Check out some of the gorgeous art of our very own Erika Friebe!

What shall we grow today...?

Today was the first day of the 2013 KidsGrow season, and what an exciting day it was!

The day started off warm and beautiful, the perfect weather for planting a new garden. We first visited the Hillhurst Sunnyside community garden, and we worked hard to prepare soil for our new plants. That meant weeding and aerating the soil so our plants' roots would have room to grow. We then got to flex our artistic muscles as we moved on to planning the garden. Everyone had a great time drawing out what our garden will look like, and what plants and animals we expect to find in there! After some snap peas and carrots to fuel all our young gardeners' hard work, we headed back to the garden to start planting. Sunflowers, beans, zucchini, radishes, peas, and beets were among the kids' favourite things to plant, and should look amazing once they start growing! A good watering and a sprinkle of compost finished our work off, and everyone started to say their goodbyes. A big thanks to all the little gardeners and parents who came out! Without you, the day would not have been possible!


During the afternoon, we had our first ever KidsGrow program at the Edible Garden in Silver Springs! After a bit of a slow start, we had lots of new friends come and help us plan and plant our garden. We learned some great lessons from the kids on how to dig a proper hole, and how to 'tickle' the roots of a plant you are moving into the garden to help gently separate the roots. An important part of the day was learning about respect for others, and that making rules for our garden helps keep everyone safe and having fun. After munching on some healthy snacks, we ended the day with a few games of 'Magic Garden', and a sharing circle to talk about what we learned.

Many thanks to everyone who came out, and to the members of the community who helped us get started and feel welcome. We could not have done it without you!

Stay tuned for next week, where we'll talk about what we have learned during our second day of KidsGrow!

Kids Grow! is Back

Building off of the success of last year, Kids Grow! is proud to announce that we will once again be running  garden events for children during the summer of 2013. Peer Helpers (student volunteers) from the Centre for Community-Engaged Learning at the University of Calgary, will facilitate weekly events to each children about gardening, food production, community building and environmental stewardship.

The Hillhurst Sunnyside Community Garden (corner of Sunnyhill Lane and 9 Ave NW) has invited us back for another year and we are excited to be returning to our lovely garden plot next to the orchard. Programming in this garden will once again run Saturdays from 10am-12pm.

Kids Grow! is excited to announce that we have also made a new partnership for the summer and will be expanding our program into another garden. We will also be facilitating workshops at the Silver Springs Community Garden (intersection of Silver Hill Road and Silver Hill Way) on Saturday afternoons from 2-4pm.

Both programs will launch on Saturday, June 8, 2013. You do not have to be a member of the garden community to attend the workshops. All events are free. Children must be accompanied by an adult at all times.

Like us on Facebook at Kids Grow Calgary to keep informed about upcoming events. We look forward to seeing you this summer.

A Harvest to Remember

With the cold frosts and wintry chills that have recently greeted Calgary, the gardening season has officially come to an end. A few last minute goods were collected to celebrate the final harvest of our Kids Grow! garden. These lovingly grown garden goodies were perfect for a delectable harvest salad.

 Harvest Salad Recipe

 Lettuce

Green Beans

Squash

Corn

White Radish

Sweet Peas

Thoroughly wash all vegetables to make sure there are no bugs in your salad! Cook up the corn and squash, chop your veggies and toss them into a bowl. We mixed up a nice honey and red wine vinaigrette to liven up the salad and finished it off with grated radish as a garnish. The salad was full of earthy colours and a variety of flavors; the sweet corn and peas, the hearty lettuce and the pungent kick of the radish. All ingredients came from our Kids Grow! plot; all locally grown, fresh and free of any harsh chemicals.

Our garden brought us a lot of joy this year but the Kids Grow! program would not have been such an amazing experience without the opportunity or the great amount of community support we received. First of all, we must thank the Centre for Community Engaged Learning at the University of Calgary for continuing to successfully foster the connection between the academic and community and for giving us the opportunity to be part of such a life-changing project. A huge thank you goes to the Hillhurst/Sunnyside Community for being incredibly open and supportive of our initiative. We also need to thank our guest speakers and workshop experts who generously donated their time to make our events enlightening learning experiences for the children and parents. And lastly, thank you to everyone who attended our events and anyone who supported us along the way. It has been a fantastic summer, a harvest to remember with no doubt.

