Building Day at Edgewood! SUCCESS!!!

Where the magic began at 8:30 am on April 14th, 2012

What a whirlwind!  It seems just like yesterday Cassie and I were planning our budget for the Edgewood Community Garden and suddenly, it was building day on Saturday!

I am truly humbled by the amount of people who came out to help us!  Big, BIG thanks to all of you!  Cassie's mother flew out from Denver, Colorado to lend a hand, Cathy, from Academy of Hope (a school in the Edgewood Neighborhood) recruited a bunch of her AmeriCorps friends to lend a hand and any one who might have passed by while walking through the park, curious to find out what was going on, we gave them a shovel and put them to work!

Cassie and I thought it would take at least all day to complete the building, but we finished with so much time to spare in the day!  We started at about 8:30 am and we were done by 1:15 pm!  Go team work!

We hit a snag early on in the day, but what project isn't with its obstacles?!  Cassie was told that Recycled Green, a company in Maryland, would deliver a 50/50 soil, compost, along with number 57 drainage rocks to place at the base of our garden beds, on top of the weed guard.  Doh!  What are we to do?  Many people said we don't need the rocks and can definitely do without, but I wasn't convinced.

Cassie and I headed to headed to the Rhode Island Home Depot, a 5 minute drive from the garden, to investigate the rock situation.  While we were there, we met the store manager, Carl, who Cassie has been in touch with about securing a donation.  Carl originally said he would donate a $50 gift card towards our garden, but he ended up giving us $75!  Woot!  Also, he said Home Depot would be interested in doing a community service day at the garden!  Double Woot!  Woot!  We purchased 15 bags of stones (why 15?  I don't know why....would it be smarter if we had purchased 16, since we have 4 beds, so 4 bags per bed?!), piled them into Frank's SUV, then headed back to the garden.  Crisis averted!  Yes!

With the amount of people we had, 4 wheelbarrows and many shovels, we got into a good groove in moving the soil/compost mixture that was on the opposite side of the park, to the site of the four 8x4 raised garden beds.  On top of being grateful for the amount of people who came out on Saturday, I'm grateful that there were people present who felt comfortable enough in resolving any obstacles together.

Now, we need to make sure that we have our water spigot installed this week!  We're waiting on some people and paperwork, but we feel confident and we will be AOK!

I'm looking forward to seeing you at the garden on Earth Day, Sunday, April 22nd at 8 am!

The finished beds are ready to be planted!

Edgewood Community Garden Photos!