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Every day is holy like every day is an unbirthday and we can celebrate and break bread together. On Sunday I was sitting in a synagogue listening to an Easter sermon next to a two week old baby and thinking about how perfect a thing she was.

When you think about it we are really blessed to have such a perfect world that at the same time is so imperfect.

And gardening is the perfect thing to be doing in these times. It makes you see the perfectness and patterns and helps you appreciate the miracle of it all.

The Free Farm Stand was pretty good this week though I felt like I was too busy and I didn’t talk to all the wonderful people and friends that came by. It was a little like a hugfest and it included a kiss on the cheek from a curvy woman named 13 with an interesting piercing on her lip wearing a tight bunny suit . Ok that helped make my day as well as seeing my friend Harrison who she came with.

Piles of farm fresh organic produce and several pounds of lettuce from our gardens. What else is there to say? I was surprised that we got a lot of basil (two kinds) from the farmer’s market; I wonder where that is grown so early in the year, probably greenhouse grown. Yeah greenhouses!

Several people came by with produce from their gardens which is the really exciting part to me! Pam Pierce who is one of the wisest gardeners around (and we are lucky to have her in San Francisco), brought by some surplus vegetables from her garden (really beautiful chard, red mustard greens, and leeks), other people brought lemons, and another woman brought some spearmint. I got to ask Pam some garden questions and she got me worried about late blight in tomatoes, which I haven’t seen yet in any of the gardens I have worked in (as far as I know). I read her blog on a regular basis and there is always something I learn from it (http://goldengategarden.typepad.com/). Molly a gardener in Treat Commons came by with some delicious homemade organic strawberry jam that she made and I served it on matzoh. Sara brought the two biggest artichokes from San Francisco State (the garden that students planted there) and some greens too.

Tater Towers update

I just came up with the name tater towers and I am happy to report that most are doing their thing…green potato shoots breaking through the mulch and growing well so far (a few of the newer ones haven’t sprouted, but the ones planted March 20^th are well on their way.

I have been adding mulch to the ones that you cover as they grow. I have just scored a lot more sprouting potatoes and want to plant more towers. I could use more wire mesh as I want to try some more lasagna style tater towers. I have talked to a number of people that are trying this out and I think this method is suddenly becoming very popular. Jim Bishop sent me a link to his blog Yards for Farms where he wrote about potato towers too http://yards4farms.blogspot.com/2009/03/potato-tower-part-2.html. I am still looking for someone to let me put a tower on their sidewalk garden. But if anyone has some odd sunny space even with concrete that wants to try this out and bring surplus potatoes to the stand let me know and I can help set you up. Maybe this Saturday we will plant some tater towers at Esperanza. By the way I am trying to grow these in various containers, including the terrible compost bins that SLUG used to distribute. They come in half and I have planted potatoes in the top half.

Last week Allegra sent me an article about growing tomatoes planted upside down in some kind of commercial product called the topsy turvy. That caught my interest and I googled growing tomatoes upside down and found that there is a lot written on the subject. One of the advantages of growing tomatoes this way is that you can grow them where you don’t have space otherwise just like we do with the tater towers. Check out this photo from http://www.minifarmhomestead.com/gardening/tomatopictures.htm (they have other pictures too).

Here are some photos of a vegetable tower from Kevin who with Starhawk built it with a class they were teaching.

I met a woman yesterday at the stand that grows tomatoes in hanging pots which is almost the same thing. Anyway tomorrow I want to try it out with the Jamestown kids and I will report back on the how we did it. With all these space saving methods garden soil and mulch is needed and it would be nice if we could have free neighborhood resource centers where people could pick up these things. The centers could be stocked with all the free stuff around for gardens off of places like freecycle or craigslist or stables. I am not a big advocate of going out and buying soil and manure unless one has no other easy option.

