Reading the library's copy of Roots Shoots Buckets and Boots: Activities To Do in the Garden by Sharon Lovejoy, got me through the month of March as winter kept its grip on us. I soon ordered my own copy and began scheming of gardening projects to do with the young gardeners at this year's garden program. I decided the theme would be Flower Power and Lovejoy had a great design and directions for a sunflower house in her book. Staff member, Paul, and I planted a variety of sunflower seeds in peat pots with a group of eager children in mid-April. By the middle of May the sunflowers were ready to go outside. Many of them were unruly, their stems twisting and bending every which way. Paul and I had a lot of untangling to do but got the plants in the ground in the outline of a rectangle, leaving space for a door. Twelve foot high giant mammoth plants are beside three foot teddy bear plants and some sizes in between. I planted morning glories to twirl up the sunflowers and hopefully will coax them across the tops of plants to form a roof. The Sunflower House is open for visitors now and has a stump table and stump stools. Come over and read a book, have a cool drink, play a game of cards. Watch for humming birds, lady bugs, and butterflies that may all visit the living house. You can write down what you see in the log book by the wildlife garden. There are a couple of magnifying glasses with the book so you can take a closer look at things. Check out the Toad Abode which Gillian Rigney made out of a flower pot. Toads can take shelter there and keep cool. Gillian and I put in the Butterfly Garden with asters, mountain mint, milkweed, black-eyed susan vine and a puddling plate. The topsy- turvy planter was put together by five year olds who didn't think it would work, but did! A nectar feeder hangs on the planter hook and is visited often by hummers. Young gardeners and their families come and garden Wednesdays at 3:30. Drop by and see what we're doing.
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| Sunflower House June 8th |
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| Sunflower House June 18th |
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| Croc Crossing |
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| Topsy Turvy Planter |
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| Sunflower House - Come Take a Seat |
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| Butterfly Garden |
