A Productive Weekend!

Saturday was a combination of activites and although it was a bit crazy, the day went fairly smoothly. The spring plant opened at 8 am with an onslaught of tomato customers. We did very well at the sale and after the morning crunch subsided, we were out of tomatoes and everything else was selling well. We sold a lot of bagged compost as well. Coinciding with the first half of the plant sale (8am-noon), we had a planting work day with 25 people helping plant over 2,000 new perennials in the Woodland Walk garden. We completed the planting and even had time to shift to some weeding. ALSO occuring was an Eagle Scout project behind our maintenance facility (see picture). The scout (Nick) had his family, fellow scouts and other volunteers there all day putting together a two-tiered shade structure for us. We'll use this structure for storing plants that don't like direct sunlight and will be protected until they can be planted.

The influence and productivity of over 100 volunteers helping with these three activities was amazing and inspiring. I was smart enough to take my camera around Saturday for the above shots but was happy to catch two new columbines peaking. These are both varieties of native columbine (Aquilegia canadensis). We love columbine in the garden and usually end up with 100s being donated every fall from nurseries that can no longer sell them (they look pretty rough around the edges a that point in the year). We have them everywhere! The yellow columbine below is actually just a yellow version of the native which is typically orange. This variety is 'Corbett' and grows 12-18". The other variety is 'Little Lanterns' which is the one foot version of the native species which is 24-30" tall. Columbine love part shade and should be in everyone's garden!