Esperanza Sustainability Center update

On Saturday I helped dig some beds in the peace mandala at the new garden next to CELL space on Florida at 19^th Street. Earlier in the week I attended a meeting about the garden and what people’s visions are. Jonathan actually got a written agreement from the owner to use the land for free until it is sold.

I am not sure how much time I have to contribute to this project though it is very enticing for me to get sucked in. They have a nice space that can be transformed into a beautiful garden and education center (and they are also building a greenhouse). I am trying to be open to other ways of doing things and when the idea of having a business component to the project came up I tried to just listen rather than give my standard do it free rap. I guess they plan on buying insurance because of the arrangement with the owner and they will have other costs like water and some materials. There idea is to have workshops and other things which will cost money, but that no one will be turned away for lack of funds and they are going to go light on bugging people to pay…like maybe a contribution box in the corner. If they did that I could hardly object to capitalism light. There is a new movement now to bring back barter and make it fashionable again (the Time Bank is an example) and I am still uncomfortable with that compared to just trusting the universe to keep you going. If I wind up teaching workshops there I am going to give this more thought and whether I would be stretching my ideals too much by have a fee (though no one would be turned away or made to feel guilty). It sounds like Saturdays there will be ongoing work happening there.

Common Vision Tree Planting Report

On Friday afternoon at 18th and Rhode Island Common Vision people showed up to plant a apple/pear tree fence. They brought 21 donated trees and they dug holes and planted them at a 45 degre angle. The idea is that they will grow together and make a fence or hedge of fruiting trees. The event reminded me of going to a Rainbow gathering. A few of the people I talked to were semi-nomadic and had no one place they lived. There all seemed like rainbow people and I liked there energy and idealism. And they plant fruit trees like a band of Johnny aAppleseeds. From February through May they travel in their buses planting trees in schools and other places. They brought their drums and made some nice sounds and there was also portable mural painting and popcorn. It was a fun and inspiring day.

The Free Farm Stand got in the news last week after Africa Jones came around and interviewed us for Free Speech Radio News for a radio show on growing food in the city. Again I am trying something new here and have been reluctantly accepting interviews (I mostly like to remain anonymous since the project speaks for itself). You can listen to the interview by scrolling way down the right sidebar and clicking on the play button. I could really use some technical web help here because the way I got this on the page took some effort and I would rather have an audio player that was smaller and less of an advertisement.

This week I have enjoyed the time I have been able to stay at home and get my backyard garden in shape. It is actually going rather slowly and I could use more help. I have been daydreaming of an Urban Kibbutz Farm or a House of Hospitality with an attached farm where a people live together and have a service project of growing food to give away and taking in seekers. I have been feeling overwhelmed trying to be a mobile gardener and growing food in different gardens, even though they are within blocks of each other. I have been wondering if I might be stretching myself too thin by getting involved in the Esperanza Sustainability Center (see last blog and sidebar for link) and managing the new greenhouse they are building. The funny thing is it seems once I start thinking about something these days things start to happen. I was thinking of how we need shelves for the greenhouse and on Saturday I accidentally ran into an estate sale where an 85 year old man used to live who was an avid gardener. The man running the sale said I could have whatever I wanted in the backyard for free, so not only did I get a lot of outdoor plant shelves from the deck, but a lot of large pots and other garden related things, including some greenhouse plastic (a step backward in some ways for getting my backyard in shape).

Anyway, I am still pondering all these wondrous things happening in the universe around me and trying to figure out how to simplify my life a bit so I don’t get burnt out.

I was told not to expect much produce from the farmer’s markets this week, but that turned out wrong (the table was filled with greens, artichokes, a few beets, and big purple cabbages that we needed to cut up). I harvested a lot of vegetables from our gardens thinking that would be all I had. The Secret Garden gave us over two pounds of baby lettuce mix and a bag of greens (mostly chard). I also harvested a lot of snap peas that the kids had planted.

