On my mind...Community Gardens and Freecycle

Many thanks to Rhonda at Down to Earth for this concept.

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Community gardens are popping up all over the place. I encourage you to search for one in your local area, or even start one up. .......I have visited a few around here....and one I have recently become more involved in is rather close to where I live...

It is called the Barrack Heights Community Garden. I became interested a while back, and met some lovely ladies while I was there; But on returning to my car (Up the hill) I became very cautious of my steps in the longer grass; after stepping into an unseen divot........ If you know me, you will know that I have a few health issues involving my hips, a recently badly broken ankle and leg, and now Osteoporosis.  With all this, I need to be careful of my footing and had decided to make my visits to the community garden on intermittent occasions, just making the occasional visit........

Aileen rang me the other day, telling me that another workshop was scheduled...The last meeting that I was to attend had to be cancelled, so; as I was to attend that meeting....Aileen rang wondering if I was still interested. She made me most welcome and I was told that no-one expects anyone to do tasks that they can't handle. So I thought I would give it another go...and go along to meet the rest of the gang. 

I stayed almost until stumps...I was enjoying the company of others who had the same interests so much....and that's never a bad thing. I came home with plants of Comfrey, Banna Grass & Yarrow....

On my suggestion after seeing they were down to their last bag of fertiliser...I offered my services as a driver to go gather some bags of Horse Manure from the stables close by.....so I will be meeting up with Cliff today and off to the stables we will go....I have the trailer, and he has the muscle.....the Community Garden will have plenty of free horse manure....and I will feel good knowing I have helped them...after being gifted all those plants, how could I not offer? That's just the way I think.

Community Garden

Community Garden 

I went along; bearing gifts of a bag of lemons to share out....

which I was recently gifted from Illawarra Freecycle Group. 

Freecycle is a world wide organisation that allows everyday people like myself to share and recycle unwanted goods to other people who are looking for listed goods. No money must change hands and no alcohol or animals can be listed.....I'm sure there are other rules. I have offered to freecycle many Aloe Vera plants, along with unwanted kitchen items, linen, a bike, and other items which I cannot remember right now...

I have also been gifted many items through friendly freecyclers like...... 

Bay Leaves and Besser Blocks for the front garden.

Lovely large glass coffee jars, which are now food cannisters

and even linen and now lemons and cumquats.

Like I said; No money changes hands...but I can't help but want to give an offering of thanks in some way, usually in preserves or baking of some kind....Of-course the freecycler doesn't know in advance that I am offering them something in return, as that would be against the rules.....It sure is a nice surprise for them though when I turn up with something little to say Thanks. "Thanks for picking my request for your item that you are wanting to recycle, I appreciate your generosity".

Do you know about Freecycle? ......Have you used it before? 

Would it be something you would use in the future?

I had a busy morning yesterday..and the new garden bed is really coming along in the front yard. I even re-potted the Aloe Vera plants into the small black plastic plant bags that I got off free-cycle.

I had put a request on Freecycle asking for small pots or seedling pots..and a lady replied with a huge amount of these little black bags....They are great and although they are heavy plastic.....they were going to be landfill if no-one wanted them....She had seen them just down the road from where she lived where a nursery had closed up shop. I get to keep my original pots and never need to find pots of this size ever again...I literally have easy two thousand of these bags.

I had lost all my little pots to the Aloe Vera and had gotten rid of heaps of Aloe on Freecycle..which I posted about earlier....but I still have plenty of Aloe....so I am going to put a sign out the front to sell the rest for $2 a plant...I think they will sell...I priced one the same size at Bunnings and it was $7...Wow!!

I also put out a request for Fowlers Vacola Jars....and found a lovely couple going to visit her father in Bathurst on the weekend. Apparently her father has a heap of jars and they could bring some back for me. How lovely of them...Well here they are..and there are still a 44 gallon drum full of them, if I need more. They make the trip every few weeks.

Below I started using the jars on the same day...

Left: Alcohol Spirit with fruit Salad Sage...and 

Right: Alcohol Spirit with Rosemary....

I think it is called a tincture..

But anyway..If they work...I am hoping to be able to eliminate bathroom sprays. 

I also covered them with plastic and secured with an elastic band...

They are aging on a sunny windowsill and I will check them in a couple of days.

Donations to Freecycle

Today I repotted my supply of Aloe Vera, I have far to much for my own supply.....It really is a very forgiving plant...always cutting a bit off here, and a bit there, forgetting to water it sometimes....it still comes back....I have given Aloe away before, but this time...I think I will offer some to freecyclers, then put  a sign up on the fence, I have no idea what to charge for them though...hmmmm...........

anyway, check out what I got from a few pots today, after transplanting into their own pots....
Yes! it was well overdue....

I love to share, I wonder how many I will have left over....???

THINGS FROM THE TIP for my garden

I love recycling. I got a huge bird cage for $5. It would hold a cockatoo quite nicely. I completely pulled it apart and flattened out the tin roof, drilling out the pop vivetts, I used the tin from the roof to make the tank pump cover, I had everything here from garage sales or the tip to make it, so I guess it was ALMOST FREE.


I just wish I had taken a photo of the cage before I dismantled it...

I cut the mesh sides into three strips with an angle grinder and used that for borders for my vege gardens.....not in these photos but if you look through the veges, you can still see the two doors from the cage....

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Here is an old steel bin that I couldn't resist for 50 cents, I got two that day and I have painted one of them green........all the frame work is from the tip as well.

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MY STRAWBERRY PLANTS

Here I have two pieces of galvanised guttering that I have attached to the beams on the fence...

I didn't buy that many strawberry plants, the nursery had punnets with three plants in each....

what I do is look closely at each punnet to see if any have more than the three plants....better value .....I did buy about $30 dollars worth of punnets that day, but I also got 29 FREE PLANTS by looking closer at the punnets.

The plants are now producing runners which I am also planting, eventually it will be full of strawberry plants.....

The cost for guttering $10 I also put down some old coconut fibre I had laying around, then I sprinkled lightly some of those water crystals, then planted the plants, I first used crushed egg shells as a mulch because they were tiny and I didn't want to feed the slugs my new plants..

Notice the organza bag on one of the strawberries, I get an extra chance at NOT feeding the birds my lovely strawberries...it seems if I can hide them, I might get to pick them...

Since building this for my strawberries, we have had some really hot days. Unfortunately many of the strawberry plants on the top row have gotten quite burnt. If I was to do another one of these I would think about putting something else in the top row, or just mounting the guttering on the middle support on the fence. I just hope my strawberry plants survive.

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MY SEEDLING AREA

Here is my set up for growing veges from seeds...I can get bread trays for $1 at the tip.....The flyscreens are also from the tip for $1.00 each....they help to stop the birds eating the nice young shoots.....the furnace bricks are leftover that I got from freecycle...we actually hired a brick saw and cut them into thirds to use as pavers for the back yard....

It is all easily dismantled if I wish as I only used cable ties as hinges and screws.....All my punnets and trays are also from freecycle.....my name tags are made from ice-cream containers cut up, we don't buy icecream, but I put a call out to freecycle whenever I am running low......

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SOME FENCING TO KEEP RUSTY AND CINDY OUT OF THE GARDEN.

Ok, now here in the front of the garden is some fencing, which is actually about 4 meters long....very straight and neat for $5 at the tip.....it was a dog impound for when people take dogs to a show....I think they would be rather expensive for dog owners.....there was no preparation or dismantling with this one, I just bought it home and nailed it onto the front of the garden beds. I now have no more dogs on that garden either...all for $5.

That is just some of the things I have done to recycle in my garden, hope you enjoy.......