WINTER PLANNING RETREAT

I am putting these two months together because this is typically a slower pace for us, as the gardens sleep, we plan and organize for the up-coming growing season. We had a new space for our annual retreat. The community foundation recently opened a new building in Cedar Falls. They have made it available at no charge for non-profit agencies in the Cedar Valley. It is a great facility and very comfortable. We were glad to be there.

MARCH

It is not unusual for this to be a “slow” month, with not much happening as the landscape can be very different from year to year. Anything from a mild early glimpse of Spring to a bleak landscape more akin to the depths of Winter. Or, anything in between. We had some early visitors but they got in free.

APRIL

The month when we really get started, we have our annual Waking up the Gardens event and ask for volunteers to come out and help get the grounds ready for the growing season.

As you can see in that photo; we had Tulips again this year, but before that; we saw signs of the continued miracle of new beginnings as perennials emerge once again.

We are fortunate that there are many companies that take the time to be involved in the community and visit us for a workday. In April we had these folks from Allen College visit.

Our director is always diligent in seeking out funding from various grant sources and late last year we were awarded money for two pieces of much-needed equipment: a new lawn mower and a new Gator

By the middle of April, the Magnolia Grove was awesome!

The Red Buds were looking good as well

We even had some Cheery blossoms this year

Toward the end of the month, the Tulips were magnificent!!!!

April is also when you need to burn your Prairie, in order to thrive, these plants need the old foliage cleared away every year or so. Thankfully the wonderful teachers and students at Hawkeye use us as an outdoor classroom and perform this task for us.

MAY

The pace begins to pick up. We usually hire garden interns for the season depending on what kind of budget we have available. We had three this year. These folks work extremely hard all summer. Here is this year’s group getting a bit of downtime with one of our guests for Story Time.

Standing is Emily, seated on the left is Michelle, and on the right is Edwina.

 Around Mother’s Day we have a plant sale.

Once we get past frost-free day (around May 15) planting begins in earnest as well as more clean-up.

CBE another of our wonderful business partners loaned us some of their employees for a work- day in our gardens. 

We had volunteers from Khol’s

We had kids from Orange Elementary School

And we have always had a dedicated group of volunteers that come out on a regular basis one of whom is:

Kathy Sadler

Perhaps the best part of May is that we begin to see how absolutely beautiful this place is going to become again.

We have the plants laid out for the Hobbit House Garden, ready to go in

And the rest of the gardens are telling us Spring is here

JUNE

We are now into the heart of the growing season. Everything is planted and has had a chance to mature. This is when the place puts on its’ pretty face, and my, is it ever pretty!

This also is when many of our wonderful events and classes begin.

I can never say enough about the folks who make it all possible, that would be the volunteers who work so hard just because they love gardening and spending time outside.

What better place to do that than CVABG?

This month a group from the UNI Orientation Staff came out. 

A huge group from Rabo came out and planted the entire Hobbit House Garden.

We are so fortunate to have a terrific gang of “regular” volunteers, without these dedicated people CVABG, would no longer exist

Sara Jansen

Kathy Payne

Randy Robinson and Gary Blonigan

The gentle gardeners, Jan Guthrie, Pam Hays, Pat McGivern (forgive me but I don’t know names for the other two)

June is the time for Shakespeare in the Gardens

We always need volunteers in the Welcome Center, this is one of our regulars, Steve Buckles

JULY

The gardens have moved into the SPECTACULAR stage.

More events this month are happening as well.

Bees & Brews

Summer Music Series

By July the gardens are the stars of the show and by gardens, I include all the marvelous displays of growing things including the shrubs, trees, and prairies.

STORYTIME:

In the summertime, as soon as school is out, we begin our weekly Story-time. This activity for children is our most popular event at CVABG and has been with us from the very beginning. The last several years, we have been recruiting guest readers from the community and it has worked very well.

AUGUST

For whatever reason, not many photos from August.

We did have a couple of events this month.

We have been doing classes since the beginning here at CVABG.

One that has proven to be popular is the Fairy Garden class, in my research, I have seen this one come up before.

Here is a look at this year’s offering.

September also means our biggest event of the year: Fall Harvest Festival. As always, our great group of volunteers are mobilized to accomplish the enormous amount of work it takes to put on the show!

Kathy and Jerry Durham

Melinda Young, Carol Duffel, Kay Rewarts

Marisa Dolan

Kathy Payne

Don Young

Some times we have great volunteers whose names I don’t know

I am not always behind the camera, this scare-crow was my namesake so I had my photo taken with him

Paul Kammerdiner

Per usual all kinds of good stuff going on at the festival.

Everyone had a great time! But now it’s time to go home

OCTOBER

This year is winding down and we hold a special Volunteer Appreciation event.

We had a special event for our new attraction in the Children’s Garden

October is always the time for spectacular foliage displays

NOVEMBER

We are near the end of another satisfying year at our favorite green space. There are two main things to do this month: We send out our annual fund-raiser bulletin 

And we put the gardens to bed

Randy Robinson, Bruce Clark, Warren George

Karen Blonigan, Roberta and Howard Craven

Sara Jansen and Paul Kammerdiner

Diane Clark, Yvonne Dugan, Karen Acton, Paula Sexton

Maurine Crisp

Kathy Payne

Pat McGivern

Paula Sexton

Bonnie Wetzel, Howard and Roberta

DECEMBER

Time for us to ride off into the sunset and dream about next year.