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☞  videos from my garden


WHAT IS THIS? 

I can help you set up a vegetable garden to grow your own food and connect with the land. It can be a one time thing, or an ongoing bi-weekly gardener relationship (limited spots).

Example: 100sq ft. Sunny’s Garden

Planning and garden prep and planting $250*
Irrigation planning and set up $300*

*prices don’t include materials like soil and irrigation tubing etc


Sunny had already put together a planter bed last year but didn’t have much success and wanted help to set up her garden for the summer season.


Step 1 - Contact: She completed my survey and sent me some recent photos of her space.



Step 2 - Planning:

We planned a short 30 minute meeting at her location, where I showed her my seed selection and seedlings and a plan was made based on that meeting.


 


Step 3 - Planting:  We had a 2.5h garden session where we weeded, amended the soil, planted and mulched. Sunny wanted to be part of this process so she helped. After this I sent her a list of all the seeds we planted and their information.






Step 4: Sunny handwatered all the seeds and seedlings we planted, once a day for 3 weeks. She sent me progress photos when everything started sprouting, so exciting! In the meantime I worked on an irrigation plan and a cost spreadsheet so Sunny knew aproximately how much it would cost:


Step 5 - Irrigation: On the 3rd week I went in to check on everything and install an irrigation system. I made a plan and got all the supplies needed and it took about 3hours to set up everything bymyself. 


I also brought some more flowers and lettuce to add to the garden



Step 6 - Done or Mainenance Plan: You’re done with me! I will give you advice on how to take care of the plants and the ways I keep my garden happy. Or I can come back and check in on your garden if you sign up for bi-weekly maintenance (this also means, I will probably keep bringing you plants if you have space and want them haha). Here’s an update from Sunny a week after the irrigation was installed: 






Sunny is now on the maintenance plan.
Photos from 4 weeks later:  I did some thinning, pruning, and adding some supports to the ones Sunny installed herself, sprayed a solution of baking soda and water to support some plants prone to mildew and talked about every plant with Sunny as we harvested some herbs (the basil and cilantro were popping off!)





So if you’re ready to set up your own vegetable garden, fill in this questionnaire that will help me give you an estimate and plan the 30minute first garden meet up from Step 2. 



WHY

This will be my second Summer with my own garden, growing vegetables, flowers and fruit! But not the first time I’ve gardened. I grew up with a gardener dad in Cyprus, and a lot of my garden plants were chosen because they remind me of my family. Working with the land, wether that’s gardening or making with clay has always been a passion and special interest of mine.

The more time I spend in my garden, the more I want to learn about how the Indigenous peoples of the Bay Area lived and cared for the land, and how they do that in the present day. The Huchiun is the ancestral homeland of the Confederate Villages of Lisjan, now known as the East Bay. 



This was really great to watch and learn from

Featuring (Ohlone) Corrina Gould the tribal spokesperson for the Confederated Villages of Lisjan.  Born and raised in her ancestral homeland, the territory of Huchiun, she is the mother of three and grandmother of four. Corrina has worked on preserving and protecting the sacred burial sites of her ancestors throughout the Bay Area for decades.

Talks about:
- Importance and meaning of the land acknowledgment
- Indigenous women leadership 
- History and Mission of the Sogorea Te' Land Trust
- The future of the organization and how communities can contribute


Sogorea Te’ Land Trust, is an urban Indigenous women-led land trust based in the San Francisco Bay Area that facilitates the return of Indigenous land to Indigenous people. On their website there’s a list of ways you can support them, and one of them is to pay the Shuumi Land Tax. A voluntary annual contribution that non-Indigenous people living on the Confederated Villages of Lisjan’s territory can make to support the critical work of the Sogorea Te’ Land Trust.


My goal is to tend to the land in our neighborhood in a respectful manner, and encourage a connection with the land and people, by helping my neighbors set up their own gardens. I imagine exchanging seeds, produce, knowledge with my neighbors and support the land together.  

In my architecture studies I learned a lot about the urban history of the Bay Area, but also about the marshlands, saltflats and other environments that exist here.
I volunteered for 3 months at the Alcatraz Island Historic Gardens (if you haven’t been, you should!) where I learned about a rose that was once considered extinct until it was discovered on the island, and got fascinated with composting after learning from a retired microbiologist, Dick Miner, who they call the Chief Composting Officer on the island.

The past year, I’ve been doing gardening gigs and was lucky to be exposed to many different types of plants and gardening methods.