National Greenhouse News

(NORTHGLENN, CO) April 7, 2011 – Congratulations to LIFT – Levántate of San Rafael, California (www.lift-levantate.org), for winning the 2011 Community Garden Greenhouse Give-A-Way Contest. The non-profit organization will receive a free Cultivator Premier Greenhouse Kit for its community garden courtesy of National Greenhouse Co.

Applicants submitted an essay explaining the positive influences their community garden is currently having on volunteers and the community it serves. The essay deadline was February 28th and the winner was announced on March 15th. The contest winner was selected by a panel of management at National Greenhouse Co.

Richard Waxman, Executive Director and Community Advocate for LIFT – Levántate, was thrilled about the news and spoke about the opportunities the Cultivator Premier Greenhouse Kit will create for the community.

“A greenhouse kit will provide a prime teaching venue for us to offer and conduct our afterschool and community education workshops – year-round – on topics such as grafting, seed germination, transplanting, and more.”

LIFT – Levántate’s afterschool program at the Manzanita Child Development Center in Marin City, CA, serves children in grades 2-6 from low-income families and various ethnicities. The program utilizes what is called the “Fun Theory” to help develop physical ability and social and emotional confidence. The program focuses on nutrition, gardening, cooking, physical activity and transferable life skills to encourage positive social, physical and emotional growth. The greenhouse will enhance the program’s current organic garden which makes cooking and nutrition classes possible; and provide work experience for teens and community members to develop peer leadership skills.

National Greenhouse Co. would like to thank all of the applicants who took the time to submit their thoughtful stories; as well as acknowledge all of the proactive communities and volunteers across the nation who work to preserve and better community gardens.

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While a new greenhouse kit can add curb appeal through a stylish freestanding greenhouse or lean-to greenhouse model and theoretically increase your property value, that’s not what this article is about. This article is about those intangibles that are created when you add a hobby greenhouse to your property and help turn it from a house into a home.

Quality Time with the Family

By adding a greenhouse to your home you create an environment that lets you partake in family activities throughout the year. You can create a fun and interactive learning environment for children and teens which enables you to teach them how to grow and take care of a wide variety of plants. The quality time you spend together can’t be quantified in the numbers of hours spent together but rather the lasting memories it will create. Plus you get to have some fun results, especially if you plant fruits or vegetables. Once you’ve grown your crops you can take the fun into the kitchen and use the homegrown produce to cook and bake any number of things. The time spent together in your hobby greenhouse is priceless.

Quality Time Away From the Family

While this seems to be counterproductive to the first reason, it’s also a great reason. With the stresses of family life and running from school to work to event after event it can get hectic. Sometimes, you just need to get away from it all and relax. Gardening in your home greenhouse provides the escape you need, even if only for a few minutes of the day. Take a break, water the plants, breathe in the aromatic smells and then head back into the wonderful chaos of family life.

Learn New Skills for Little to No Cost

Adding a greenhouse kit to your house will have the obvious initial upfront costs but after that you can learn new skills at your own pace whether it’s trying to grow a tropical plant, growing those Christmas Poinsettia’s or growing your own strawberries to make homemade jams. There are so many new options to try with a greenhouse from baking and cooking, to making your own flower arrangements, to creating dried flowers for scrap booking. Most of the time the cost for you is only a pack of seeds, some water and a little bit of time but the skills learned become a source of personal pride.

Cut Down On Grocery Bills

This has been mentioned in our previous articles but it is a very valuable point to mention. When you add a home greenhouse kit to your home, you provide yourself with a great option to grow your own fruits and vegetables. It’s the freshest produce you can get and you can do it completely organic. A pack of seeds is all it takes and you’ll no longer have to spend a fortune at the grocery store on overpriced fruits and vegetables, meaning you’ll have more money to put away for that family vacation or new basement renovation.

Ultimately, adding a greenhouse kit to your house will help to quickly turn it into a home, leaving you and your family a number of fun new activities to take on without ever leaving the comfort of the house. Now that’s what we like to call real value.

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Gardening is one of those activities that is great for a person with a green thumb and those who want a fun and exciting hobby to pass the time; but that doesn’t mean you have to toil away alone at it. Gardening is a great way to meet new people and create a fantastic way to spend time and see positive results.

Communities all across the United States have developed gardens that are run and maintained by volunteers. They can be a small garden in an apartment complex or a large garden in a public park, size doesn’t matter, it’s all about the message they send. A community garden’s message is different from community to community but ultimately renowned scholar, Marshal McLuhan, said it best; “The medium is the message,” and in this case that medium is gardening. Gardening can help guide at-risk youth stay out of trouble, provide seniors with a hobby that keeps them active, and help teenagers and adults become teachers and learn in a practical hands-on environment all while building a positive centerpiece that communities can take pride in.

While scholars sit and debate that famous quote, that’s not what this article is about. We want to put the focus on how community gardens aid in building strong communities and how a greenhouse kit can help those gardens operate year round. Community gardens are an excellent addition to any community.

A community garden provides a place for hands-on education for people of all ages and helps to establish leaders and teachers. Community gardens are often found, but not limited to, lower income neighborhoods where children may be at a higher risk for dangerous behaviors. In the garden they can learn not only horticulture skills but life skills including healthy nutritional habits, teamwork, responsibility and finally practical skills; as they can be taught cooking skills using the fresh produce being grown in the garden.

While some states have a year round outdoor growing season that is not true for all the states and that is where a greenhouse kit becomes so valuable. If at-risk youth are able to continue maintaining the garden inside even a small hobby greenhouse, they will continue to learn and help them avoid those high-risk situations that they may otherwise find themselves in.

Greenhouse kits are often very affordable and are a great way to increase the attractiveness of the garden and the surrounding community. A hobby greenhouse kit is a great focal point for the garden and can help increase the sense of pride and accomplishment of the volunteers who have worked hard to create a welcome and inviting place for anyone to enjoy.

There is also the secondary benefit of the produce that is grown in community gardens. Often that produce is sold at local markets to help raise funds for new projects in the garden, or it is used to teach the garden volunteers how to cook and utilize fresh produce, or donated to local shelters to help feed those in need.  A community garden not only provides an entertaining hobby to those who participate in it but often times helps those in need by helping them to establish new skills or through the donation of produce grown. Adding a greenhouse kit to the mix will help to ensure that the pride, skills and donations can continue to grow, learn and contribute every month of the year.

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