Guerilla Sunflowers...

My sister Sara noticed and took me to this guerilla garden (pictured above). It is a garden spot in the park by the tennis courts on North Parkside Drive. The bed is planted with ever greens - someone added sunflower seeds and now there are dozens of sunny flowers growing there.

The above sunflower garden is in a back alley a few blocks from my place...

Cameron and Spencer!

Today was great for several reasons - one being Cameron and Spencer dropped by the Boulevarden (I am sorry Cameron if I have been calling you Campbell - for some reason that was the name I had in my head but I see looking at the note I made when you stopped by before I wrote Cameron...oops). I have talked about Cameron and Spencer before - they are neighbourhood boys you visit the garden all most daily I learned today. They have been watching the tomatoes and waiting for them to be perfect...which would have been today - they came and they were gone. Sad. But we (actually they) found some cherry tomatoes, strawberries and a zucchini to take with them. Spencer found a 'funny tiny one' pictured below


Cameron had dropped off a Shamrock for me...the 'seed' is a corm I think he calls it - he says 'it looks like a pineapple'...which it does - see the picture below of him holding the 'corm'. We decided to dig it up and I would plant it inside.


In another post I will add in the instructions Cameron has for the care and SHARING of a Shamrock plant. Cameron was very precise...while Cameron was giving me instructions and tips, Spencer was crouched down eating the flat leave parsley...seriously cute! I gave Cameron a cutting off my Jade plant.

One of the times they were here in the last bit, Cameron, Spencer and Rhonda their mom were by to take some of the plant volunteers in the garden (some Phlox, Chinese Lanterns, and Black Eyed Susans), but they didn't transplant so well so we are going to have a go again. Fall is better for transplanting those anyway.

Spencer wanted a sunflower - he chose one that was 10' tall...it was a beaut I have to say, but I told him that it would not transplant well at this time of year - he is going to take a smaller one in the upper garden another time.

Rhonda came by after a busy day of work and musings of missing their first day of school because she had to work...she was working at a school and she said it was a busy busy zoo. As I scurried off in a hurry to go get Paul, Rhonda asked the kids if they wanted a ride home or wanted to walk - they opted to walk. As I drove off I watched them...as they walked down the street they looked at around, said hi to a woman who walks a one legged dog in our neighbourhood, and generally just seemed to enjoy themselves. These two precocious boys are lovely...they want to be part of a community - they foster their community - they are community.

Thanks Cameron and Spencer for making my day.

My heart is strawberries...

Perhaps this is all a bit dramatic...

...but

I have been wanting to complain to you
or maybe it is just a desire
to share my thoughts with you
on this summer
so far
...or as it ends.

I found this summer
different
from the last
the first
...and it has left me slightly melancholy.

...and I can't figure out why...this summer has been a great year for Guerilla Gardening in Lethbridge, and I have been a catalyst and part of many of the efforts. We did the Coyote Garden, seed bombs, the Boulevarden, small weeding/actions here and there...I traveled and visited with women around the Lethbridge area who offered and shared with me their stories and plants. Several of the press have been to the garden again this year. When we had a gg table at the Amnesty concert at the beginning of this month person after person come up to me to applaud my efforts, and to tell me that my actions have inspired them to make small/important guerilla efforts of their own (I say this not out of ego...but people have been really positive, encouraging and impassioned about guerilla gardening this summer...word has gotten out and people are excited about it - and I do know I have played a part in that).

which brings me to the dramatic part...

I feel a bit detached

from the garden this year. I think part of it is because I am disappointed that it has not done as well...plant wise. As I have said before the tomatoes were more than disappointing, the Basil died...and Zucchini barely grew! Those three items were what people mostly harvested from the garden.We had no plums this year...last year kids on bikes and would stop, grab a plum and ride off with a wave. We have not had much to share. Which has made me sad...as that was the point, right? or at least one of the points...I loved/thrived on the gift aspect of the Boulevarden as much if not more than the community part of it, well I guess the gift part is community,but...I'm sorry, I am talking in elipses...

Don't get me wrong...the garden looks wonderful...all of the flowers and perennial herbs have grown very well, and people have still been by to see and share the garden (and its tiny bounty...smile)...

But I worry me as my detachment has caused me to not be in the garden...or out front as often, I am not interacting with the community as often. Last summer I did a performance a day in the garden. This year when I go out I feel self conscious and have only done half a dozen or so. Although as I peer through my screened window at people in the Boulevarden (which I sometimes do) I feel I am in performance...I feel like another...I feel sneaky, closed, open..I have begun to wonder if they see me and have started to think of me as the strange woman who spies on them...if they feel self conscious...

So I don't know what
to do with this...
is just indulgent?
moaning and g(r)ow(n)ing?
I don't know...
but my heart is very still

very committed
to guerilla/community/performance gardening
...but it feels a bit like a small strawberry presently.

But then perhaps this is all just a bit dramatic...

