Our Edible Garden

As well as working on our vegie patch at home we have been busy establishing one at school. We had a working bee a few weeks ago to clear out the few plants in the courtyard garden and get it ready for planting. The folks at the community garden came to give us some pointers and steer us in the right direction as we are aiming for an edible garden with a bit of permaculture thrown in.

So far everything that we've planted has grown and is looking healthy so the kids are very happy. We have some compost bins and a worm farm and have set up a garden club for the interested kids to do a bit in their lunch break. It's early days yet but the aim is to get it up and running and have the kids (and teachers) using it for lessons and making it part of their everyday school life. It's amazing how keen the littlest kids are to have a go and plant some seedlings, they have been so excited. Oldest fishes prep class have been growing things from seed as part of their science lessons and then planting them into the garden .

It's made the fishes very keen to get into the vegie patch at home and plant some seeds, so we have done a bit of maintenance work on it and have things starting to flower now. they have planted seeds, planted seedlings and watched them all grow. It's become part of their day now to go down to the patch in the afternoon and check on the plants and give them a water.

The pictures above are of the awesome mural that the students did on the wall to brighten the garden up. The grade sixes and seven designed the mural with one of our clever, artistic parents at school and then painted it on Friday. All the kids got to come out of class and do a part of it so the whole school was involved. The older kids partnered up with the smallest kids and gave them some help which was lovely to see. The older grades are really wonderful with the littlies and were so good with them.

The kids that were part of the design team stayed for the duration and saw it finished and they were so proud of themselves.

Does your local school have an edible garden or some great artwork?

Little fishes new bed.

It was decided that littlest fish needed a big girl bed. She was just growing too big for her toddler size bed and as handy as it was given her room is rather small, it was time to go. So off to the bed shops we went! And then we came home.... All the beds that we saw were made from "timber veneer" or "laminated stuff" or other rather blaghhh materials. All we wanted was a wooden bed painted white. But they don't seem to exist in our town. So then we decided to search the op shops to see if we could find an old bed to fix up and, lo and behold we found one! At the second place we went to there was an old timber bed that looked to be pretty sturdy and apart from being old and a bit grotty it was just what we were looking for. And it cost all of ten dollars! Not $399 or even $250 just ten. dollars. Sold!

We brought it home and gave it a clean then sanded it and after an undercoat it was looking better already. Both the fishes had to help with the painting and after three coats of white semi gloss paint it was ready for action. Mr fish took the metal springs off the base and replaced them with timber slats for a firmer base and we gave the frame a coat of silver spray paint to brighten it up.

So now little fish has a lovely new bed that can be re-painted or touched up should anything get scratched or 'decorated'.

And after we took out the change table that was hogging the space in one corner there was quite a bit of room, a lot more than we thought. I'm not sure why it didn't get the boot earlier, I'll put it down to slackness.

She insisted on wearing her singlet on the outside of her pj's, she's just that kind of gal!