While there on Saturday I noticed that the zucchini we planted on Tuesday had got totally eaten and were gone! But the potato towers have potatoes that are growing well and the newer ones haven’t sprouted yet. Treat Commons had snow peas and some greens, chard and tree collards and some kale. My backyard garden is more of a nursery these days and that is where a lot of my time has been going, trying to raise a lot of starts. I am just starting to get some things in the ground (I installed three potato towers) and planted some seedlings from Jonathan.

The SF Glean team scored again this week with Jonathan and Ashly picking 36lbs of meyer lemons from one tree in Noe Valley. Two other neighbors came by with lemons they picked from their trees. Someone else brought some nice oregano from their garden and Steve and Shelly brought some rosemary. Fresh herbs are so easy to grow and they often produce more than we can use, so it is a great thing to share. We really can get free from having to buy some store bought herbs like rosemary, oregano, thyme, etc.

I must admit that the Farm Stand gets a bit crazy busy at times with all the people showing up especially at the beginning. I am trying hard to make it a fun and mellow scene, which for the most part it is. We have a great crew of volunteers which helps, though we are still in need of some people to help run the garden advice and plant give away table. A lot of people are showing up not just for the produce, but to check out the garden and I love talking to people and answering their garden questions.

Alvin came by with a big bag of sprouting potatoes that he got cooking with Food Not Bombs. I am still excited about growing potatoes and am looking for a sidewalk garden to try growing potatoes on. When I was putting things away at the end of the day, I noticed someone had brought by some pretty baskets that we can use for the stand. I feel blessed that there is such good energy around and it feels like we can transform things if we try.

Here are some events coming up that are pretty inspiring. Next Friday April 10^th at 4pm Common Vision (http://www.commonvision.org/ is going to be planting an apple/pear fence at 18^th and Rhode Island Sts. There will be drumming and tree planting and tree planting education. Another event later in the month is the Bay Friendly Garden Tour happening Sunday April 26 in the east bay. I love visiting other gardens as a way to get ideas and get inspired and this self-guided tour is free (and there are some gardens selling interesting seedlings), but you have to register online by April 16. Go here to check it out and register http://stopwaste.org/home/index.asp?page=617 .

Towards the end of April of this month we will have the 1^st year anniversary of the opening of the Free Farm Stand and I am starting to look back and evaluate how things have gone so far. I want to see what I have learned and if there are any changes I should be making in what I am doing.

This Saturday I had a mini-realization that I can’t always count of getting free left over produce from the farmers market (this week there was very little for some reason and there will be little next week too). I was wondering as the economy gets worse, will there be less free food to hand out? I was starting to get a little anxious like I did when I first started the stand that I wouldn’t have much to give out to all the people showing up these days. Then I thought in reality I can only grow so much food (unless I somehow manifest a small farm in the city…see the end of this article) and other people will only have small amounts of extra produce from their gardens that they can contribute. I reminded myself that I am not trying to run a food program exactly, but to be part of the movement of people encouraging local food growing and sharing (though I must admit I have that tendency to want to do serve large numbers of hungry people). One thing I am able to produce a lot of (though it takes some work) are vegetable starts or seedlings. Thinking this I went into greenhouse day dreaming mode. More on where that led me later on.

The Free Farm Stand was pretty good this week despite the lack of huge amounts of farmer’s market booty. There was definitely a lot of people and a great feeling of community. It was such a sunny day everyone was out in the park and the garden got a lot of visitors and helpers. Especially the kids were really into watering the plants. There was lots of chit chat everywhere. One woman who spoke only Spanish requested some chayote leaves to cook with. Rebekah was around and spoke to her in Spanish and got the recipe how to use the leaves for a kind of mush she makes with them. Here is the recipe:

I have a new friend and garden apprentice I mentioned before, a ten year old boy name Zeus who came and helped potting up seedlings to give away. He is filled with millions of questions and I had a hard time answering them all. He is so enthusiastic about gardening and it is very wonderful to see. His family gave us two bird houses they had built and some carrot seed.

