SAVANNAH’S GARDEN

PROFILE

I want to work at the garden because: Discipline is really important to me. I wanted to work at the garden because I need to keep myself accountable and dedicated to the things I sign myself up for. I enjoy being outdoors and learning new things. I don’t have a lot of experience gardening, and I wanted to explore more of it.

Two of my personal goals for working at the Dallas Youth Garden this summer are:

  1. Understand more about gardening.

  2. Build relationships with people within the community.

Two things I hope to learn from working at the Dallas Youth Garden are:

  1. Time management skills.

  2. Develop gardening skills.

I think my biggest challenge will be: I don’t have a lot of experience gardening, so my biggest challenge will be getting everything planted and ready in time.

My favorite vegetable or fruit is: My favorite vegetable is the cucumber, because I love making delicious meals, such as cucumber salads, for family and friends. Creating memories through hard work creates long lasting moments in life that are hard to forget.

I hope to contribute this to the garden this year: I hope to contribute a good work ethic, and I want to show that I am dependable. Additionally, I have good communicating skills, and I am productive.

 GARDEN PLAN

Vegetables and Flowers Planted (list in order):

  1. Zinnia

  2. Carrots

  3. Radish

  4. Lettuce

  5. Radish

  6. Carrots

  7. Onion

  8. Lettuce

  9. Zucchini

  10. Marigolds

  11. Beats

  12. Acorn squash

  13. Dill

  14. Pepper

  15. Tomatoes

  16. Tomatoes

  17. Cabbage

  18. Beans

Rows of vegetables planted: 18

Number of different kinds of vegetables planted: 13

Planned Garden Yield: 288

Planned Biggest Producer: Tomatoes

Changes in my plan during planting: I had to replace my 2nd row of carrots with cabbages.

GARDEN LOG

  • May 1-3: We spent Thursday introducing ourselves to each other. On Saturday we removed the tarps and cleaned up the garden to get in prepared to start gardening.

  • May 4-10: We had Zoom meetings to plan out our gardens. And to help prepare us to start gardening next week.

  • May 11-17: We went over the guidelines to start planting. Tuesday and Thursday we began planting the first rows in our gardens. On Saturday we had a zoom meeting because the dirt in the garden was not ideal to plant in. We went over our projects and how to set up our website.

  • May 18-24: We started planting our gardens this week, I was gone on Thursday due to a track meet. On Saturday I was able to plant a large portion of my garden, with the help of others.

  • May 25-31: I continued to plant my garden and was able to get a lot of things planted on Tuesday. On Thursday and Saturday, I wasn’t there because of State for track and field. During Saturday they started laying down straw and mulch.

  • June 1-7: This week I weeded, and watered my plants, we also started placing down straw on everyone’s garden.

  • June 8-14: I watered and weeded my garden; I had to replace one of my rows of carrots with cabbage unfortunately. On Saturday I weeded and watered, with the addition with laying down more straw.

  • June 15 - 21: This Saturday was really rainy and wet, but we were able to lay down a lot of straw, because of this we had to go home early. The 19th was an optional day; I still went to the garden that day. I weeded and watered my plants.

  • June 22-28: On Tuesday we didn’t need to water our plants because of the expected rain. Tomato cages went up during this week too. Also, we set up one of the fences for the beans in my garden. I watered and weeded on Thursday. On Saturday we almost finished placing down the straw in everyone’s garden.

  • July 1-5: This week our first projects are due by the end of the week. We harvested lettuce on Tuesday. I watered and weed on Thursday, I am going to plant more carrots in my garden because they haven’t been doing that well, so I prepared the old carrot row by weeding it really well.

  • July 6-12: This Tuesday I spent my time watering and picking lettuce. Before we send the lettuce to the food bank we must wash and bundle up the lettuce. On Thursday I water my garden again and after I spent the rest of my time weeding my marigolds and carrots. On Saturday we discussed our outlines for creating a video about professionalism, while in the garden.

  • July 13-19: This week in the garden was very hot, I had to make sure my plants all got enough water. I picked squash and zucchini on Tuesday and Thursday, with the addition of weeded a little bit. On Thursday we talked about the video on professionalism in the garden. Lastly on Saturday we started to lay down bark dust to create the paths in the garden.

  • July 20-26: On Tuesday this week I spent my time watering, and picking my lettuce, squash, and zucchini. We talked about the video project on Thursday more, I also spent time weeding and water this day as well. Unfortunately, I discovered flea beetles on one of the rows of cabbages I have, thankful Dean was able to spray them. Saturday is when the video project is due, I spent Friday and Thursday creating my part of the project outside of the garden.

  • July 27-Aug 2: I took Tuesday off to go to turner lake with friends and family. I spent Thursday watering, picking plants and weeding my transplants. On Saturday is the open house. I gave a tour of my garden, and I came early to help tidy up the garden. Two sticks were placed next to my single bean to help support it. Also, my Zinnia flowers are starting to bloom.

  • Aug 3-Aug 9: This week I really wanted to weed a lot. On Tuesday and Thursday, I spent most of my time weeding, and the rest of my time was spent on watering all of my plants. A lot of things grew in my garden this too. I picked patty pan squash, onions, Beets, and zucchini. This Saturday I spent a lot of time watering my tomatoes and squash because the next two days were going to be really hot. Also, on Saturday we spent time talking budgeting with Annie. She introduced us to an activity that everyone had to take home and work out our own budget.

  • Aug 10-Aug 16: Tuesday I spent my time watering and picking anything that was ready to be picked. The next few days are also going to be really hot, so I spent extra time on watering my squash and tomatoes really well. Thursdays was the day we discussed about recipes for summer squash. For any recipes we come up with we are going to cook on Saturday.

