Planting Seeds for our Future

This year was one of many 'firsts' for CORE/El Centro's Garden and Nutrition program, including our first annual Kids Camp, held August 5-9th.  The 40-hour camp covered a number of topics through a variety of activities - from videos and coloring pages, to hands on soap making and composting.  Our 18 participants learned a lot, made new friendships and all left eager to return next year.

I'm including just a sampling of photos from the camp - more to come via video.  Enjoy!

Getting their hands dirty with Kompost Kids

Campers work to cut out pictures for their MyPlate project.

Finding pictures of the 5 food groups: Dairy, fruits, vegetables, grains, and protein.

All Finished! 

Painting the inside of their pizza box with black paint to absorb the sun's heat

Campers fill their solar oven pizza boxes with paper for insulation.

Solar oven pizza melting in the sun

A group shot after a presentation by Charlie, from Beepods. 

Decorating seed pots in preparation for planting

Planting Beds are Taking Shape

I visited the Clock Shadow building today for some inspiration as I continue to put together the farm plan and start to set-up operation systems for our first year.  The rooftop - a long with our indoor office spaces - is really starting to take shape.  We are exactly FOUR weeks from moving in and it's exciting to see the walls going up!

You can see in the pictures, we will have four long planting beds, as well as one L-shaped bed surrounding the deck/movement and meditation space.  In addition to the beds you see here, which are built into the rooftop, we also have the recycled Earthbox planters that I highlighted last August. This will give us a total of over 3,000 sq feet for vegetable, herb, and (in future years) fruit production!!!  Let the planning begin!