one last salad...

It's officially fall and today with the sky full of dark clouds it feels like it. I'm celebrating our short summer with one last summer salad sandwich. Despite the fact that we planted out garden in late July we still got to enjoy lots of greens, swiss chards, and a few tomatoes!



Garden Summer Sandwich

*Ciabiatta bread (but any bread can be used)

*Whole grain mustard

*Sliced tomato

*An assortment of greens (Rainbow swiss Chard,

*Mustard Greens, lettce, etc)

*Low-fat cheese

YUM!!!!

 Happy Fall!!

.chives.

Clives are a member of the allium family. These allium herbs were popular among the Egyptians, Greeks and Romans. The strong odor, so typical of these herbs, is due to a variety of sulfur compounds, such as alkyl sulfoxides and allyl sulfides. They are reported to have beneficial effects on the circulatory, digestive and respiratory systems.

A beautiful herb but HOW do you cook with it??

The leaves are best used when fresh. However, they may also be finely chopped and frozen for later use. The leaves, however, do not keep their flavor when dried. Chives have a mild onion flavor. Their pungency is not as pronounced as that of garlic and onions, which are considered the bigger cousins of chives. The delicate flavor that chives impart to food makes it a very useful herb to use in a variety of situations.

 

Soups, Stews, Salads and Sauces

Chives are widely used in stews and soups, especially potato and asparagus soups. The chopped leaves can be sprinkled in salads or used to flavor various sauces, dips, soy mayonnaise, and sour cream. Chives can also be used to garnish cottage cheese, and potatoes.

Try this quick, healthy, and super tasty recipe this week!

Egg Salad Sandwich

all this helpful chive info was found at: http://www.vegetarian-nutrition.info/herbs/chives.php

Who doesn't love quesadillas??

Honestly, tortillas and cheese?? What's not to love! So we decided to add some yummy garden goodies to our quesadillas to pump up the nutritional value in these yummy eats.

Swiss chard and spinach anyone?
Swiss chard is a dark leafy green that is full of vitamins A, K and C. It is also rich in minerals, dietary fiber and protein.^[4]

So we began to google Swiss chard recipes and found this:
http://oheatdirt.blogspot.com/2010/06/swiss-chard-or-spinach-tacos-with.html

WOWZA.

So we made out our concoction...
Swiss chard & spinach quesadillas

Prep time: About 10 mins

Cook time: 5 mins

Ingredients:
-1 1/2 tablespoons vegetable oil or olive oil

-3 garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped or crushed through a garlic press

-A big bunch of Swiss chard thick lower stems cut off 

-A big bunch of spinach

-Salt to taste
-12 warm corn tortillas
-1 cup low-fat cheese (we used mozzarella)

-Heat the oil in a pan,
-Add the garlic and let saute for a few minutes to release all the flavor (don't let it burn)
-then add in all the swiss chard and spinach.
-Let cook down
-Add salt to taste.

 
 

Warm tortillas and then add cheese and swiss chard & spinach mix.

  

Enjoy. 

face paint

What's a good party without face paints? Right?

We are lucky enough to have a very talented Receptionist, Rosa share her amazing face painting skills with all the garden go-ers!! Here are the results:

 

And the Artist, Rosa.

**FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT HAVING FACE PAINTING AT YOUR NEXT EVENT OR PARTY**
SEND AN E-MAIL TO piink.iink@ymail.com

it was a party!!

welcome to the garden!

our first guests!

the bubble station was a HIT!

Even tinkerbell made an appearance!

We loved seeing families explore the gardens together!

Tinkerbell couldn't get enough of the bubbles!!

Sandra, our Dietician shared lots of good tips
 about our yummy produce!

We had lots of good eats!

The garden party wouldn't of been complete without Carlos cutting the grand opening ceremony ribbon!!

The garden is officially open!!

We learned about how much you
can grow with $15!

Dental staff came to show us how to
properly brush our teeth! Thanks Dental!

And of course NONE of this would've been possible
without our garden angel, Laura (aka Garden Lady!)
We can't thank you enough

WAHOOOOO!!!! For a successful garden party! Thanks to everyone who supported the event!

          

 

Happy National Health Center Week!

You're invited!!!!!

vertical gardening...

Do you live in an apartment? Do you live somewhere with not much green space? Do you want to grow? If so, vertical gardening can be a perfect solution. There are soo many different ways to "grow up" but we decided to use recycled shipping palates. They can be found anywhere (even look on craigslist!!) and don't many uses (or at least I thought..).

Laura, also known as "the garden lady" collected some old 2 liter pop bottles cut off the bottoms, painted them black, and beautified them with some lively colored acrylic paints. wow!

Laura is not only a great gardener but a great colorist! Look at this shipping pallets!! So vibrant! This is just what we need in gloomy Snohomish co. She used spray paint that you can find almost anywhere (i.e. Home Depot, Lowe's, Fred Meyer, etc.)

You're almost ready to plant!! The next steps are so easy:
1. Drill the bottles to the boards.
2. Cut a small square of landscaping fabric and place in the bottom of each bottle
(we don't want the soil falling out)
3. Removed the caps on the bottles
4. Add soil/compost mixture to bottles
5. PLANT!!!!!

TIP: You can arrange the bottles in any order you like but remember if you have bottles above other bottles like this:
I     I     I
I     I     I
I     I     I
be sure to put the plants that need the MOST water ON TOP. 

TADA!! We are still adding more bottles but here is our work in progress...
So easy and affordable! Some people like doing an herb garden, others have made salad gardens,  what would you like to have???

Have you made a vertical garden before? Do you have any tips for us?
 Please share!!

Here are some great resources:

http://www.improvisedlife.com/2011/05/11/d-i-y-shipping-pallet-vertical-garden/

http://lifeonthebalcony.com/how-to-turn-a-pallet-into-a-garden/

planting day...



One of our 4x4 beds with a raised section for
plants that need a little more deepth to grow!

 


This is going to be our salsa garden!



                                    

Busy at work!!! Our Care Coordinator, The Garden Lady,
and our Nutritionist planting away!!





 

   

 

                  


rainbow swiss chard! yum!



our health educator and dietician planting away!!

                    

                                                               Planting day!!! WAHOO!! 

As you can see it was quite a success!  Can you believe it? 

Someone described it as "our little garden that could!"We are so excited to be growing!

We got some great green thumb help from our Nutritionist and our Chronic Care Coordinator!

Next week we'll be talking more about vertical gardening!!

day two

Day two was filled with painted pallets for vertical gardening (see bottom picture). Have you heard of vertical garden?? Everyone can do it (even apartment dwellers and lawn lacking people!!)!! 

Educate yourself! 

We also sawed off the bottoms of some old Home Depot buckets (see top picture). Bucket gardening is perfect for those wonderful YET invasive plants such as mint, lemon balm, and other wild growing plants. This way you can enjoy them with them taking over your life (I speak from experience.) 

Laura has been checking out all the local nursery sales for end-of-season goodies...

stay tuned to see what she has found!!

day one

  

 

So the journey begins with bags of compost, a tool box, and our starting point garden. Then we got rained out but still very determined we decided to begin building our 4x4 beds in the staff lunch room! By the afternoon the sun was out and we were ready to ripe up some sod and our 3 4x4 beds!!

  

        It was a successful day one! Three beds ready to go and our pile of sod is on it's way to become great compost for later in the season! (Yes, that is an answering machine holding it down oh the things you find by train tracks!!). Stay tune...