Here we are at August. I sometimes feel that August is the month, that I really try to ignore. I don't even ignore January the way I try to ignore August. In January or February there are seed catalogs, good books, and fires in the fireplace and warm cozy jackets to enjoy. There is the promise of spring. But, poor August, is right in front of September, who brings with it a promise break in 100+ degree weather. The garden is tired. August is just 31 days of days, not even a single holiday.
This morning, I went outside, secretly hoping for the smell of fall, but it was still the smell of August. The sky was still dark, but I could see that it was still going to be the sunrise of again a summer day. In September the sunrise is golden and nothing feels as good as days when I can open the windows and leave off the air conditioner. The sounds of children laughing as they come home from school or riding bikes and birds and the sound of lawn mowers. So I will try to enjoy each day, instead of racing in my mind to fall.
We, Ron and I got to take a drive to Shafter, Ca. Emilie our daughter manages the garden out there for Grow Academy Shafter. It used to be a private school but now is public. I wish all schools were like this one.
The school is built around the garden. When the kids walk out of the class rooms, there is the garden.
Gardening is one of the electives and it is the kids garden for class. They plant seeds, they clean and weed. They get to have cooking classes with the food they grow and harvest.
I just loved the little tool shed, where all of the tools are stored. The school is K thru 8. The Kindergartners get to use the little rakes.
The kitchen was just lovely. The list of foods the kids are going to cook this year was really impressive. Sushi, home made tortillas, lasagna. Things that they can harvest too. They were making tomato sauce this week, from the tomatoes out of the garden.
Emilie told us about a class day, when the little kids brought blankets and rested under the grapevines and a little boy laid down on his blanket and fell asleep. When it was time for his next class he got his teacher to let him come back with his blanket and we went to sleep again under the grapevine. You just never know what home life might be and Emilie is always conscious of that. She has children, that the teachers just don't know how to handle, and they send them to her and she gives them work to do, and they are much happier than sitting in class. So they plant seeds, they harvest produce, the pull weeds. Or they just sit with the chickens.
I know that when my Mom died and I was in the sixth grade, if I had had a place to go to like a garden I would have done so much better. So I thought about that as I walked around the garden and I was so thankful that there is a place like this. The city schools here in Bakersfield are looking to implement gardens in their schools. Which I think would be so much better for kids than labels and medications.
I loved the green house. Emilie said, that when it was raining so much that she would bring the kids out to plant seeds and they would be out of the rain, and they would be all so busy as the rain hit on the roof and it was such a nice place to have school.
You can't really tell by my picture how purple this purple kale was, I picked a leaf and it wasn't even bitter nor had it bolted. I might have to grow some of it. It had a nice taste. Out here we have such a problem with squash beetles we have a horrible time ever getting pumpkins or squash, unless you spray. This is a complete organic garden so they don't spray with pesticides but focus on pollinators and keeping the plants healthy
My son, and his family who have The Hollar Homestead on You Tube found that by planting Luffa Sponges around his squash plants it kept the beetles away. So Emilie did that. I was looking at her pumpkins and not a single bug or eggs. Then she said, this last year because of so much rain they had a plague of frogs. The frogs ate every single parent,and larvae. Now the Luffa is growing strong and still no bugs.
I heard someone I was listening to last week, remark that man is always trying to get back to the Garden of Eden. I knew that when we had our garden in our other house, I spent so much time trying to do that. I am so proud that Emilie and her team have accomplished just that. She says the hardest workers are the little kids K-3rd. They will do everything, plant, weed and pull out the old stuff so they can replant. They will gather eggs and harvest and pick fruit. There is something to that phrase, "Time began in the garden."
Its true and my happy place is still fooling around in my garden.
One of the things I didn't get a picture was of a Gazebo out in the middle of the garden with vines growing all around it with benches in a circle and the kids for class get to sit out under there while they get taught. I just thought how wonderful it is that the kids get to be outside. Its a garden for children. So they can touch and taste and learn how they can feed themselves by what they grow. I just love that.
Okay, I will stop now, its something that I am passionate about can you tell? I always thought the best place for a child to grow up was a place that he or she could walk down a dirt road, with no place to go but to be able to see things growing or maybe having a garden of their own. To live outdoors and climb a tree. To listen to the trees as the wind blew and felt the seasons change by watching the tree sleep in the winter, wake up in the spring, bloom and bear fruit in the summer and get ready for rest in the fall.
I have had two adventures this summer with Emilie. She does really live an Extraordinary life.
Thank you for reading along if you have made it to here. I have had this blog going around in my head since I got back yesterday afternoon.
~Kim~
“There shall be an eternal summer in the grateful heart.”
-- Celia Thaxter
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