November Garden Workday

First Saturday Workday

Our first ever, First Saturday Workday** was a great success! The perfect opportunity to weed our plots and get ready for the fall planting season while chatting with others. Some gardeners were ready to transplant seedlings and start seeds. With our first summer crop behind us, we were all optimistic of what the fall may bring.

Holly helping weed one of our free plots.

If you have a chance, check out Clarissa's plot. The rosemary is flourishing.

Can't wait to see what Paula will plant in her fall garden. 

Teaching the next generation all about gardening. Love it!

**We plan on having an informal workday every first Saturday of the month. A chance for us to get together to garden, help others garden, and chat with other gardeners. We need your help to give this event a fun and catchy title! Please email ideas to nasjrbcommunitygarden@gmail.com.

Summer Highlights

As our first planting season is winding down, lets take a moment to congratulate ourselves. We started a community garden from scratch! We were provided a fence and a piece of land. Through fundraising and garden dues, we were able to purchase concrete blocks, soil, water barrel, garden shed, and community tools. With the hard work and diligence of our garden members, we transformed the land into a working garden with raised garden beds and a compost as well as a citrus area and flower garden. Congratulations NAS JRB Community Garden members on this HUGE accomplishment!

The following pictures are highlights from our first growing season. All pictures are courtesy of Michele Irizarry.

All Coming Together

With the addition of a new shed, compost stalls, and donated plants, our Community Garden is really coming together.

Instead of an unorganized area where we kept our community tools and supplies, we now have a shed.  It really helps the Community Garden look neat and tidy.

After attending compost workshops and gathering ideas from fellow gardeners, the COMPOST TEAM and Community Garden members designed this three stall compost system.
The compost in one stall is almost ready to be added to our plots.
Our plants are going to love the black gold.

The easy to read signs describe exactly what can and cannot be added to the compost. 

We are grateful for the donations of flowering plants to the Community Garden. 

Coming Soon! Special blog posts featuring our Community Garden Members and their fabulous gardens.

Time to Celebrate

Thanks to the persistence and patience of our President, we have running water on site. A couple of days ago, a member noticed workers digging near our Community Garden. She asked what they were doing. And to her surprise, they told her the Community Garden was getting a water spigot. For all of us, this was a welcomed surprise. Now, we don't have to ask neighbors if we can walk through their backyard to hook up a hose, drag the hose across the street, and fill up the water barrel. Then, fill up a watering can multiple times to water our gardens. The water barrel served its purpose, and helped us get our gardens started. But now we're living in luxury with running water on site. Thank you again, Rebecca, for making it happen.

Oh, the suspense.

The spigot works!

We're in business.

The joy of gardening with running water and a watering wand.

Time for a celebration! We popped open a couple of bottles of Martinelli's and enjoyed  tasty bakery treats.

Getting ready for the toast.

Creating Our Compost

Composting doesn't look pretty in the beginning, but the end result is golden!

How would our community garden benefit from a compost? Composting fruit and vegetable kitchen scraps and brown lawn litter like leaves is a cheap, if not free, way to create a nutrient rich amendment for our gardens. It's the organic alternative to store bought fertilizer. 
We're going to use the knowledge we gained from workshops and site visits to create a composting area in the community garden. Not only do we need your help with the lifting and building aspect. We also want to share with everyone how our compost system works, and what we need to do keep the compost working. We really hope everyone can make it this Friday.

Who: You! Our Community Garden members

What: Creating Our Compost

Location: NAS JRB Community Garden

Date: Friday, April 5th

Time: 1:00pm

Beneficial Plants and Insects

Interested in keeping those pests away from your garden organically. Try companion planting. There are certain types of plants that attract beneficial insects. These insects like to eat the "bad bugs".

Holland Angello created an easy to use spreadsheet on beneficial plants, what they repel, and tips about the plants. She also created a "good bugs" spreadsheet with names of the insects, and how they benefit your garden. You can view these spreadsheets by clicking on the highlighted names above. Thank you Holland for the wonderful resources.

MGGNO Field Trip

Who are the MGGNO, and why would we travel all the way to Uptown to meet them? They are the Master Gardeners of Greater New Orleans, and they have a wealth of knowledge about gardening. They were so polite and patient as Clarissa, Rebecca, and I asked question after question. Now we are armed with knowledge about composting and gardening in this unique climate.

Composting is easy as 1, 2, 3! 

Master Gardener, Bendy, is explaining the details about composting.
We hope to create a system similar to this one for our community garden. 

The beginning stages of the compost pile.

A compost pile in the later stages.
Creating what gardeners call, Black Gold!

In the greenhouse, getting pointers
about starting from seed or cuttings.

Beautiful and healthy seedings!

Touring the organic vegetable and flower gardens.

Field Trip

What a great opportunity for us to meet Master Gardeners! 

I hope you can make it. 

Please RSVP on the Facebook Event Page, 

so if need be we can pass on information. 

Garden Prep Party

Thank you to our garden members who helped prep the garden for spring planting. We created new raised beds, set up our compost area, and added a water source! Your help is very much appreciated.

Great work gardeners! Thank you for spending your Saturday morning in the garden.
(left to right) Rebecca, Clarissa, Kelly, Angel, Michelle, Holland (kneeling).
Missing from the photo are Paula and her son. 

Helping direct the placement of blocks for the new garden beds.

Reusing paper bags underneath the blocks makes for a great (and free) weed barrier.

Clarissa, you are one strong woman! How many wheelbarrow loads did you move?

Adding "greens" to our compost system.

WE HAVE WATER!
It's time to get serious about gardening!

Garden Work Party!

The weather looks perfect for a garden prep party this weekend; 72 degrees, party cloudy, 8 mph wind, only 10% chance of rain! (Well, that's what it looked like at the time of this post.) We encourgae everyone to join in on the fun, whether you're a member of the Community Garden or not. Please RSVP on our Facebook event page, click here for the link.

Let the Creativity Flow

True to their word, Painting With A Twist was a fun night out! You could feel the creative energy flow  from each artist as they transformed their blank canvas into a colorful, floral abstract. We also shared laughs by renaming colors (baby poop yellow), adding a little too much paint, and "accidentally" painting the "wrong" color.

The Community Garden members would like to thank each participant for attending our Painting With A Twist fundraiser. Not only did we raise desperately needed funds, but awareness about the community garden.

Blank Canvases

Getting a few pointers 

Time to mingle before the painting begins

Setting the tone with the background

Having a blast!

Carefully blending the colors

An intermission while the background dries

A thank you to the ladies who donated refreshments.
We needed the extra energy
for all the brushstrokes. 

A BIG THANK YOU to those who donated items to our raffle.
A few lucky ladies went home with wonderful prizes.

Time to add the flowers

Waiting for the final instructions

Masterpieces 

Different interpretations of the same painting. Beautiful work ladies!