Hi again! It’s Adrienne. You may remember me from my healthy snacking post back in May.
Not only do I like to attempt to take good care of myself but I also enjoy helping others. I strive to regularly volunteer and this past weekend I had the opportunity to do so over at Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden.
In the back of the park hidden from the regular visitors, they have almost an acre of gardens that produce vegetables for FeedMore’s Community Kitchen. This year they hope to produce 10,000 pounds of crop. Last year they only missed the mark by about 80 pounds!
The garden depends heavily on volunteers to help with all tasks from tilling the land to harvesting at the end of the season. I enjoy gardening at my own house so I thought it’d be fun to help out.
We spent the morning moving through various tasks.
The first thing we did was check squash plants for squash bug eggs. It’s a tedious but necessary task that helps prevent the bugs from killing the plants. To get rid of the eggs, we snapped off any leaves that held the tiny, copper-colored eggs. Pretty easy to do and rewarding.
We planted tomatoes next. Many plants are grown from seed on site but others are often donated like the ones we dealt with. We planted about 30 plants in a very short amount of time. It’s amazing how much you can achieve with a good amount of volunteers!
After planting another 20 or so tomato plants, our last task was to do some weeding in the wheelchair accessible beds. Yet another task that seemed to go quickly. Did I mention that I love weeding? Not normal. 🙂
I really enjoyed the morning – talking to the other volunteers and learning a little from the head gardener all while helping the community. I hope to visit again soon. It’ll be fun to see the results of our work!
If you’re interested in joining me one Saturday, please visit Hands On Greater Richmond to sign up. I usually click on the ‘Project Calendar’ at the right-hand side of the page to find opportunities. On the calendar you’ll see that you can volunteer at Lewis Ginter every Saturday and Monday for the next couple months.
You don’t need any experience to come help! Just wear some clothes that you wouldn’t mind getting dirty, closed toe shoes and bring gardening gloves if you have them. Water and sunscreen are good to have too!
Feel free to email me at hippieitch [at] gmail [dot] com if you have any questions or comments!
Adrienne @ HippieItch
This is such a cool way to get involved in Richmond! I definitely want to do this, and it would be fun to get a group of bloggers together for it!!
Sounds like a wonderful day with great people for a good cause…here’s hoping they reach that 10,000 lbs.!
We’re so glad you enjoyed volunteering and are connecting via our site! The Garden is a sight to see, isn’t it!?
Gardening is definitely my own activity since it actually aids me to enjoy and loosen up. I like to grow plants and flowers both indoors and also outside the house. My own preferred plants are usually tropical decorative plants as well as fruit bearing plants.
I’ll immediately snatch your rss as I can’t in finding your email
subscription link or newsletter service. Do you’ve any? Please allow me understand in order that I may subscribe. Thanks.