Signs for the future

After several months of rich unsettlement we came again to garden together. Many signs help us in a community garden. Informing, handing over, and gathering knowledges and skills such as 'writing up a jobs list.'

 

Some signs let folk know about the ethics of the garden,

and some about what is going on in places that look like not much is happening,

When new beds are planted they are vulnerable to many things. Our tending and the chance tending of kindly community folk bring gifts to this garden of love.

Some signs give simple insights. It's not that Thai basil is anti life, rather our medical culture, like the dominant culture it springs from, is simplistically human centric. Learning to become hardy and resilient participants of life brings many insights and gifts.

Some signs encourage spontaneous participation,

some sing praise to other-than-human agency and service,

and others alert us to future abundance.

When we water today for tomorrow's fare, fare that we may not even get to eat ourselves, we too become participants in service to the living of the world.

Letting others know when we've last watered is again another way of handing over precious information in order to save precious resources.

Directing kitchen wastes to our community compost hub to make enriched soils for future food is true money in the bank. If the virus has taught us anything, it is how vulnerable industrial food chains are.

We planted this weeping mulberry several years ago for children's play. This little nook doesn't need a written sign to invite children in. 

Reading can reduce our capacity to play and experience life in the present. Some places are better without signs.

Many thanks to Jen, Meg, Andrew, Ruth, Tyson, Fe, Jasmine, Jasper, Woody, Fab, Luna, Archie, Elias, Solaris and Apollo for helping in the garden this month. And big thanks to Patrick for organising and facilitating the working bees and communications in the garden. When we come together our souls and our soils are lifted, turned and enriched.

And when we garden on Djaara land we know that it always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

New Years planting day at Daylesford's Community Park

On January 12 we shared tools,

smiles,

and various kinds of labour. You see, we were given a wad of money from Spa Country Events for our participation in the 2018 Daylesford NYE Parade.

We came up with a moving food forest as our float. You can see our shenanigans here. The idea was that our temporary float would be converted into a permanent benefit for the community. The community park garden needed some lovin', so we decided this would be the garden we renewed with the plants. First we had to scratch out many weeds and dead head the perennials.

We also had to be there to receive another big gift from local arborist, Scott Little. Thanks for the mature mulch Scott!

Now with our materials on site it was time to start loosening the terra,

to bed down the gifted plants.

We know from experience that many hands make light work,

and many skyward thumbs popped up over the few hours we gathered for yet another community permablitz.

It was a songful time of peasant labours,

peasant labours reclaimed in a casual sunglasses kinda era,

A hot morning meant broad hats accompanied ever broadening feelings,

and we kept cool with the spray of the hose,

before mulch time to trap in all that moistness. With a wheelbarrow train we moved three cubic metres in no time.

We worked from morning till lunch to finish the job, then posed for this photo:

Thanks (from left) Django, Maya, Sian, Woody, Julian, Meg, Nick, Leah, Patrick, Kirsten, John, Brenna, Jeremy, Josh, Nick, Lyra and Michelle (all pictured), and Scott (who gifted and delivered the well composted mulch) and Pete, who had to leave early.

2018 'Thank You' Bee

Thank you to the broad beans that fed our bellies and enriched our soils with nitrogen.

Thank you trees that so generously shared their gifts.

Thank you friends from near and far who volunteered their time and intentions.

Thank you to the flowers and countless pollinators.

Thank you to the people who donated seedlings for prosperity and sovereignty.

Thank you to those who came and cheered us from the sidelines.

Thank you sharp minds, sharp tools.

Thank you for your energy and enthusiasm.

Thank you for sharing your cabbage stems.

Thank you to our bodies that laboured our love.

Thank you to our love that laboured our bodies.

Thank you Mother Earth for receiving, enabling and sharing. We honour your food and seasonality and literally owe our lives to your gifts. We love you.

* * *

Happy solstice season one and all!

The community gardeners are once again going to participate in this year's Daylesford NYE parade. If you'd like to join us, please stay tuned for more deets.

Here's us at last year's event: