Gardening for Beginners, By a Beginner - Part 3

I hope you stopped by the Museum yesterday for the Spring Fling, and celebrated the opening of our outdoor learning center...The Wild Place! It was a beautiful day of nature and green fun!

So here it is, the final part of "Gardening for Beginners, By a Beginner." It has been four weeks and all of my plants have sprouted! I tried my luck with four different seeds: pea plants, basil, lime basil, and parsley. I think I might actually have a green thumb, and may have found a new hobby. Either way, I can't wait to make homemade hummus and try some new recipes with my homegrown herbs.

Now as the weather gets nicer, we can finally move our plants outdoors from their spot on the windowsill for some fresh air and sunlight. It is important to slowly get our plants used to a different climate by exposing them to small amounts at a time.


As with any other living thing, plants need room to grow, so the time has also come to transfer them to a bigger container. Same as before, you can buy and design your own pot or rinse and re-use to really get creative.

For a fun project to do with your little gardener, buy or use an old beach pail. Put rocks in the bottom for drainage again, add more soil, and then your plant sprouts. Beach pails or buckets with a handle are convenient and easy to transport for different sunlight exposure.

And since we live in New England, and there is still a chance of frost until about mid May, we won't be able to plant outside right away. But, that doesn't mean our plants can't soak up some sun during the day and go back to their home inside at night until it is warm enough. You may choose to plant them outside in a garden with your kids or try different seeds as it gets warmer.

Take the chance to admire and enjoy what you have created from just a little seedling, you've earned it!


-Jennifer Nash
Public Relations and Development Intern, Childrens Museum Easton

Blue is The New "Green"

75% of our planet is made up of water, and we all need water to survive. During the Museum’s Spring Fling we will be talking about what we can do to at home to “Go Green in Your Backyard.” But did you know that conserving water is also a very important step in working towards a healthier environment for our animal friends and us?

I had the chance to see the trailer for the upcoming Disneynature film: OCEANS, opening in theaters on Earth Day (April 22), and it looks pretty incredible! Disneynature has teamed up with The Nature Conservancy as part of “See OCEANS, Save Oceans” and a portion of each ticket sold during the film’s opening week (April 22-28) will go towards new marine protected areas in the Bahamas!
Here’s the trailer and link to the movie website: http://disney.go.com/disneynature/oceans/?videos

I love the ocean, and this has inspired me to find ways that we all can help. And, April 11-17 is National Environmental Education Week, so it is the perfect time to start. To learn more check out http://www.eeweek.org/

It’s really pretty easy for anyone to make a few changes at home to help conserve water and energy. Here are a few to get you started:

• Take shorter showers.
• Turn off the faucet while brushing your teeth. (This wastes about a gallon a minute!)
• Turn off lights when you leave a room.
• Run washing machines and dishwashers only when they are full.
• Turn the thermostat up two degrees and the summer and down two degrees in the winter.
• And most importantly: Recycle, Recycle, Recycle!
The MarineBio Conservation Society lists these and many more in their 100 Ways to Make a Difference.

Another great website that I found is Kids for Saving Earth. It’s geared towards teaching children all aspects of conservation. Check out the “water” section to learn about marine creatures, and what you can do in your home to help.
http://kidsforsavingearth.org/index.html

For more activities and ideas for kids, visit the Museum’s Kids Page. Create your own recyclable flowers and learn about what you can do in your local community to conserve.

-Jennifer Nash
Public Relations and Development Intern, Children’s Museum in Easton

Gardening for Beginners By A Beginner Part 1 - Homegrown Herbs

Are you sick of the snow and rain yet? Ready for some fun in the sun? I know I am! I am especially excited for the next few weeks leading up to our Spring Fling here at the Museum. For those of you who don't know, the Spring Fling is the annual opening celebration of our "Wild Place" outdoor learning center! We will be spending the whole day outside, learning how to create our own family gardens and the importance of community gardens.

That being said, I've started my own herb garden at home this week, and I thought you might want to do the same. For all you rookie gardeners like myself, herbs are a great way to start, and very KID FRIENDLY! Herbs can be grown indoors on a windowsill with plenty of sunlight, watered about once a week (be careful not to over-water), and be used for all of your cooking needs. All you need are: seeds, all-purpose compost, and a container. Be sure to put something in the bottom of the container to prevent root rot, I used rocks, but packaging peanuts work just as well.

Go "green" by washing and reusing

· old coffee tins

· peanut butter jars

· ice cream pints

· deli containers

· soda bottles (have your parents cut the top off)

OR buy your own pot and decorate it however you want. Paint it funky colors, use your favorite stickers, decoupage pictures or postcards from vacations...the possibilities are endless!

There are a whole lot of herbs that can be grown inside; basil, oregano, mint, parsley, and rosemary...just to name a few. Here's a great website I found with more tips on creating your own herb garden: allfreecrafts.com. You should start seeing some growth in a week or two, but you will have to wait 4-6 weeks to really use them...trust me, it will be worth the wait!

Good luck gardeners, and check back next week for part two of my gardening series for some yummy (healthy) recipes to make with your homegrown herbs!

-Jennifer Nash
Public Relations and Development Intern, Children's Museum in Easton.

Its Time for our Spring Fling!

Its FINALLY time for our official grand re-opening of the Wild Place!!! This Saturday, from 10-3 we will be having all kinds of fun activities during the Spring Fling to help welcome in springtime in our own backyard. We'll have all kinds of visitors, including Mother Nature, the Bristol Beekeepers and Miss Candy who will be here to make terrariums with us that we can take home.

I am particularly excited for the performance of the Girls from the Hill, Stonehill College's female a capella group, featuring our very own intern Katie Boyer! I can't wait to hear what they'll be singing. Right after their performance, the museum will be featuring a Question and Answer with a cast member from FETCH! with Ruff Ruffman! Make sure to be there to see what our special visitor will have to say.

There will be plenty of other things going on too, so be sure to stop by and check it out! All of our activities during the Spring Fling are free with general admission for the Museum.

Celebrate Earth Day!

This Wednesday, April 22nd, is Earth Day, a worldwide event that celebrates our planet and keeping it in good shape for future generations of kids!

People from across the world come together to reduce waste, recycle, plant trees, and promote awareness about the environment and what we can do for it. Here at the Museum we celebrate Earth Day in conjunction with the grand opening of our own little piece of the earth "The Wild Place" with this weekends Spring Fling! Our outdoor learning center the wild place is fantastic for kids to discover, explore, learn, play, run around and get in touch with mother earth!

Here's the trailer for the upcoming "Earth" movie from DisneyNature to help you get in the real Earth Day spirit! The movie takes you through a year in the life of three different families of creatures who live on this great planet and raise their children along side you and me!


Earth day 2009 from Zoltan Ladanyi on Vimeo.