Updates and How you can be involved.

Well, things keep happening fast for us. Today, we rented a sod cutter (from Pacific Rim Equipment Rental, who gave us a great discount on what was already the lowest price in town--so please think of them if you need equipment) and cut and flipped the sod in the entire garden area. If you go out to the field or look at the pictures below, you can see that we removed the sod in the outline of the two U shaped beds. This sod was placed in the center where the taller bed will be. Essentially, we will build the sides of the bed around the sod and cover the top with about 10 inches of soil for growing. The lower beds will be about 11 inches tall. We will till them later this week, then build the beds and finally fill them with more dirt so that we can move on to the gardening part of this project. Anytime you see people working, feel free to come out and help us.

Thanks to all of the neighbors who have stopped by and introduced yourselves and shown interest in our project. We truly want this to be a beautiful addition to the neighborhood that can be enjoyed by everyone who lives nearby.  If you are interested in gardening, please come and talk to us about it. Providence Mount Saint Vincent has generously granted us permission to create a gardening space in a portion of the field. We are working to create a plan for developing the garden with room for possible future expansion West along the Charlestown fence line. We want to preserve the rest of the field (South of the current garden) as an open space for the neighborhood. Also, there is an agreement form from Providence that must be signed by anyone who wishes to garden in the field. For more info contact us at GrowCharlestown@gmail.com.

Finally, a few neighbors have asked us to create a "Wish List" of things that are needed for the garden. We will be doing this and publishing it here soon. In the meantime, any help you can offer would be appreciated, simply stop by and talk with us when you see anyone working in the field.

Now the pictures:

Early in the day: outlining and removing sod from the Eastern raised beds 

 

Here's a close-up look at the curved area which faces the opening at the corner of the field, the curved lines  will be finished in bricks.

 

At the end of the day: Over 20 hours of labor went into this today. The beds are all outlined and prepped for tilling, the tall bed in the middle is ready for us to build around it, and all the sod is cut and flipped, ready to be covered in wood chips.