll have to work together to plant and maintain the garden.

Math
She’ll also be tying in math activities like how much they’ve gotten out of each plant.

Nutrition
“A lot of these kids haven’t been exposed to anything but iceburg lettuce. This is a whole new experience for them.

Responsibility
Some of the kids will also learn about having responsibilities as well. When winter break rolls around in a few weeks, some will get the chance to take the containers home to care for them.

When I was in elementary school, we just got the chance to take home a hamster.

The workshop will be broken down into two days with the first focusing on building the self-watering containers with the parents. After the containers are built, I’ll go over how the containers are made, how they work, about how they are reusing materials and the environmental impact of them.

Day two of the workshop will revolved around planting and setting up a worm composting bin.

It’ll be interesting to see how the kids react to the worms. I know that they still kind of freak me out.

My secret plan (well not so secret anymore) is that the kids have such a great time that they pester their parents to start their own gardens at home.

It’s all about getting people back in touch with their food source.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jnuuGOcWzv0

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Scrapping the Small Plastic Greenhouses in Brooklyn

I’ve decided to scrap the small plastic greenhouses in my Brooklyn backyard vegetable garden. The past two weeks I’ve had problems with support for them and realized that I should’ve built a larger greenhouse.

It’s not that they don’t work because they work fine on my fire escape garden. The problem is that I get to my Grandmother’s only a few days a week, so the plastic stays on them for most of the week. This is causing a lot of condensation and affecting the plants.

Some of the kales, lettuces and especially the sorrels were starting to die because of the conditions. So I took of the plastic greenhouses before I left for a 10 day trip out to Los Angeles.

It’ll be interesting to see how the plants are affected during this time. The weather hasn’t been too cold here in NYC. It’s been about 50s during the day and 40s at night.

When I get back it’s still not out of the question to build something, but we shall see when I return.

My thoughts are just letting the uncovered containers go for as long as possible. Take note of all the lessons, I learned (and will share) and start from scratch (and seeds) next season.

What do you think?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYg4hFvvxts

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Drying Out My Wet Compost Bin

It’s been about a week since I started a worm compost bin in my kitchen.

When I checked in on it, the newspaper was very damp and there weren’t many worms in sight. I dug some more and finally found some worms, but they weren’t very lively at all.

Not to point fingers (but I will), my roommate threw in some coffee grinds in there without adding additional newspaper to dry it out.

The result seems to be a worm bin that is too wet. It’s not leaking or runny and there is no smell though, which is a plus.

All didn’t seem lost. The worms seemed like they could be revived. I even saw some baby worms poking around.

I think the bin could definitely be saved by adding additional dry newspaper to dry it out. I dug down to the bottom of the bin and added a layer of newspaper, then scattered more dry bedding throughout.

After I shot the video, I also separated out the piles into two bins to allow more room for air circulation.

I’m going to be away for two weeks, doing some urban gardening workshops in LA, and hope that I return to a dry and healthy bin. If not, I’ll have to start another when I return.

Do you think the bin has a chance at being revived?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jg_Gv603y2o

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Housecleaning On My Fire Escape Garden

There were two of the hanging soda bottle planters that I took down from my fire escape garden.

The first one that I removed was because one side of the rope snapped and it was dangling by one side. So I removed it for safety reasons. I didn’t want another soda bottle falling like one did when I did my fall planting. Safety first.

The other that was removed was the bottle with the basil. It was apparent weeks ago, when I realized that basil isn’t a cold weather herb, but I was holding on to the fleeting thought that it would revive.

After the bottles were removed, I dumped them into my indoor compost bin where it will eventually make it’s way back out to the garden again.

Gotta keep the fire escape as clear and safe as possible.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eU6iz8ANK7w

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My Cauliflower Plant is Starting to Head

One of my cauliflower plants is finally starting to head. A few weeks ago, I gave my thoughts on growing cauliflower in containers.

I received varied responses as to why they weren’t heading – the weather, not enough nutrients, too many plants in one container and more.

Not sure what to do, I let the plants be and didn’t do much to mess with them. Sure enough a little over a month later, one of the plants is starting to head. I’m going to continue to keep the container as is.

It wasn’t the first time that I received a boatload of different answers to help with some my problems. The responses from everyone are much appreciated.

This is why I keep saying that you should just start your own garden. What happens in my garden may or may not happen in your garden. We each experience things differently.

What’s stop you from starting your own garden and getting that first hand experience?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmTAnWxrCk0

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Should’ve Built A Larger Greenhouse For My Backyard Vegetable Garden

Last week, I realized that there was a support problem with the small plastic greenhouses in my backyard vegetable garden. The water was gathering in the plastic causing it to fall and crush the plants.

This week the problems continue with them in Brooklyn. One of the plastic covers blew completely off and another slipped off a bit.

I think there are a few things going wrong with them. The most obvious one is that the rope is loosening up during the week, which is allowing the plastic covering to come off.

For the backyard vegetable garden, I definitely should’ve built something larger like possibly this hoop house that Andrew Odom built out of nearly all recycled materials.