  • Aug 17-Aug 23: This week I was gone on Tuesday and Thursday from the garden. I went with my family to Sunriver for vacation. Saturday I was there at the garden, a made sure my plants were well watered.

  • Aug 24- Aug 30: To start off this week I watered on Tuesday, also this was the day that we can pick anything in the garden, so most of my time was spent picking everything from my garden and any others that needed it. Thursday, I spent half the time watering. That day was kind of special because I finally had some squash to pick after a week or two.

Final Thoughts:


My favorite garden vegetable was: My beans
Because: I had this single bean from one row be the only bean to survive, now by the end of the season its thriving and growing really well.
I harvested 167.67 pounds of produce from my garden.
My favorite job was: I really enjoyed planting all the seeds and transplants at the start of the season.
My least favorite job was: The Job I hope to not do ever again, would probably spreading fish fertilizer on everything.
I could have done better at: I could’ve watered a lot faster, because of my slower watering, my weeding got a little behind.
I did the best I could doing: I really tried to be up to date with my website, and I wanted to create a place where I can come back to and look over what all I did while at Dallas Youth Garden.
The two things I learned most at the garden this year were:
1. I learned how to pick an assortment of different vegetables, and how to identify when plants are ready to be picked.
2. During my time at Dallas youth garden, I learned about how to make a bunch of fun things with zucchini, such as zucchini fries. (Which I may or may not make again).

GARDEN PROJECTS

2. Video Project

The video about Professionalism in the garden

How I contributed to the video: I created a minute long video about why it is important to maintain your hygiene while in and outside the garden. Some of the important things to keep in mind are, taking a shower after the garden, putting on deodorant, and wearing clean clothes. Each of these things is important to do to maintain good hygiene. If your hygiene isn’t well maintained is can cause some problems. This includes, not being able to work as efficiently, making your peers uncomfortable and not being able to work well with your fellow gardeners, lastly not feeling at your best can really affect how diligent you are in the garden. Additionally, some people may struggle with poor hygiene. They may wonder who they can talk to. That is the next part of my video I discuss who you can talk too if you're having a hard time with hygiene. These people can include but they are not limited to: your parents/guardians, supervisors, and lastly fellow gardeners.

I used the website cap cut for editing my video together. I also used to google slides to create the slide shown in the video.

Any difficulties/ Anything I enjoyed: I had a hard time adding in the voice over parts in the video due to my lack of experience using cap cut. I did enjoy creating the slides used in the video. Adding all the cute images to each of the slides was something I enjoyed doing and was my favorite part about this project.

1. Recipe

Name: Chicken Lettuce Wraps

Vegetable Used: Lettuce

Ingredients: Ground Chicken, Garlic, Onion, Hoisin sauce, Soy sauce, Olive Oil, Rice wine vinegar, Ginger, Sriracha, Water Chestnuts, Green Onions, Lettuce.

Steps to Make it: Heat olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the ground chicken and cook until browned, make sure to crumble the chicken as it cooks; drain any excess fat. Next stir in garlic, diced onions, hoisin sauce, soy sauce, rice wine vinegar, ginger and sriracha until onions have become translucent. Then stir in diced chestnuts and green onions until tender. Lastly spoon several spoons of the chicken mixture into the center of a lettuce leaf and enjoy.

Opinion: This recipe was really enjoyable to make, and turned out really yummy, this makes a good easy lunch to make for friends and family. In the future I hope to make it again. The water chestnuts and lettuce added a crunch that made the texture really nice. It also the hoisin sauce added a sweet taste that mixed well with the sriracha’s spicy kick.

3. Recipe #2

Name: Zucchini Fries

Vegetable Used: Zucchini

Ingredients: Zucchini, Flour, Breadcrumbs, Salt, Pepper, Olive Oil, Garlic seasoning.

Steps to Make it: Chop a medium sized zucchini in french-fry like rectangles, set aside. Then in a separate plate add your flour, breadcrumbs, Salt, pepper, and garlic seasoning. Set your zucchini fries in a bowl with olive oil, mix and make sure every piece of zucchini is covered with oil. After, place each piece of zucchini one at a time in your mix of dry ingredients. Make sure all side of the zucchini are covered in your mix. After all pieces are covered, set them in a saucepan with olive oil. Give each side about 2 mins to cook, then turn the zucchini to the next side, until completely done.

Opinion: This recipe was quite messy but is a fun activity to do with multiple people. I would make this again with my family, like for a lunch or a dinner. This is relatively quick to do if there is a lot of help. In future thought I would add more seasonings because I found the fried a little plain. Additionally, I would make sure the zucchini is heavily covered with oil olive, due to when I first made it was hard to get the mixture of dry ingredients to stick. I believe that the zucchini fries would also go well with a hot sauce. (Overall, it just needs a little more flavor).

MONTHLY GARDEN SUMMARY

May: Days Worked 11 Days Off 3 Extra Days Worked 0 Days Late 0 Total Produce(Pounds): 0

June: Days Worked 12 Days Off 0 Extra Days Worked 1 Days Late 0 Total Produce(Pounds): 0.

July: Days Worked 13 Days Off 1 Extra Days Worked 0 Days Late 0 Total Produce(Pounds): 57

August: Days Worked _____ Days Off 2 Extra Days Worked 1 Days Late_______ Total Produce(Pounds): 110.67

September: Days Worked ____ Days Off _____ Extra Days Worked _____ Days Late______ Total Produce(Pounds):____