The table had some beautiful chard and greens from mostly the secret garden and a handful of herbs, some red celery stalks, and a handful of snap peas. Nosrat brought by a huge amount of herbs from his garden including fresh sage. It is nice to use fresh herbs in our cooking and for a lot of us it is simple laziness that we open jars to get our flavor instead of picking it from a kitchen garden, either from a backyard, community garden, or windowsill.

There was a lot of baby romaine and radicchio from the farmer’s market. I must admit I have a prejudice against radicchio and if anyone out there that can turn me around on this with some fabulous way of using it I would love it (I am not much into bitters I guess). We also had a lot of bread that people like.

I was most excited by the fruit on the table. We had 33lbs of navel oranges picked from a local tree that was hecka sweet and juicy. It was the first big harvest of the year by SF Glean (see web site link on the sidebar, though the site doesn’t have a lot of information on it now). Jonathan took the list of fruit trees that needed researching and lucked out in meeting the owner of the trees. He got permission to harvest the trees and we might get more in a the following weeks.

Margaret (also on the gleaning team) came by with some beautiful lemons she picked from Holy Innocents Church and a little sign that explained where they came from which was a nice touch. Steve brought not only lots of chard seeds from his dad’s garden in Sonoma County, but also a bag of big Meyer lemons.

I tried this week to put more attention into the plant giveaway table. We had a lot of tomato seedlings to give away plus cilantro and chives, plus a few miscellaneous plants like rhubarb and hummingbird sage. A friend brought over a collection of the healthiest looking tomato starts she had grown to share and the varieties were ones that I didn’t have. Our helpers talked to everyone that took plants to make sure they know how to grow it and to told them about the different we had varieties and other related information. We also put in a word about donating any surplus they grow to the stand. If we can get it together for next week we would like to have a flier in English and Spanish how to take care of the plant and grow it. We will start with tomatoes.

There was so much happening this weekend with many gardening events everywhere across town. On Friday we had a good workday at 18^th and Rhode Island. Our small crew built two trellises for tomatoes and planted 12 kinds of cherry tomatoes, mostly heirlooms. We also built one more potato tower. After that, Page and I went to the Secret Garden and planted three more towers. The potatoes are starting to grow in many of the towers we have planted (I think we have about 14 towers now planted in different places). On Saturday I heard the PDC class planted more stuff on the hill.

On Friday evening I got an email from my friend Jonathan who was one of the people who started CELL space who has started cleaning up the vacant lot next to CELL on Florida and is resurrecting the garden that was there a few years ago. His project is called the Esperanza Sustainability Center and he seems to want to do everything you have ever heard of there in terms of sustainability, including a community garden (not divided into plots but to give to the food to those who garden and maybe to sell some to local restaurants), a nursery for “Propagation of edible fruit trees, native trees, medicinals and other plant starts for Urban Dissemination” (including constructing a quick dome greenhouse), workshops, and a performance stage. I went there on Saturday and there was a big 20yd pile of Bay View Greenwaste Management fine woodchip compost piled on the sidewalk. Sound familiar? It was sheet mulching day and I went off to help get a bale of cardboard from Whole Foods (while there the FARM project people that I wrote about last week was there doing the same thing (stuffing cardboard into their van for sheet mulching). When we got back, there were a whole lot of new people that I have never met ready to move cardboard and mulch. Two volunteers went off with me to pick up a load of horse manure and when I got back the place was hopping with energy and sweat. I stuck around for a while shoveling wood chips and then I took off to check out the sight at Hooper Street where the CCA students were sheet mulching the long strip of land next to their college building.

I found the scene pretty inspiring and like I wrote to Robyn one of the organizers, to see a wasted piece of land being transformed like that is so inspiring to me. They actually got permission from DPW to do what they were doing.

I just got word of a man in San Jose that has access to an acre of land in the middle of downtown that is flood plain and can’t be built on. He wants to grow food to give away, convinced we will have 18-22% unemployment soon. His project is a week old and says he needs all the help he can get. I wish san Jose was a little closer to the city.