Annual Spring Clean!

Hello wonderful community. 

Green Lake Garden Club will be hosting our annual Spring Clean Up at the school on May 21st from 10am – 2pm. 

Rain or shine – come out and help us clean up the beds and get the school grounds ready for Summer.  Bring your own tools or use the ones we will have.

See you in the dirt!

Northwest Flower Garden Show!

OK gardeners.  Time to come out of hibernation.  The annual Northwest Flower Garden Show is this February 23-27.  Get more information or buy tickets at:
www.gardenshow.com

Early bird ticket prices if you buy before Feb. 22

Gratefully Yours

A heartfelt thanks goes out to all our community friends and partners who came to Olallie Garden’s Grand Opening.  We had food (complete with olallie berry jam), wonderful music by Steve Hansen, Anglela Blemker and ‘the band’ as well as Paul Vegors of the Northwest Junior Bagpipe Band. We presented garden storybooks to the Green Lake Elementary School Library because gardens and books just go together, toured our secret fairy and gnome dwellings, and searched for natural treasures during the kid scavenger hunt.  We all had a great time but mostly we were grateful (for good weather and) that we live in a community that loves their gardens!

But wait there’s more….. Stay with us as we continue our enhancements that include, more benches and a chess table, interesting signage and an artistic entryway into this special place we know as Olallie Garden.

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Phase II Is Complete! Come Celebrate!!

Finally, we can spend time together in the garden – no work required.  Phase II is complete and Olallie Garden is having a Grand Opening.  Please join us Saturday, October 2, 2010 10:30am to 12:00pm.

We have great  things planned: food, coffee and juice, music by Steve Hansen and Angela Blemker beginning at 10:30am to about 11:00; garden tours; a

Outdoor classroom paver

brief thank you presentation, a surprise gift to the library and more music with the Northwest Youth Bagpipe Band.   Come and join us for some fun and learn about our future plans! OlallieGardeninvite

Coffee and donuts and mulch oh my!

Bring your work gloves and join us for some gardening fun. Stop by anytime on Sunday, Sep 26 between 9am and 4pm,  see all the work we’ve done so far and lend a hand.  Oh and we’ll have coffee and donuts too.

Location:    Green Lake Elementary Olallie Garden

Where:        2400 N. 65th Seattle WA 98103

When:         Sunday Sep 26 –  9am to 4pm

Bring:          Gloves, water bottle, shovels (If U can)

If you have questions please email us at:

olalliegles@gmail.com

Unfurling our Shades of Green

The Olallie Garden Steering Committee decided early on that one of our goals during the garden creation process was to be as green as possible.  It was a challenge and an opportunity for sure.  We had to be creative and  maximize our resources.  We looked at everything; the  structures and elements in the garden, the way we did the work and what to do with the bits of stuff that accumulates as you progress.  So here we are many months later and Katherine reminded me the other day of all the ways in which we walked our talk and unfurled our shades of green:

1. Reclaimed  door to the tool shed from ReStore.

2. Green roof on tool shed creates oxygen.

3. Collecting water in the rain barrel.

4. Siding on the tool shed was reclaimed wood from Earthwise.

5. Transplanted shrubs instead of getting rid of them.

6. Composted yard waste with Cedar Grove.

7. Recycled wood scraps.

8. Re-used bench forms so we did not have to make a lot.

9. Used less cement in Rammed Earth Benches, than in traditional concrete.

10. The path is made from compacted gravel, not concrete.

11. Consolidated delivery loads and times.

12. Reused the straw from last years Charlotte’s Web school production.

13. Used grass seed for NW conditions.

14. Pruned plants instead of removing.

15. Planted grass seed in the fall to make use of the rainy season.

16. Recycled our cans and bottles from the work parties.

17. Made paths to go around existing plants and hills.

18. Used soil excavated from the paths and put it into the planting beds.

19. Designed the garden to minimize mowing/weed wacking.

20. Removed Rosa rugosa, exotic possibly invasive plant.

21. Re-positioned existing boulders.

22. Used re-claimed slate from ReStore as a message board on the demonstration shed building.

23. Placed all excess gravel under the ramp.

24. Place excess rocks under the demonstration tool shed.

25. Wood stakes used for the path were donated to the ReStore.

26. Recruited volunteers locally and lots of volunteers came on bikes or walked to the site.

27. Encouraged volunteers to bring their own water bottles.

28. Used “bad” gravel as fill.

29. Used leftover grout for colorant in the rammed earth benches.

30. Most of our communications were via the internet.

31. Used excavated soil to fill in existing ruts.

32. Used tools from volunteers, instead of buying new tools.

33. Group lunches, were purchased locally which saved car gas.

34. We used hand/human powered tampers for the REB instead of gas powered tools.

Our green roof adding oxygen to the environment. What's your roof doing?

35. Re-donated reclaimed lumber or or traded excess lumber for another material.

36. GLSA tended and harvested veggies and watered critical plants, instead of adult volunteers driving to school to take care of plants and also drive to foodbank.

37. Some  materials came from a local hardware store, instead of driving farther for cheaper products.

Just Before the Morning Light – a poem

Fairies in our garden

Just before the morning light

Dewdrop fairies take their flight

Sprinkling earth with dewdrop honey

Dawn a day that’s bright and sunny.

In a winter, cold and gray, they sprinkle frost jewels at our feet

Covering all the winding way

With twinkling gems to greet.

Snowflake fairies high above

Sprinkle earth with their gift of love

Gently scattering as their duty

Lightly falling flakes of beauty.

-Author Unknown

Path to completion

We’ve come so far but we need to finish our larger projects before the kids come back to school. Join us for a community building garden project. We’re  focused on finishing the path, making it wheelchair friendly, and on the outdoor classroom for all the kids.
Saturday and Sunday – September 4 and September 5 we are hoping to have more volunteers to help us shovel in the gravel for our new garden path and complete our outdoor classroom. Come by 9:30 to 12:00, 1pm to 4pm or anywhwere in between. All help is welcome and appreciated. Please bring a water bottle to minimize trash and a shovel and work gloves (if you can) and be prepared to get dirty.

P is for Progress

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Our demonstration green roof shed – the beginning

Our outdoor classroom benches made of rammed earth

Add mold and fill with rammed earth, color, and lots of man power

Bert removing a bench mold to reveal the finished product

Completed building made with donated and salvaged materials

Our volunteers hard at work

Phase two, no shed or benches – just making holes

Mixing up the medium to fill the holes and start to make the benches

Carl Berg our volunteer from Viking Craftsman donating his time

Green roof filled in and ready for planting

We’d like to say that actions speak louder than words and pictures speak even louder.  We are so fortunate that our great volunteers and community business partners have spent their time and resources to help Olallie Garden.  We’re not done, but we’ve made tremendous progress.  We wanted to share some pictures  of the great work done to create function and beauty within this garden space.  In coming posts, we’ll tell some individual stories and give kudos where kudos is due.  For now, look how far we’ve come!!

Work continues at Olallie!

The Green Lake Garden Club will be out again this Saturday and Sunday August 28^th and 29^th finishing out new gravel path.

Thanks to all the hard work by Chris Vegors and his team of volunteers we have Phase I – Excavation complete.  We’ll have gravel delivered this week and we need lots of help with shovels moving it into the path.  And if you ever wanted to know what it is like to run a plate compactor this is your chance as we will have two!

So if you are in town and able, stop by anytime between 9am and 4pm and lend a hand.  Every bit helps towards finishing this worthwhile project.

Location:    Green Lake Elementary Olallie Garden

Where:        2400 N. 65th Seattle WA 98103

When:         Sat and Sunday Aug 28 and 29 –  9am to 4pm

Bring:          Gloves, water bottle, shovels (If U can)

Why:           For our kids, our community and our environment (and we’re a really fun group)

If you have questions please email us at:

olalliegles@gmail.com