Tomatoes everywhere!

Reaching in for garden goodness. 

 Tomato season is here! Red tomatoes, yellow tomatoes, big and small are bountiful in the garden. Students have enjoyed snacking on them during recess, as a class after watering the garden and inside for their snack. The garden experience has been taken inside to a classroom or two...what foods come from tomatoes?

Harvest

Harvesting and enjoying. 

Having a taste gardenside. 

A treat left for a favorite teacher. 

Tomatoes for snack. 

Tomatoes for snack. 

Bringing the garden into the inside classroom. 

Reading what students are seeing, touching, smelling and tasting in the garden. 

First Days Back in the Garden

Many visitors on the first day of school. 

The first days of school have found many visitors- with two legs and six legs- to the LINCS Growing and Learning Garden. Students were amazed to discover how "big" the garden grew since they last saw it in early June.

Students were excited to find many tomatoes, green beans and green peppers to try. The kale and chives continue to be favorites.

Discovering late-summer insects is certainly a highlight. Grasshoppers, caterpillars and bees  provide the opportunity to learn about pollination, being respectful of all living creatures and everyone who depends on our gardens to live in. Japanese beetles demonstrate what a pest can do in a garden.

Hunting for  green beans. 

A fresh, local, healthy snack. 

Garden resident, a grasshopper. 

All eyes on the grasshopper. 

Kale all around! 

A fuzzy friend with gentle hands. 

A handful of green beans. 

A popular spot to spend recess. 

Swiss Chard!

The swiss chard we planted on Earth Day in the Spring continues to grow and grow. LINCS Music teacher Mrs. Hayes has made great use of the swiss chard the past week. She made a vegetarian lasagna and has enjoyed the swiss chard with her eggs just about every morning!

Veggie lasagna featuring swiss chard. 

Hands on Learning!

 Experiential and hands-on learning at its finest. The same gardening friend planted a pepper plant in early June, harvested a pepper in late August from that same plant and cut the pepper to make salsa. The salsa was enjoyed with fellow gardening friends.

Our own salsa!

Lots of tomatoes. 

The LINCS Growing and Learning garden continues to provide many with learning and yummy, healthy food.  

Monday we harvested lots of tomatoes, our first green pepper and the first of the onions. Just the right ingredients to make our own salsa! 

Everyone helped to cut, dice and chop. Everyone was also very eager to enjoy the salsa with corn chips. A great treat for all who have helped tend to the garden over the summer. Thank you! 

The main Garden crew with the produce. 

Cutting and chopping

LINCS Garden Salsa! 

Healthy appetite for this gardener. 

CNN Story about School Gardens

Here's a great example of what school gardens can accomplish: 

http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/14/health/healthy-school-gardens/index.html

Garden Update

Although the Japanese beetles are at full force, the garden is growing well. The marigolds and zinnias are keeping those nasty garden-eating bugs away from the more important plants, like the tomatoes. Tomatoes are starting to ripen and I'm fairly certain we are going to have a huge amount of tomatoes during the next few garden gatherings. 

Join us on Mondays anytime between 4-6 and take some tomatoes home with you! Pick some basil too and you can make a yummy bruschetta or caprese salad!