Creekside Residents building their community by growing fresh produce together!
On October 26th 2015 the building of the long awaited Backyard Farms was hauled into the Creekside Gables right in the middle of our enclosed lawn and this is when the fun began!
For a very long time, we anticipated this wonderful way to bring natural homegrown food to our community and seeing it develop right in front of our eyes has been more than amazing in many ways!
Joan and Colleen who are representatives and master gardeners who help to plant these lovely gardens all over the twin cities in various communities and are partnered with Hennepin County in many cases to bring their wonderful mentorship programs to novices ( like ourselves) to help teach us how to plant and grow and finally harvest our own herbs and vegetables. From planning the planting to actually seeing our garden flourish during the summer months was nothing short of amazing!
We learned so much about organic soil and we learned together about vegetables we never heard of, such as Kohlrabi and little cucumbers called “Cuke” nuts. We raised string beans, enormous eggplants and zucchinis. We also raised collard greens, tomatoes, potatoes, jalapeno peppers and cabbages. Every week, when we got a chance to harvest our food, we were ecstatic to see the results of our labor. The experience has done more for us than help to increase our awareness of healthy food options, it has helped us to create community where people are planting friendships as well as food to sustain our bodies. We learned about foods that can be cooked or prepared certain ways and our salad parties were spectacular. The freshness and the difference from store bought vegetables were apparent and the idea of fresh food caught on greatly!
Judie H. says “This was absolutely the freshest food she has ever had and trying new things is wonderful.” Alberta J. says “Watching small things grow into larger and edible things was really fascinating.” We look forward to our garden next spring and the idea of recapturing the fun and excitement of our 2016 garden is fresh on our minds and will sustain us all through the winter months! We so appreciate the help and consideration that the team from backyard farms has shown us and look forward to working with them next year!
We invite you to check out our Backyard Farm!
Creekside Gables
7601 Zane Avenue
Brooklyn Park, MN 55443
763.503.0104
