Holiday Cheer!!!!!!

Happy holidays to everyone!

In celebration for the short wait until winter break, the garden club planted Poinsettias for all 17 first graders to take home as a Winter Holiday gift for their parents. They re-planted the plants into little pots, and wrote a little message to their parents. Everyone enjoyed the activity, and the first graders were happy to take part in the fun! Happy Holidays, and have a Happy New Year!!!
   -Joanie

First Grade Gardeners' Observations of Their Plant!

Ahbai - I saw that it is much more green, long and it is mint!

Hanna - It was green! I saw mint. It was short and flat.

Noah - It is pretty long and some lemons are not ripe.




Mariela - It smelled good and tasted good and minty.

Madeline - It grew! It grew 2 more centimeters.

These are quote from the first grade, saying their favorite part of garden club.

"I really like the rosemary and the strawberry I ate" -Jae (1st grader)

"I'm looking forward to...watching plants grow"-Ahbai (1st grader)

"I like smelling the mint"- Hanna (1st grader)

"I like planting the mint" -Madeline (1st grader)

10/22/10 Edible plant project with PHS first grade

First graders came to the garden to choose an edible plant to learn about. The sixth and seventh graders taught them how to measure the size of the newly sprouted plants. It was fun seeing them trying to use the meter sticks. Our first graders will track their plant's growth over the next month and will prepare and eat it once it is ready to harvest!

Reflections from our gardeners!

So... One week Todd told us we were having our annual garden party for the adults. This year he had planned something very special. He arranged for a professional chef named Su to help us choose and cook special dishes for the party! She came in and met with us one Friday, and brought in a bunch of cookbooks and food magazines to look at and chose from. After looking at them for a while, we chose some dishes that used winter vegetables and fruits. The following Friday, we met with Sue in the school kitchen. We took about 2 and a half hours to finish the dishes. We had SO much fun cutting, baking, stewing and stirring... I had a great time working with Sue and my friends. At the end of our cooking session, we presented a gift certificate to a spa to Sue for a gift. I'm just upset I didn't get to eat some of the food.


~Katrien (The awesome one)

To start off with cooking with Su was.....AN AMAZING EXPERIENCE! Working with her was a joy. She taught how to use so many different many tools and how to make our food come out perfect. It was so much fun and I hope we will get to work with her again. Last Friday we worked with different kinds of food mostly Winter fruits and vegetables. We cooked for 4 hours straight. Everyone had a job to do at all times and we never had time to even breathe. Even though we were dirty and sweaty at the end it was a great learning experience! After that we cleaned the dishes and gave Su a certificate to a spa and she was so happy. It just isn't fun that we didn't get to eat all of our hard work.

- Ashley [The awesomelicouslylicous one!:)]


We had an awesome time cooking with our guest cook Su. we picked out amazing things to eat for the garden adult party. unfortunately, I was busy, so I couldn't be a server at the party, or go to the work day for leftovers due to the SSAT's. it was fun to cook with a professional, and my favorite dish we made was the leek and onion soup. It was to die for. The garden club did a majority of the cooking, and the cooking consists of cutting, blending, baking, and much much more! I'm happy that garden club had this privilege to do something like this, and I hope that we will do more cooking in the future. I had a lot of fun even though I didn't get to eat any of the food, except for being able to taste test the soup. Blog ya later!

-Joanie (the photographer, and blogger)

A Full Week for PHS Garden Club

First Graders Working Friday at Lunch

Garden Workday!

Chef's at Work Preping for Party

It was a rich week for PHS gardeners. Our commitment to working with the first grade continued to grow this week. Or team of first grade gardeners were chaperoned by James as they took out plants that had gone to seed. They amended the soil and planted Yerba Buena, rosemary and mint. Su-Wun Harris returned to PHS to teach us how to prepare the food for our garden party. Su brought all sorts of cool tools for us to work with. We loved using her super sharp chef’s knives! We prepared leek soup, quiche, chicken sattay and strawberry shortcakes. The food turned out wonderfully. It was an amazing process! We are so thankful to Su-Wun Harris for sharing her time and experience. What a wonderful gift! That night parents, staff and garden supporters gathered to enjoy the foods the garden club prepared and to dance to live square dance music. A lot of fun and laughter was the order of the evening. Saturday morning students and parents gathered in the garden for our garden workday. Students worked hard removing plants that had gone to seed, amended soil and planted lettuce, chard, cabbage, spinach, lavender and lemon trees. We made remarkable progress in a short time and then shared a feast of bagels and cheese.