This project was just another result of me being lazy and rushing through things. I definitely should’ve taken the time and built something more sturdy and well…better. Plus I’m only at my Grandmother’s 2-3 times a week, so I can’t check on it daily.

With that being said, the small plastic greenhouse on my fire escape is great. That one I’m able to tend to everyday and have a more secure rope around it.

One thing is for certain, I’m going to stop being lazy when it comes to this stuff. I hope all of you to start holding me accountable.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKijP_aGAD8

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When Do You Plant Cucumbers?

When do you plant cucumber plants? Not in July. I can tell you that much.

Now that the cold weather has come around and it’s dropped into the 40s some nights, the cucumber plant is sad looking. I’m hoping that the two small pieces of fruit on it will grow some more, but I’ll have to wait and see.

Next year, I’ll definitely get the cucumber planted much earlier in the season.

Here’s what happened this year and why I planted it so late – I killed the first one and took too long to get the next one planted. No excuse except laziness.

The second one was growing nicely. It got to be so big that I had to move it across the backyard closer to allow it to climb up the fence.

A week or so later I was able to harvest my first cucumbers.

The downfall of the plant could’ve been a month ago when the leaves started to yellow. At the time I wasn’t concerned because they were still bearing fruit and blossoming, but that’s recently changed with the weather.

There are still small pieces of fruit on the tree that I’m hoping will grow to be larger, but the important lesson is to get the damned cucumber planted earlier in the season.

When do you usually get yours planted? When do you start your seeds?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSG8KrvOoXE

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Starting A Worm Compost Bin In My Kitchen

I finally manned up and started the worm compost bin in my kitchen. It’s filled with newspaper, red worms and my food scraps.

I’m hoping that in doing this that I’ll be able to use more of my food scraps. I haven’t been able to add too many of my scraps to the aerobic compost bin that I have set up because it’s too small.

My hesitation in setting up the worm bin is putting in too much food and having the stink that I did back in the spring. I plan on taking it slow at first and see how the worms handle the food.

Do you have any horror stories in starting your worm bins?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pc5YhXauujI

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Support Probelm with my Small Plastic Greenhouses

I set up the small plastic greenhouses last week on my fire escape and backyard vegetable gardens.

When I had set them up on my fire escape, I tied some strings up at the top to support the weight of the plastic and debris that fell on it. I didn’t do the same with the ones in the backyard.

So after a few days of rain and me not being there to drain off the water, the weight of the water fell onto the plants causing them to flatten out a bit.

There is no excuse for that happening except my laziness. I drained the water off the plastic, removed the containers and had to prop the plants back up. I’m hoping that it didn’t cause too much damage.

Now I have to set up some reinforcements on the greenhouses so that they can support some weight.

I don’t think the small plastic greenhouse is a failure. It’s just still a work in progress.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M6KsfcJptqE

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What To Do After Harvesting Your Vegetables

Last month, I planted kale and lettuce in the container that I harvested my celery from. At the time, I wasn’t sure if the the kale and lettuces would grow because of the celery root.

Little did I realize that after being harvested, the celery would continue to grow. So now the containers have celery growing along with lettuce and kale.

I don’t think it’s the optimal growing situation because I already know that celery plants like to grow in their own containers.

Much like “Ebony and Ivory” they are living in perfect harmony. Ok, I wouldn’t say perfect, but they are living together.

So I learned another one of these lessons in gardening – after harvesting a plant from a container, don’t jam more plants into it. Let the original plant grow and produce some more.

It seems so obvious as I type it, but I’m so used to picking something off the produce shelf and it not growing back that I assume that’s what’s going to happen here too.

What your gardening story that you look back and say, “What was I thinking?”

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDGj8sIZ35A

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Checking in On Mariann’s Arizona Container Garden

Back in August, I shared a story with you about Mariann. She lives in Arizona and was hesitant about starting her own container garden, but did it anyways.

Now that she has over two months of experience and experimentation under her belt, she checked back in and shared her progress with me. Below is part of her email:

“If you recall when I started I planted by seeds, early girl tomatoes, cucumber, basil and oregano. Of that 1st batch all that survived was the basil and the cucumber plant. I have harvested quite a bit of basil and the cucumber plant is finally starting to flower.

I have since seeded more basil and more early girl tomatoes which you can see are both doing fabulously. I think I might need to transfer the early girl tomatoes but I am so afraid they will die if I do.

The cherry tomatoes I purchased as a plant and it was probably at least 1/2 the size if not smaller than it is now and as you can see I am seeing fruit.There are about 20 cherry tomatoes on the vines as we speak. This is a blast but i am trying to figure out a way to do this indoors as these are at my parents house as I do not have a lot of sun at my condo, (go figure no sun in AZ) and they are thriving over there but it would be nice to have them at home as well.

As we progress and harvest fruit I will take more pics.

Thanks for sharing all your info. I am truly enjoying it.”

Emails like this totally make this blog worth it. Couldn’t be happier that not only did she start her garden, but is having success and fun with it as well.

I know you can’t wait to start your garden in the spring. Am I right?