Garden from scratch with the Kilcock Men's Shed

Final session at the Kilcock Men's Shed today...I think the lads have done an amazing job - here are a few snapshots of the project and a before and after shot, it's quite a transformation!

It's all about the willow!

It's all about the willow this week - a gorgeous willow dome built by the 6th class of Rathfarnham Educate Together NS on Monday, willow fence at Ashgrove Community Garden on Tuesday and Willow archway at Kilcock Men's shed today!

New VEC Community Garden Project - IWA Clane

Herb Spiral in St.Finian's NS, May 2012

In May, we continued with our ongoing school garden programme at St. Finian's NS in Finglas. This time we  built a herb spiral in place of the old herbacious border that the school wanted removed from the front of the school. With 4th class we built a very magical spiral bed into which we planted a huge variety of herb plants, from medicinal to colourful to culinary herbs, rosemary, sage, thyme, marigolds etc.

Progress being made at Piper's Hill, April 2012

The ladies are making huge progress in the new school garden we're building for the students down at Piper's Hill School in Naas, Co. Kildare. I'm working with a parent's group to develop the garden, and it has turned out to be an all women's group, but let that not deceive you, there has been trojan work done by the ladies, during April we built the beds for and planted up the herb and fruit areas in the garden. We planted raspberries, currants, strawberries, and rhubarb to name a few!

*NEW COMMUNITY GARDEN PROJECT AT PIPER'S HILL, NAAS*

I have just been asked ot get involved with the development of a new community garden at the Piper's Hill school in Naas, CO. Kildare. the idea is to kick start a garden that will be used by the whole school, the initial plan is to work with a group of parents to get the garden going. This project will be starting in February 2012! Watch this space...

Donadea woods woodland wander

Men's Group at Donadea Woods - Tree Seed Collecting

Last week I took my men's group to Donadea to go seed collecting. We found acorns, conkers, sycamore and maple helicopters, lime seeds and beech masts. And this little fella! Any thoughts on who he is?

Summer - NFRC Family Grow Your Own Day

Family Day - Grow Your Own at NFRC

 In July, we were asked to hold a family Grow Your Own day at the Newbridge Family Resource Centre. We had a lovely day planting up window boxes with a mix of edible plants, lettuce, scallions, parsley, and herbs. We planted tomato and pumpkin plants with the kids, who painted the pots in gorgeous bright colours first. We dug up potatoes from the vegetable garden and the kids chopped and cooked them into chips, which we feasted on before the day was out. We made dream catchers to finish off and the families went off laden with plants! Lovely day all around.

Community Gardening Projects

 Community Gardening Projects

Since the beginning of September, Mairtin and I have been back working on our community garden projects in Newbridge and Allenwood. The men's group in the Newbridge Family Resource centre have this autumn started into doing FETAC Level 3 horticulture, we're keeping the vegetable patch going, planting it up for winter with onions, garlic, spelt, green manures and some spring cabbages! We're hoping to expand this autumn and get some money for a polytunnel and expand the vegetable patch, and maybe even get an orchard and woodland in, fingers crossed! Over in Allenwood, Mairtin is doing the locally devised module, developed by the lads in KEEP in Kerry, it's called 'Local Organic Food', so they're sprouting seeds, storing vegetables and putting together a local cook book, I'm continuing on with a new FETAC Level 3 group, who are lovely, and we're working away doing a bit of seedsaving, harvesting and crops for the winter!