Party and Menu Planning + Potato Planting

PHS gardeners had the pleasure of welcoming Su Wun Harris to the roof garden. Su is a chef and teaches culinary arts at the San Francisco Art Institute. Su shared her expertise as she guided our planning of Friday's party menu. Su had us envision what we want our party to be, showing us how to stay within our budget. At the same time tying the menu to foods we hope to grow in our garden this season. It was fun going through all the beautiful cook books and foodie magazine Su brought along to inspire our work. We are very excited about the menu we've planned and can hardly wait to work with Su in the kitchen! Yes, Su will return to PHS next Friday to manage us in the kitchen as we prepare all the foods for that evening's festivities!

Another bright note, PHS first graders worked up a sweat as they continued planting potato in our very own potato towers. They love working with the seventh graders and getting their hands dirty in our garden. It is amazing what they can accomplish in 25 minutes!

The First Garden Project of 2010 - 2011

09/24/10 The garden club welcomed the PHS first graders up to the deck garden. We broke up into 2 teams to build and plant potato towers. It was a beautiful day to work in the  garden with friends! We learned that first graders are very hard workers who love to get their hands in the dirt!

A Time to Plan, Amend and Plant! Meetings Start 09/17/10 at 1:20 PM

The 2010-2011 gardening school year begins! The garden club invites all interested middle school students to participate in planning, designing, building and tending the deck garden. Students need to plan on attending the weekly club meeting on the science deck 1:20-1:55 PM each Friday. Students leave JK Park at 1:15 and return to PHS with an adult in charge.

Topsy Turvy Tomato Plantings

The garden club crew guided PHS first graders through the process of planting tomatoes in topsy turvy planters. First graders are really hard working individuals! They love to get their hands in the dirt as well as try new things.

We all munched down on garlic roasted potatoes that had been grown in our garden. Pretty cool!

Eating Strawberries!

The horse poop was really popular this week. Pretending to eat it and skipping around dropped blobs of it made for lots of laughter.

We continued planting spinach, cabbage and chard.

Last week's plantings seem to be doing well.

The treat for working hard was eating the sweet ripe strawberries grown in our earth boxes.

Yummy!

Lunchtime Planting

PHS first graders achieved a lot in their 25 minute visit to the green roof. They amended the soil with horse manure from Horse Hill in Mill Valley. They had a ball planting peppers, tomatoes, corn, spinach, red chard and cabbage. A very productive time was had by all!

PHS First Grade Harvests Potatoes

We had a ball today! First grade did lots of garden chores. The class of 2017 stored our paint cans, took out the green bins, swept the water off the deck and released lady bugs to do away with our aphids.

They harvested the potatoes in our potato towers. We were all very excited!

Garden Club Gets Support and Company from First Grade

The PHS First Grade joined us in the edible roof garden today. We started with getting acquainted by introducing ourselves. It feels good to know names, feel seen and valued. We then went to work in three teams to plant chard, cabbage, cilantro and lettuce. We learned how to use a power drill to put drains in some planters. We finished off by watering everything. The time was a lot of fun, educational and very productive. We look forward to having more company in the garden.

Eyes to the future

Thanks to Nicholas for doing a bit of planting during a spare moment. It appears he has a natural love for gardening.

We're brainstorming ways to make the garden financially sustainable. We thought it may be cool to partner with the dance committee to raise money for garden supplies. Another idea was to have a farmers' market on Friday mornings in front of school during drop off. Families could purchase edible treats grown in our deck garden.

We are hoping to take on some leadership in organizing the up coming film showing at The Bridge Theater. The film is a documentary called "What's on Your Plate?"Grades 5 through 8 will be attending and participating in a Q&A with the film's director afterwards. Visit their website at http://www.whatsonyourplateproject.org/.

We are hoping to get students from the lower school up in our garden to learn, have fun planting and to enjoy nature.

Lot's of great things to look forward to!

Oh No... We've Got Rats

The PHS Garden Roof Club has run into its first big issue: rats. As Todd says, "It's the next plague." The rats have taken over the garden and have eaten some cabbage. Oh no! What shall we do?

Well, reader--get it? Reader? It's singular--that's where you come in. Does anybody know treatments for rats that won't harm plants? Or a way to gently get rid of them (Or bloodily, we're not too picky...)?

Thanks,

The Garden Committee

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Thank You so much!

- Garden Committee

Project Scarecrow

A Garden Needs Scarecrows!

The 8th grade got in on the the green movement through fashion and design! Teams created scarecrows and had themselves a fashion show! The stylish event was hosted by our wildly witty Celeste and celebs like Michael Jackson graced the runway!

OMG! We have veggies!

PHS Garden Club is thrilled with the progress of the winter garden! We have a cauliflower growing, cabbages, tons of chard, peas, strawberries and potatoes going strong! We brainstormed ideas for next lunchtime work meeting, but it might be nice to chill and prepare some foods taken from the garden and just eat our hard work!

We're also proud to report that the space we've created has become a wonderful place to work and learn. Before break the 6th graders did as Claude Monet did at Giverny as they painted in a garden they built themselves!

Happy New Year!