Reunions and a Hen

My friend Kelly has returned after a summer of traveling and art residences...lucky very talented girl. It is nice to have her home for a bit. We caught up a bit and then took a walk to another friend to see his hen (I will leave his name off so that no fowl business will occur). As we were walking we passed one of my favourite front yards on 7th Ave...it is done with drought tolerant plants and looks lovely. They have also planted their boulevard. Their neighbour has also done some great landscaping. The boulevard is pictured above the front garden below.

As we were walking we met Hannah another friend who joined us on our journey. I have not seen her since June so it was lovely to visit - even if it was brief - her smile lasts in memory for a long time fortunately.

The hen was lovely and one of the hen's keepers said that her daughter comes out and visits with the hen every day - and when she has a bad day she says, "I am going out to see the hen"..."it calms her" she said. I love the idea of fresh eggs, chickens in my yard...but I will stick to veggies...for now.

City TV Interview

A couple weeks ago I did an interview with Norm LeBus from CityTv Calgary. I first met Norm last year when the Lethbridge Herald did a piece on the Boulevarden - at that point Norm was first back here and was taking photographs. He called me this summer looking to do a story this summer.

Here is the link
http://www.citytv.com/calgary/yourcity_60596.aspx

For Your City Norm LeBus

Backyard gardens are about feeding your soul through tilling soil as well as feeding your family. But in Lethbridge one woman's moved her plants front and centre, on civic property.

It's an intersection of art, acts of kindness and community activism. As a community garden planted on civic property without permission, it's also known as guerilla gardening.

Edwards' guerilla garden's now in its second summer, with drought-tolerant flowers, herbs, tomatoes, squashes growing. From the very first day it was evident the seeds Edwards was planting were the right ones

"Right from the first day we had soil coming in to create the garden the neighbourhood come out to help. So immediately, a community started," she recalls.
Edwards say the majority of feedback she gets is positive. But she's aware she's bending the rules
But in this instance city hall seems to be behind citizens acting unilaterally to essentially vandalize city property.

"We would insist that people do not cut down trees or do something of that nature, but as long as someone is willing to make the commitment to guerilla gardening, fine," mayor Bob Tarleck says.

So guerilla gardening is political on several levels. It's about the environmental cost of shipping groceries from foreign countries... and growing community through growing vegetables. http://www.citytv.com/calgary/yourcity_60596.aspx

Seed Bombing at Amnesty International Human Rights Concert 08-08-08

On August 8, 2008 the Lethbridge Amnesty International Friendship Circle had a concert for Human Rights in Galt Gardens. The date was 20 years from the day 8-8-88 when university students in Burma took to the streets in the name of democracy (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7012158.stm).

Also at the event were tables that had been invited to set up during the concert - most of the tables were groups that were connected to activism, community and diversity (my personal favourite was a native woman selling Bannock mix...served the same as the natives were given it for rations...in a cloth sac, so subversive.

Lethbridge Guerilla Gardeners were there, we had a table. Shawna, Liam (who has the undefeated title of world's youngest guerilla gardener at 9mo...he has been gardening since he was a baby : D), Paul and myself. We created and gave out seed bombs (description below). The seed bombs were a hit. People of all ages were really into them - which was super cool.

I had many people who came up and let me know that they had executed/attempted their own guerilla gardens...I met so many people so I can't remember names - but one of my that I thought was particularly lovely was a man that said he had gathered some kids from his neighbour hood and they had weeded and cleared out a section of an empty lot...a lot that has been empty I think as long as I lived in Lethbridge...and just as they got their spot ready for planting new owners came, cleared the lot and fenced it! They were so disappointed - I told him that is part of it though - and that the actions he led them to are life altering for them - it will have impact.

It was affirming to meet so many people that were conscious of guerilla gardening, the Boulevarden, urban farming, and the importance of sharing our garden bounties.

Seed bombing, also known as "Seed Grenades" is a technique of introducing vegetation to arid soils or otherwise inhospitable terrains. A seed bomb is a compressed clod of soil containing live vegetation that may be thrown or dropped onto a terrain to be modified. The term "seed grenade" was first used by Liz Christy in 1973 when she started the "Green Guerillas". The first seed grenades were made from balloons filled with local wildflower seeds, water and fertilizer. The seed grenades were tossed over fences onto empty lots in New York City in order to make the neighborhoods look better. It was the start of the Guerrilla Gardening movement.

Cameron, Spencer and Rhonda...

A couple of weeks ago I had the pleasure of meeting some neighbours who are regular visitors of the garden. Cameron, the fellow in the background of the above picture and beside his Mom, Rhonda in the below picture, is an avid gardener. He could tell me the names of almost all the plants in the garden. He also cultivates and propagates indoor plants and calls them my their Latin names for the most part...wowzers.


They were a lovely family, we had a great visit and Cameron and I are going to swap some plants. He has already brought over a Shamrock which he planted in the upper garden - unfortunately I was not here at the time...but I hope I will be able to visit with them again before the summer is over. Below are Rhonda, Cameron and by the bird bath Spencer.