Garden Launch a great success!!!

Hi all,
what a great day for all involved with the garden.  Our garden launch was today and we were blessed with fabulous weather!
I am so pleased for all the pupils involved with today - you were an absolute credit to the school, yourselves and you parents.  Well done!!!
Also we were so pleased to celebrate the opening of the garden with so many important people -
Mayor Hillis - The Mayor of Coleraine - officially opened the garden
David Mc Clarty MLA
John Dallat MLA
Awards for All Programme Manager
Jim Allen - Coleraine Borough Council Environment Officer
Parents (who were one of the most important guests)
Board of Governors
etc

I know all the pupils loved that your garden was so well received.  I really is something to be proud of .  I want to thank everyone for all the hard work that has been put in in the last few weeks in particular.  The power of teamwork is amazing!!!  Well done!
I just want to thank RACHEL, NAOMI, ROISIN AND MEGAN in particular for the gift of the scrapbook that you made for me.  You must have put in so much time and effort into this.  I will treasure this.  I wanted to share your poem with everyone as it is so funny (I hope you don't mind!)


Mrs Toman's Garden

Mrs Toman would dig and sow
till she made a little garden

And Roisin kept splashing
in Mrs Toman's garden

Of Rachel's there were two
and they had plenty to do
in Mrs Toman's garden

And Becky kept everything watery
in Mrs Toman's garden

Then there's Louise whose smile kept everyone pleased
In Mrs Toman's garden

And Shea made it most days
In Mrs Toman's garden

And for Courtney there were the bees
In Mrs Toman's garden

And Chloe tended leaves
In Mrs Toman's garden

And Aaron weeded onions
In Mrs Toman's garden

And Ellen always had a hand to lend
In Mrs Toman's garden

And Lucie was always busy
In Mrs Toman's Garden

And from Carl there was never a snarl
In Mrs Toman's garden

And that Katy one loved a good scallion
In Mrs Toman's garden


And Ben his advice has no end
In Mrs Toman's garden


And Megan put cuttings in
In Mrs Toman's garden


And Naomi did everything happily
In Mrs Toman's garden

But Mrs Toman let them go
And they all sat down to their toast in a row
In Mrs Toman's garden




I loved this poem!!  You are all so creative!!!

I will put some other photos on of the launch when I get them  - I didn't get time to take any photos today but I will get some and publish when I do.

These are some photos of Conor Mc Clelland in front of the ECO GREENHOUSE he designed.  He is a star!

This is all for now.

Carrots find a home in wellies!

Hi all,

we planted some of our carrots in interesting homes today!  Wellies!  They look really cool and we hope to get more wellies brought in to plant more of them in more colourful homes!
We also planted an old boot with flowers which look really cute.

We thinned out the cabbages and broccoli again  - we have planted some of the thinned out planted up the middle of the potato patch.

Our pumpkins have started to grow as well  - all 6 seeds are growing well.  We are very excited about this!

Our greenhouse is also almost up - just the glass to put in.  Thanks Stephen!

We now have 3 fish in the pond - they look a bit lonely in such a big pond so we will have to get some more.  Each class is trying to raise the money to get one.

We had 17 pupils at the club today which is great for a wet day!  Well done everyone for turning up!

Tidy up day!

Not very exciting today - but we still had lots of jobs to do.  Watering, weeding and thining out the young cabbage and broccoli seedlings.  Becky discovered that you could tell the difference between the broccoli and the cabbage seedlings by tasting them!  The tiny broccoli plants already tasted exactly of broccoli but the cabbage did not taste of much.  Well done Becky!
All pupils planted the thinned out plants into a yoghurt pot and they can plant these into a pot at home to grow on.
Not much else to report.  Will update next week.

Fish have arrived!

Hi all,
lots happening today!

Rebecca and Amy who have been saving their 2p's and 1p's every monday with Mrs Toman for months went to the fish shop and got their 2 baby Koi fish today.  They are very cute and we loved putting them in to their new home.

In gardening club, another busy day:

• planted up the flower baskets with strawberries and mint
• sowed the pumpkin seeds and covered them so that the birds don't get them
• weeded all the raised beds
• staked the peas with bamboo canes and sowed more peas as a full row didn't come up so we think the birds got to them.  We have covered them this time so this might protect them!
• planted chives
• thinned out the letttuces - we ate the thinned out ones - they were yummy!!!
• watered everything  - alot!!!!

Also our potatoes are coming through so this is good.

That is all for now - will update next week.

Weeding day today.

Hi all,

we were busy today with all the weeding in our vegetable patches.  They were also very dry so we had to water everything alot.

The lettuces that we planted last week under their little blanket are doing well.  It is interesting that the little lettuces that were well in under the blanket have grown more than the other ones that were more exposed.  We think the blanket therefore must have worked!

Our pond has got it's liner in and we will soon be able to fill it with water and then in a few weeks we should be able to add the fish.

Stephen has been busy and the rockery is finished with little plants growing in it.  It looks really nice.  We also got the wild grass seed in to sow our wild area and this has wildflowers in it so it should be nice.

That is all for now - will update next week.

Lettuces put to bed today!

Hi all,

we planted our tiny little lettuces outside today in rows in our raised bed vegetable patch. 

Apparentlty Mrs Nutt says that their is supposed to be a frost tonight so we had to put a vegetable blanket over our little lettuces so they don't get killed by the frost.

We also planted some broccoli seeds today straight out into the vegetable patch. 

Our peas are starting to come up but only 3 of our garlic plants are growing!  Ahh!!!!!!

Maybe they will grow soon.

Our sweetcorn is still growing tall.

Will keep you updated next week.

Spuds planted today!

Hello all,
another busy day at the gardening club.  We planted two rows of seed potatoes today.  Mrs Nutt says they should be ready to dig up in September at the start of the new year.
We also repotted our peppers into bigger pots and they seem to be thriving.  They will grow even quicker when our greenhouse is built in the next week or two.
We repotted our one and only sweetcorn into a bigger pot as well and this also looks to be doing well.
We watered our little trees that are in pots  - they were looking a little dry so we hope they will recover.  Mrs Toman says we can plant these out next week as it would be better for them to be in the ground as then they will not dry out.
The lettuce that we sowed in seed trays last week are growing well and should be ready to go into the ground next week.
That is all we got up to today.  Sorry no photos today as Mrs Toman forgot her camera.
Will update next week.