Barrels AND Puppets! A great day in our garden ~ March 10th!

Hey friends of East Lake Community Learning Garden!

Remember to register for our rain barrel workshop with the Upper Chattahoochee River Keepers – $40 = your very own barrel (a re-purposed Coca Cola syrup barrel), the kit and guidance to change it into a rain barrel, a one year membership with the Upper Chattahoochee River Keepers, and a wealth of info about water conservation and why it’s critical for our community.  Click here to register!

And of course, yummies and coffee from East Lake’s My Coffee Shop – Bring Your Own Mug!

If you already have a rain barrel, then just join us at 11am for more ‘green’ garden activities – including the return of Damon the puppet master!  He will be guiding the kids through a project that will teach them about the water cycle – amazing!  You don’t want to miss it.

Next Saturday, March 10th, 10am Rain Barrel Workshop, 11am activities for all, especially the kids 🙂 see you there! 

You thought goat puppets were cool? Well, they were! But wait and see what we can do with the water cycle!!

Register now for your Rain Barrel ~ March 10th worshop!

Hey East Lake Community Learning Garden!  We are definitely going to be green for March, kicking off with a Rain Barrel Workshop with Upper Chattahoochee Riverkeepers on Saturday March 10th at 10am!  There are a limited number of barrels available, so register soon!  $40 includes your barrel, kit and loads of info regarding water conservation.

We will also have refreshments and other projects and activities around the garden.  If you already have a rain barrel, and just want to join us for a Saturday in the garden, feel free to come around 11 to plant and say hello to our sweet sheep 🙂

Register for the Rain Barrel Workshop here! (be sure and choose Mar 10 (Sat) for your workshop date).

UCR’s Rain Barrel Program kills two birds with one stone! Thanks to a partnership with Coca-Cola, UCR re-purposes donated 60-gallon syrup drums from the Atlanta-based beverage company and teaches workshop participants how they can convert them into rain harvesting containers. Our rain barrel design requires no over flow or worries about mosquitoes, so the collection in the barrel is easy and painless.

Headwaters Outreach Manager Bonny Putney, who is certified in rain water collection, hosts a series of rain barrel workshops over the course of the year.  The $40 fee not only includes a rain barrel, installation kit and instructions, but also is good for a one-year UCR membership.  Register here.

We braved the cold! and…. RAIN BARRELS!!! :)

Hey East Lake!  Thanks to those of you who joined us for a chilly but wonderful morning in the garden this past Saturday (check out our updated pics!).  A huge thanks to the Atlanta Community Food Bank and the kids from St. Luke’s who worked hard helping us move rocks out of the way, and shoveling our compost pile.

Save the Date – March 10th @ 10am we will have a Rain Barrel workshop with Bonny from the Upper Chattahoochee Riverkeepers!  A link will be posted here soon so you can reserve your spot in the workshop…  it’s $40 per barrel, and you will leave with a wealth of knowledge on the whys and hows of water conservation as well as your very own rain barrel with an easy to use installation kit to take home.

If you haven’t already, friend us on facebook! ~ East Lake Community Learning Garden.

Come meet the sheep THIS Saturday (Feb. 11th!) when you join us to “Plant Love” from 10am – 12pm…  hot cocoa and coffee from My Coffee Shop (bring your own mug!), fun newspaper planter pots for the kids, and planting red in our gardens… see you there!

Plant Love NEXT Saturday! (Feb. 11th) 10am – 12pm

Garden Work Day @ Crawford MS – Feb. 7th 4:00 – 6:00pm

Hey East Lake Community Gardeners!  Our friends at Crawford Middle School are having a Garden Work Day next Tuesday, Feb. 7th.  Details below:

“Crawford W. Long Middle School is having a Garden Work Day on February 7^th from 4-6 pm.  During this event we will install a fruit orchard (courtesy of the Atlanta Local Food Initiative) and a vertical gardening system (courtesy of Plastics Make it Possible).  We will also build a tool shed and complete other small garden jobs like composting, seed starting, mulching, weeding, and creating garden artwork.  We need volunteers to bring shovels, wheelbarrows, rakes, tools, and gloves.  Water and healthy snacks will be provided for the volunteers.  Please help us as we try to build a better garden for our school and the surrounding community.  We hope to see you there!”

We hope you can come out and loosen up your gardening muscles with the energetic middle schoolers 🙂  And if you can help bring tools, it’s much appreciated.  If you have any questions, let us know!

*Make sure you reserve Saturday Feb. 11th from 10am – 12pm on your calendars to come Plant Love in your East Lake Community Learning Garden!  More details coming soon…*

Thank you! and a couple of updates :)

Thank you everyone who came out and made “Plant Peace” a success!  We celebrated our peace pole, planted peas, made amazing goat puppets, and played with the goats while enjoying delicious coffee, hot chocolate, and pastries from East Lake’s My Coffee Shop.  I hope you will plan to join us for our next event on Saturday, Feb. 11th from 10am – 12pm… details to come 🙂

As we continue planning exciting events in your community learning garden, we need your feedback!  Please click the ‘Survey!‘ link above and take a few moments to answer just a few brief questions, so we can design future garden activities around your interests and schedules.

Also, plan to spend time in our sister garden, Healthy Belvedere, this weekend, a quick note from them about the time change:

Sorry Everyone – a ‘time change’ for Saturday’s workday.

12:00 noon – Saturday, January 21st.

There is a 70% chance of rain on the news today, however, that’s a couple of days away it could change.  But if it’s raining Saturday morning please stay home and we’ll see if everyone can make the next Saturday, January 28th.

Thank you much,

Celeste Beaty
Administrative Assistant

Healthy Belvedere – Making the Healthy Choice the Easy Choice

thanks again East Lake!  See you in the garden soon 🙂

Lauren Patrus

Plant Peace THIS Saturday!

Remember to join us THIS Saturday, Jan. 14th from 10am – 12pm for “Plant Peace” @ ELCLG. We will have plenty of activities for the kids, and warm drinks for you from East Lake’s My Coffee Shop. Come help us plant peas and celebrate MLK, Jr. weekend with our own Peace Pole, declaring that we are a unified community. We’ll see you there!

Mark Your Calendars ~ Plant Peace @ the garden Sat. Jan. 14th!

Plan to join us on Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend as we enter the New Year at East Lake garden with goats, seeds, and peace.

On Saturday, January 14th we will gather at 10am (we’ll have some hot drinks for you!).  Our darling goats will have arrived, and they need names!  You’ll have a chance to get to know them and then vote on their names.  And we’ll work on meeting our Million Plant March goal by planting seeds(peas, please).

We will also plant a peace pole (http://www.peacepoles.com/).  This pole will be an expression of our commitment as a community to be established in peace.  In honor of the work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and those who labored with him, we will plant our statement that peace will prevail on earth.

We’ll see you there!

Getting Ready for Goats!

Hey East Lake Community, ever put up a wire mesh Field Fence?
We plan to get goats or sheep at the garden to clear the kudzu and in preparation for our little hooved buddies, we are putting up a fence at the garden.
Come on out Saturday, December 3rd at 10am for some fun community building!

(This is an example of the kind of fence we will construct at the Garden)