Windmill wonders

 

 Whitebait Season & Wild Weather...you can't have one with out the other!

 

It was time to embrace our October weather and make windmills!

 Take an ice cream container lid and carefully cut the edge off, then cut in toward the centre from each corner...

 Here in our Garden we like to use power tools...so we drilled a hole in each corner and one in the centre of our lids...

 ..we then drilled a hole through the centres of 2 milk bottle tops...

 We learnt that threading and folding in corners with a nail was tricky business!

 Some felt the need to just practice their hammering...

...hammer your ice cream lid, all weather windmill onto the fence & let the wind do the rest of the work!

Well done Garden Warriors, these have certainly added some colour to our fence posts!

Two weeks left...

 

Only this week and next remain of the Tui School Garden Challenge...and we still have a LOT to get under way!

 

Have a look at our video clip to see what our Garden Warriors discovered in their Garden after their 2 week end of term break...

Term 3 Terminated

 

Last year when we started our school garden, part of our vision was for the garden to eventually become self sustaining.

 

With Term 3 coming to an abrupt thundery end, with a seemingly endless lightening show to herald springs arrival, it was very pleasing to look around our garden at the end of Term 3 and see...

• self seeded parsley, chives, coriander and chamomile utilising any space they fell, or blew to
• Calendula and Statice staging a come back after a winter cut back
• Rainbow beet shining on with no curtain call in sight after 12 months centre stage
• Vivacious violas engulfing our bottle spiral
• Ravishing raspberries running out over our compost corner
• Curvaceous celery continuing to hold the fort, providing dipping material for many a parsley pesto yet
• Rambunctious rhubarb making a spring come back

It seems nature was helping us out after all!

Farewell "Mr Mix it"

 

Friday was Ethan's last day with us in the School Garden.

 

Affectionately known as "Mr Mix It' to all our Friendly Garden Gnomes, Ethan joined the Garden Warrior's not long after the Christchurch earthquake when all schools in the Buller Region had a temporary increase in their roles of up to 20 kids.

 Ethan was always one of the first Garden Warrior's to turn up to the lunch time Garden Sessions, and promptly immerse himself in any task that involved multiple containers, water and mixing...

It was a privilege having you on the Team Ethan, we are really going to miss your cheerful and engaged presence in our School Garden.

 

All our Garden Warrior's wish you and your Family well on your return to Christchurch.

We hope you enjoy your garden "mixing tools", take care!

 

PS: keep an eye on your mail box as we will make you up your own Special "Mr Mix It" Garden Book soon...

 

Another 15 Garden Start up Packs

 

 Home Grown/eat Fresh Family Garden Challenge

 

NO sooner had our friendly Garden Gnomes delivered the first 15 "Garden Start up" packs on the last day of term...that they found another bunch of orders at the school office!

 

This was GREAT news, 30 Families now registered for the Challenge!

 Another emergency call was made to Awapuni Nurseries, and further fertiliser packs were bagged...

 Three of our most loyal (and understanding) Garden Warriors swung into action (some more than others!) to make the delivers happen over the holidays...

About 20 "Salad Enhancers" were also potted up ready to sell at the Labour Day Market to the visiting Motor Home Jamboree...they should find chives, parsley, celery and rainbow beet a tasty addition to their mobile homes!

ON the subject of Mobile Homes...check out this leggy local (with a leg span greater than 10cm) who made a temporary home in one of our Awapuni seedling packs over night! He crawled onto an unsuspecting Garden Warriors hand... who promptly flicked him off with a mere "Argh!"

 

He is so BIG you can actually see all his multiple eyes & is our Kiwi member of the Tarantula Family!

Home Grown Eat Fresh:Family Garden Challenge

 

 Home Grown Eat Fresh Family Garden Challenge

 

This year our Garden Warriors have launched a "Home Grown Eat Fresh" Family Garden Challenge to their School Community. For $5 each registered Family receives a "Garden Start UP Pack" of seedlings that includes the following:

• 2 flat leaf parsley seedlings
• 2 chive seedlings
• 1 yellow cocktail tomato
• 1 celery seedling
• 1 zucchini seedling
• 4 rainbow silver beet
• 4 different lettuce seedlings

This should provide herbs for flavouring summer salads and frittatas. More than enough zucchini to grate into afore mentioned frittatas and hide in moist chocolate cakes. Silver beet will be able to find its way into curries, feta filo pies, and lasagnes, while the assorted lettuces will make wonderful "imagination salads" for several weeks!

 Our lovely Garden Gnomes were very busy yesterday afternoon bundling up all these wonderful Awapuni Nursery seedlings ready to go out to our Garden Challenge Families'.

 

Unfortunately we couldn't get our own seed sowing efforts to grow quite big enough to have ready to go out ready for the school Holidays...so it was a last minute order from Henri and his Team at Awapuni Nurseries!

 Some of our Tui prize winnings got mixed up and bagged up with instructions ready to go out with the seedling start up packs...

 Fourteen "Garden Start up" packs ready to be delivered, complete with fertilisers & instruction sheet!

That's a take up of our Garden Challenge by almost 10% of our school Families...can't wait until judging time at the end of next month to see how they grow!

 Our School Garden Gomes (parent helpers), were also busy this week organising our Garden Warrior Stand for Wednesday nights "Northern Lights," end of term  Show case. We sold a few more raffle tickets, and took a few more Garden Challenge registrations.

There was no shortage of willing helpers to circulate our pesto and dip... nibbles platter.

Ali once again volunteered his services at front of house, after thorough quality control was first undertaken!

 

This time we also handed out pesto and dip recipe cards in response to overwhelming feed back last term!

Tuesday's Tasting Table

 So just what have our Garden Warrior's been building in the garden this term?

 A Tasting Table!

 

Some of our Garden Warriors have been very busy in the garden wielding power tools, saws and crow bars! They removed a weather board partition from one of the changing sheds and up-cycled it with the addition of some legs...to a table!

 

Add some of our prize winning Tui product, a bit of fertiliser and you have the biggest seed raising, tasting table ever...

 Smooth some Tui Vegetable mix over 3 bags (that's a whopping 75 litres!) of Tui compost mix...

 Mix some blood and bone and vegetable fertiliser into the top layer...

 ...then choose your seeds!

 

We placed apple cucumber seeds in each corner to hang down, peas round the edges for Niagara Pea pod falls, then cress, mustard, radishes, baby spinach, sweet basil, and other tasty nibbly treats in patterns...

Bird netting draped over re-purposed fire surrounds... are a must if we are going to be first with the nibbling rather than the birds!

Hopefully when we get back into the garden next term our tasting table will be a mat of green munchiness!

 

Another good team effort Garden Warriors