THANK YOU TO THE JUNIOR LEAGUE OF BOISE!

Garfield Elementary greatly appreciates the Jr. League of Boise for volunteering 2 hours to help us get our garden boxes ready for planting!  We moved 5.5 yards of compost/soil into our beds.  They also pulled the remaining weeds in the beds!  THANK YOU!  Our students will soon be planting the seeds in the beds and also starting seeds in their classrooms.

Friday, April 11

Beautiful Day in the Garden....Thank you to Mrs. Wolfkiel's class and Ms. Harsin's class for spending some time this beautiful day weeding our Garden Boxes in preparation for the soil/compost soon to be added.

Monday, April 11th

THANK YOU TO THE GARDEN COMMITTEE FOR MEETING AND PLANNING FOR THE FUTURE

Updates/Meeting Minutes:

1. Materials/Seeds Needed:    Carol put together a nice Survey Monkey questionnaire for all teachers at Garfield to tell us about their plans and seed/equipment needs. Debbie emailed the survey to all teachers yesterday. We asked folks to respond by next Wed, April 16th. 
2. St Joe's service project:   Requests from the Survey Monkey doc as well as ideas brainstormed at the meeting will be passed on to the teachers/students at St. Joe's who want to do a service project for Garfield. I may get this submitted to them sooner than the 16th depending on their time crunch. Joni, can you send me the name and email or phone for the teacher at St. Joe's that I need to coordinate with? I will call her and find out more details and get them what they need as soon as possible.
3. Water:   I asked Debbie about some of our water questions and here is the info:                "It will be watered as needed by our custodian staff.  It is just a simple turn on and off valve. (next to the GATE portable)  We can also have a hose available on the spigot at the main building (front corner).  Erin (from BUGS) said it would be great.  She and I met with them.  I really don't think we need to meet again.  As we proceed in the summer---we can see if it needs to be adjusted.  It can easily be adjusted." If committee members have questions about the water, please email or talk to Debbie. It sounds like we just let the custodian staff know once things are planted in the beds and that we would like the watering to begin. If anyone is doing direct-saw seeds early in the spring (like next week) then you may want to consider hand-watering the seeds until they sprout with watering cans as the big sprayer currently out by the beds  may drown seeds with too much water. It will be a good test anyway... We will need to get some watering cans as soon as possible....
4. Storage:   We discussed the need for a medium-sized storage shed for garden tools, etc. that could be located near the garden. I believe Alyssa was going to look into this (using Firefighter guys to construct if we supply the materials...) as well as Tara (as a potential Eagle Scouts project where they would do the fundraising, get materials and build it). Lisa Conde also has Eagle Scout connections (though her husband) and could possibly help connect us to the right person at that organization.  In the meantime, we wanted to ask Debbie if we can use the storage shed by the back cafeteria door. How do we get access to that? And is there any room in it for short term?
5. Other Equipment:   Carol is going to follow-up with Home Depot and possibly Thriftway about getting some 5 gallon buckets and some simple gardening tools donated - spades, weeders, for each bucket and 1-2 bigger tools (shovel, hoe, etc.)
6. Volunteer Calendar:   Sarah is going to be the coordinator of the Summer Garden Volunteer Calendar. Debbie put together some sample calenders that we can use. Please send volunteer names, info, leads to Sarah as you come by them.. Consider signing up for a week yourself.  Remember, those who weed and water that week get to take home the produce that week as well.  When it gets closer, we will need a write up of What To Do and Who to Contact in Case of a Problem for all the volunteers. Maybe it could be laminated and posted on a wall near the garden.....
7. Donations:   Sarah donated an awesome Composting Bin that she won at the BUGS training and it is not in the storage shed near the basketball courts.  This will come in handy in the future! 
8. Bed Work/Other Donations:   After the meeting, some of us went out and took a look at the beds - the sun and the watering situation - and found the beds full of weeds! A few teachers said they could maybe come out with the classes this week to weed before the beds get filled. Good luck!!  The beds get filled with donated compost (North End Organics) this Saturday (the 12th) by the Junior League volunteers.  I will bring thank you cards for all of us to sign for Junior League and North End Organics to the next meeting.
9. Next Meeting:   We will have another meeting in a week or two to see how we are all progressing on our various tasks. Invite others who are interested. We will try to get a few more parents there and perhaps a community member or two!
10. What else?   That's all I can think of for now. Let me know if you have any questions or suggestions. I welcome your feedback! :)