This summer has been the summer of opportunity.
On July first I took off for my trip to Europe with my Girl Scout troop after almost 18 months of nonstop fund raising. we toured London, Paris and Lucerne, Switzerland in a whirl wind of ten days. It was an amazing experience in which we stayed in two of the four Girl Scout international houses (Pax Lodge in England and Our Chalet in Switzerland). Traveling oversees has given me a broader view of cultures.
I have also been blessed with a scholarship from the Rondout Valley Growers Association and the opportunity to complete an internship(Paid!!) with them this summer. Mark Davenport also won a scholarship from RVGA and is also completing the internship this summer. you will probably read some posts from Mark.I first met Susan Perrin, the director of RVGA when I interviewed her as part of my WISE( wise, individualized,senior experience) project which was based around a tremendous amount of research on the topics of eating locally, food production and how this effects the environment. Ultimatly I chose to create a dinner made entirely from local foods grown on farms in Ulster County, NY as well as a presentation of my research although my initial idea was to create a farm school program as well as an educational garden at Rondout Valley High School.
there are a couple of projects we will be working on for our internship including:
Collecting, sorting and creating an inventory of donated "seconds" produce from Davenport's Farm, Gill's Farm and Saunderskill's Farm. The donated produce is being distributed to local food pantries to help out the growing number of people these facilities service.
Helping out at the Marble town Elementary School Garden and working with the group "From the Ground Up" who started the garden.
Creating a new garden at Snyder's Estate in Rosendale. We will also be leaning about the history of the Rosendale Cement Factory and the farm that was on the estate.
we are also growing kale for a dinner at the Governor's mansion in celebration of his new outdoor kitchen and garden. we will also be visiting the govenor's garden in Albany.
All of these project are what make the internship exiting and I can't wait to help out with all the great projects while learning tons!
The strawberries have finally been transplanted!!! -hundreds and hundreds of them. Me and Mark were really starting to hate them but in celebration of finishing we took leftover plants and planted them in the woods next to the nature trail. We didn't plant them that well but there were tons of runners and they will probably be taking over by next year. I wish I had a before and after picture of the strawberries.
We planted some of the strawberries in hanging baskets in attempt to outsmart the chipmunks which are at fault for devouring all of the strawberries. Mark is going to biuld something to hang them with. other than that we just worked on making the garden look beautiful for the RVGA farm tour that is happening saturday and ending with a tea party at the MES garden. Me and Mark are going to be working at a few different farms saturday with susan Perrin, the Director of the growers association.
Overall I have been enjoying working at the MES garden. Above are some photos taken by Nicci, one of the gardeners we have been working with. in the picture to the left me and Mark are Picking Kale that is going to be used for a dinner at the governor's mansion that has to do with the new garden they have there. To the right are some of the Marbletown Elementary summer school kids who came out to help us transplant strawberries.
In an up coming post I hope to talk about the Snyder Estate and the historical Society- I am just waiting on some pictures. And you should hopefully be hering from Mark soon also.
enjoy!
Carrie
