We've Got Benches

Notice anything different about this picture?

Take another look.

Look closely...

That's right! These girls in our After 4 gang are all sitting down. That's something new for our garden. Because up to now, we've never really had anything to sit on.

But thanks to the good people at the Wardman Court Condominium Association, we now have five new park benches.

The association, located just up the hill from us at 13th and Clifton Streets NW here in the District of Columbia, recently donated the benches to Children's Studio School so that visitors to the garden can have a place to sit and relax.

People like to eat lunch in the garden or contemplate the beautiful flowers and herbs. They should have a place to sit and enjoy our space.

Our good friend Darren, who also helped build the garden, lives at the Wardman Court. He heard that the condominium association was looking for a new home for these benches and thought of us. Darren also helped disassemble the benches and transport them to Children's Studio School.

The benches are a cool green color--just like most of our plants--attached to black-colored iron legs. The legs are actually very long because they are designed to be sunk into the ground or into concrete. The legs have to be shortened so that people can sit in the benches. Baba Jose and Mama Elizabeth are working with a metal grinder to cut the legs down to the correct height.

Four of the benches will be installed around our central herb planter, where Mama Elizabeth and the After 4 gang are now assembling a solar-powered water fountain (we can't wait to see that). The fifth bench will be placed in the playground area where it will make a huge difference for our artist/teachers, who up to now have had to find folding chairs in order to sit while they are supervising children on the playground.

These benches are making a huge difference in the garden and on the playground. Thank you, Wardman Court Condominium Association, for thinking of us and making such a great donation!

Garden in Bloom

One of my favorite displays in the garden right now are the clusters of Sweet William and dianthus blooming next to the silvery lamb's ears. We have multicolored flowers of pink and crimson and almost purple, and the small flowers look so perky next to the fuzzy, floppy lamb's ears.

Also the roses are putting on a big show right now. We have one rose climbing against the wall that has a profusion of pink blossoms. Two roses set on either side of the entrance to the garden from the sidewalk have big blooms of creamy peach.

The rock cress, with the tiny little sky-blue blossoms, are only now beginning to fade after a rioutous early Spring blooming. Many of the daisies look like they are getting ready to pop. And you can just see the beginnings of flower buds on the Black-eyed Susans and the cone flowers.

Lately we have been planting lots of different kinds of lettuces because they do so well in the garden and we can make salad for the whole school. We've also been planting a number of flowers, including the marigolds whose seeds we saved from last year, and Shasta daisy, asters, cosmos, zinnias and nasturtiums.

Next week we hope to plant several different kinds of sunflowers. But we have to put more soil in our planter boxes first.

And here's a surprise. We received a note from our friends at the Garden Club of Annapolis. They sent us a very kind donation. So we went right out and bought two winterberry trees, a male and a female, and ordered some clematis vines that will help cover the chain link fence around our garden. We also want to order some small fruit trees, such as peach and plum.

Thank you Garden Club of Annapolis!

This is a picture of our friend Helen holding our even newer friend, Hazel. They came to the garden to help us plant seeds. Wasn't that fun Hazel?

Please come again soon...

Anacostia Haikus!

Recently the girls in After 4 have been learning how to write haikus. Here are a few inspired by their Anacostia boat tour.

Fish have cancer there.
When sun shines in the river
the water is blue.

-Christina

"Pollution"
River in D.C.
It is really polluted
And it has sewage.

and

"Bird"
Dashes to river
just like a big rocket ship
Flying high in sky.

-Princess

Students write about the Anacostia trip

The After 4 gang wrote about their experience going to the Anacostia. Here are some excerpts from those writings combined.

"We went to the Anacostia River. We got there by vans, trucks, and cars, and we rode on a little boat. Mr. Josh's company name was Earth Conservation Center-- the ECC. Mr. Josh was a boat rider/captain. We learned about sewers and ducks and birds and flowers and fish. He told us that if you litter and it starts raining, it will come out at the Anacostia River. Then, we saw a bird flying with a fish; it was very odd."
--Princess

"I've never been on an exciting boat ride. Josh said we shouldn't litter, because then the earth won't be healthy. I learned that a park is better for a river than buildings. The best thing for the edges of a river are wetlands and miles of trees, especially the Weeping Willow. Then, we have a healthy river.

The Indians discovered the river first. They called it the "Country Trading Center." The one thing I noticed was everywhere we went there was lots of sewage and Captain Josh said, if you litter on the ground, the trash will go to the river. "
--Devinity

"Captain Josh told us about littering, then Nia started chanting, "No more littering!" Captain Josh said maybe you should save your energy and say it to the buildings. We all said it loud to the people on the bridges and in cars."
--Aiyana, Princess, Quennie, Devinity

No More Litter!

The After 4 gang has been learning about our precious water resources and some of the issues we need to think about to protect the Chesapeake Bay watershed.

Part of that watershed is the Anacostia River right here in Washington, D.C. This river is only 8.4 miles long, running from Bladensburg, MD, to the Potomac River.

The Anacostia is mistreated in many ways. For instance, long stretches of the river have been stripped of all the trees, which help filter water before it enters the river and also help stop erosion along the river banks.

Even worse, the Anacostia is badly polluted. Many species of fish live in the river. But an estimated 60 percent of all the catfish suffer from some form of cancer.

People simply dump their trash into the Anacostia. Storm drains from the District of Columbia empty into the river. And when it rains heavily, much of the city's sewage system overflows and spills into the river as well.

That's right: When we get a heavy rain, your toilets dump right into the Anacostia. Hard to believe, but true.

Yesterday the After 4 gang took a boat ride with our captain, Josh, of the Earth Conservation Corps. They have an office in an old building on the river in Southeast Washington near the new baseball stadium. The building used to contain pumps that sent water from the Anacostia to make steam heat in the U.S. Capitol building.