Even though the gardening programming for the summer has come to an end, Kids Grow! would like to share some exciting news with you. We have been invited to speak at Food Secure Canada's national assembly this November. At this exciting national conference entitled Powering Up! Food for the Future, we will share our story and hopefully spark interest in others to realize the potential children's gardens can have in our society.

 Check out their website

August 18: Scrapbook day

Making Memories !

Today, we spent a while weeding the garden as the radish plants were twisted all together. We also found many slugs which we took out and moved out of the garden. The kids loved getting their hands dirty and pulling all the slimy slugs out!

Then, we handed out sheets of coloured paper and had the kids decorate it as they wished. We also stuck a small bubble to each page that asked a question like, "What is your favourite vegetable?". The kids loved decorating the papers with stickers, paint, glitter, and feathers so much so that many of them wanted to do another one. We will be putting each of these papers into a scrapbook for Kids Grow! to remember this summer in the garden.

We ended the sunny morning off with a few games of farmer and the animals. Thanks for coming out everyone and make sure to join us for the harvest picnic in September!

Scavenger Hunt Extravaganza!

We're into August and our garden is a jungle! The daikon is towering like skyscrapers, and the beans are spiralling into the clouds. The vision of our garden inspires the kids and they sit down to illustrate what they see. How different it looks from the beginning of June, when all that could be seen was the brown soil of the plot. Now green overwhelms the scene, while yellow squash flowers explode joyful blooms. The red and orange vibrance of the nasturtiums contrast wildly with the soft green blades of corn leaves. Everywhere is spotted with colour and joy. We feel calm and awe in the miracle of our garden.

The radishes are in abundance so we try to pull some of them up. Their roots smell sharp and pungent. Some of us crunch on the crisp snap peas, or steal some sweet raspberries from our neighbours stand.
Today we are going to have a really fun scavenger hunt. Each of us receives a card and marker to check off what we find. All sorts of nature things are on our list. We must find a bird, a butterfly, and two ripe strawberries, an orange flower, and a lonely pear tree. We also have to look for a Ken doll doing the splits, a pink pig with blue earrings, and a bunck of puzzle pieces.

The kids scatter with excitement and search all over the orchard to find the hidden things. Some kids work togther, and others go it alone. Sometimes they ask each other for help, utilizing the power of the collective and mutual assistance. Eventually everything is found on our search cards and now we are immersed in solving the puzzle. Both kids and adults work together, sharing in the enjoyment of accomplishing our goal.

A fresh, juicy watermelon is on the menu for snack time. The kids gobble their pieces up and start into making recipe cards for our scrap book. This is a crazy project in which the kids can learn about the types of things needed for a recipe: Ingredient lists, and directions as well as all different types of foods. We need to put measurments in our recipes as well, and of course a great title. The kids create all kinds of recipes some very practical, and others wild and silly.

Our little garden community is getting stronger and stronger. We love spending Saturday mornings together!

Healthy Food

Learning  about healthy food doesn't have to get complicated. When we look at food as a compiltaion of nutrition facts and figures it can start to boggle the brain, but when we keep it simple, things start to make sense.

Today at the garden we discovered the bounty of yummy and nutritious foods growing right here in the city. We found strawberries, saskatoons and raspberries as well as snap peas and even some edible flowers. From our findings we made paper plate faces that were both fun and tasty! There were angry faces, and lion faces, and beautiful gaia princess faces. Making a fun activity out of eating was a great way to encourage the kids to experiment with tasting new foods.

After gobbling up our faces, we listened to a story about the different food groups. We discovered that grains such as wheat, rice, and quinoa give us energy so that we can play endurance demanding games like tag or hockey. The bright colours of fruits and vegetables provide us with antioxidants that protect our bodies from getting sick. Dairy foods like milk provide calcium for our bones to grow, and protein foods like beans, meat, and fish help build our muscles so that we can be strong. Healthy fats are also really important for our brains and organs, so eating foods like nuts and seeds can make us smart!

We enjoyed eating in our garden today, and learning about the foods we put in our bodies.  We all agreed that healthy food can be tasty, fun to eat, as well as good for us.