The making of a garden

The girls and I spent some time last week, yesterday and today, in partner with another family, putting in a children's garden at our church.  We broke sod on Wednesday and finished the bed on Saturday.  It was a lot of digging, discussing, chatting, chasing the kids and getting very dirty.  In other words, my favourite way to spend time.  The bed is very big, situated right beside the rain barrel and against a very sunny wall of the church.

This morning, during the main church service, all the two-to-seven year olds planted petunias, peas, onions, lettuce, spinach, sunflowers and nasturtium.  And then they watered it and played tag and dug some more and were dirty and very happy.  

I was equally happy to see how much fun they all had, how happy the parents all were that we started this project that will go on for many, many years.  I love that the children have something to call their own on the church grounds and that they can traipse through it and pick things and water things when they feel the desire.  I love that they will soon have a pumpkin patch in another area that they can harvest in the fall.  In short, I love that our church has embraced this and encourages it and that we are using the land there to grow food and foster a love of working in the dirt.

The rest of the weekend was also spent outside with our kids, most notably at a little park not far from our house, Pushman Park.  The city has put some new playground equipment in this year more suitable for Hope's age.  The kids had a blast.  It now sort of dwarfs our closest park for the fun factor.  I imagine we'll be biking over there more often now.  

Given that the rest of the week is going to be rainy, I'm glad we were able to dig and play so much the last few days.  I hope you did too!