Josh takes people on tours of the Anacostia almost every day. There is still wildlife on the river. He showed us osprey nests. We also saw cormerants and seagulls and a great blue heron.

We also saw some Canada geese. But Josh says the geese are a problem: They eat important wetland plants. Wetland plants along the river's shoreline act as a filter, remover harmful pollutants from the river. We need more wetland areas, but they have to be fenced to keep the Canada geese out.

Imagine a time when the area around the Anacostia River was inhabited only by native Americans. There were no buildings or cars, only lots of trees everywhere along the river and wildlife. The natives, or Necostans, considered the river their own special market, because it supplied so much of their food.

Now, people give the river hardly a thought. They also dump their automobile tires into the Anacostia. Josh said the Conservation Corps at one point cleaned up a small portion of the river and collected more than 400 automobile tires. Also, everywhere you look trash is floating on the river, mostly soda bottles and plastic packaging.

This past weekend, the Conservation Corps filled 320 bags with trash from Kingman Island near RFK Stadium. But when we passed the island yesterday, the trash was back. Lots of trash.

The reason for so much trash is that people litter everywhere. And the litter gets washed down the storm drains and into the Anacostia. So the After 4 gang began to chant: No more litter! No more litter!

The chant grew louder and louder. It went on and on.

We hope you will take up the chant. Tell all your parents and all your friends. Help the Anacostia and our Chesapeake Bay watershed.

No more litter!

Boat Trip on the Anacostia River

Recently in class we've been focused on learning about photosynthesis and vascular plant systems. These images show a papier mache tree the gang made. The leaves are made from their handprints, and if you look closely, you can see that built onto the side are papier mache layers that fold out, labeled: Outer Bark, Phloem, Cambium, and Xylum.

The class got so excited about their knowledge of how trees use light energy to make glucose, that they expressed a great interest in having a play on the subject. In this image, the kids are cutting out different lengths of light waves as costumes. There was much fuss over who would play the sun, so in addition to that role, we designated girls to play different lightwaves that penetrate our atmosphere, and thus a tree's leaves. Shown here are three little smiling rays!

Things Are Blooming

Our garden is in its second year now and clearly some of the plants that we started last year from seeds are very happy. What a great thing to see them coming back so vigorously and in such good health.

At left are rock cress in full bloom. They make perky little purplish flowers in a great profusion. We planted the rock cress to surround our new crape myrtle trees in large, concrete planters situated in the corners near the entrance to the garden. I remember last summer when the sun was so hot and the garden was driest it wasn't clear at all that the rock cress would survive. There were just small clumps of it here and there, hiding from the blistering sun it seemed. But this spring they've come back in full force and we are really glad.

Last year we had good success with our strawberry plants. Every morning, the kids would come to school excited and asking if they could pick the latest strawberry they'd found on the verge of ripeness. We harvested quite a few.

These plants bear moderately size berries in the spring only. Some other strawberries bear fruit all through the summer. Our farmer friend Mike Klein, who owns and operated a food subscription service from his truck farm in Prince George's County, allowed us to dig these plants from between his strawberry rows. Strawberries like to spread by sending out "ruuners" that then make new roots. Earlier this year we divided quite a few of the plants--enough to start another crop of strawberries in one of other big containers in our garden.

Yesterday the After 4 gang took a walk around the garden and the whole school property to try and identify the things that are growing. We found blossoms on our pussy will and lots of lush new leaves on the butterfly bush, or buddlea. The witch hazel that bloomed so beautifully in March also is sprouting leaves, so we know it is healthy. We have lots and lots of thyme and parsley and bronze fennel. Also a salad herb called salad burnett that tastes like cucumber.

Over in the flower boxes, the black-eyed Susan plants are big and bush. The pinks are starting to bloom and it looks like we have many purple coneflower plants that we thought had died during the winter. The crape myrtles also look a little dead, but now they have leaf buds all over.

On the other side of the school building is one of our favorite trees around. It's an old red bud that is just now covered with tiny purplish blossoms. Did you know that you can eat the blossoms of the red bud tree?

We've Got Steam!

We try to make sure our Mantis composter gets at least a couple of turns every day. This helps the bacteria inside breathe. In the morning I check to see what's happening with our compost and guess what? Yesterday it was steaming!

I didn't have my compost thermometer with me, so I couldn't check the temperature. But steam is a very good sign. It indicates that the bacteria are happy and are eating away, making heat in the process. I placed my hand over the compost and it was plenty warm. This means our work is paying off.

We are trying to pay greater attention to our compost this year, making sure we have enough carbonaceous or brown material along with our nitrogenous or green ingredients. Nitrogen gives our microscopic decomposers quick fuel, while the carbon supplies a real meal. These ingredients need to be kept in balance, along with the right amount of water and oxygen.

During our recent garden cleanup, we made sure to cut all the garden debris into small pieces before placing it in the composter. Also, Mama Jenny has started bringing bags of old produce from the food co-op where she works. That needs to be sorted through and cut into pieces as well. Ideally, the old leaves from last fall that we've stored also should be shredded before going into the composte. All this work to break things into smaller pieces helps the decomposers do their job. And Baba Oron has started collecting coffee grounds from our local Starbucks. Coffee grounds add nitrogen to our compost.

Now we just have to keep turning and checking and watering until we have compost we can use in our garden. I'm guessing it won't be more than a month or two.

We're in Garden Rant!

The story of how our garden got started--how we built this garden from scratch on an asphalt lot next to our school--appears today in the Garden Rant blog. Garden Rant is read by editors, designers and gardeners here and across the Atlantic in Great Britain. Check it out at http://www.gardenrant.com/my_weblog/2007/03/studio.html