Growing Warriors adds a new community Garden

Through a most generous donation of plots at the Peace Meal Community Garden in Lexington, Growing Warriors has added a new community garden site. The Garden is right next door to the Leestown Road V.A. facility and accessed through the Bluegrass Community Technical College The plot needed a little work so armed with digging forks we decided to take the project on one forkful at a time.

Fortunately for me, Jason Couch was on hand to keep Mike Lewis focused on digging and a turning. The plot was full of brambles, saplings, and even a little sod to make things interesting….. but once we turned the soil what we saw made us very happy… some of the most beautiful soil in the region. We were happy with the potential we had discovered but the digging was kicking our “aged” rears. So with a little negotiation with Rebeca Glasscock (actually she offered)…

We were blessed with a crew of University of Kentucky service volunteers. That is when the work got rolling. These students rocked!

This garden is a no-petrol garden – so everything is done by hand..no tillers.. no tractors.. blood, sweat and muscle was all we needed and fortunately these students donated all of those.

Blood – there were around a million brambles that were cut out and each bramble provided our students with many blood donations.

Sweat – Mike, Mark and Jason were sweating as the oldies (Richard Simmons would have been proud)

Muscle – The young folks volunteering on this project worked their tails off to help us make this happen.

After some coordinating from the immortal  Jason Couch we got a successful system working..

Before we knew it we were in the final push of the day

With a few final inspections from the supervisors……..

Now for a comparison.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All in all this was a great day of working hard… in the dirt, in the brambles (stickers), and in the company of some individuals who care about the communities they live in and who are willing to do things to improve them.

Thank you Rebecca Glasscock.

Thank you students.

Your communities and the veterans within them thank you for your service.

 

Thanks JP!