Kids and Gardens and Markets, oh my!

On Friday, I found out that I got one of the internships that I wanted for the summer! I'd been concerned because the job actually starts almost two weeks before I'd be able to start (on account of our wedding and honeymoon--more on that to follow) and I'd already been rejected from another internship program at the same organization for that reason. But this one came through, so now I can share the exciting news that I'll be working as an intern with the Kids' Gardening Program at Community GroundWorks at Troy Gardens.

Troy Gardens is this awesome urban farming project a couple miles north of where we live here in Madison. Their missions are:

• To nurture a meaningful relationship between people and the land
  
• To grow wholesome and organic food for local tables
  
• To regenerate urban natural areas
• To cultivate a diverse learning community
  
• To teach what we practice
  
• To foster healthy communities and personal wellbeing
  

And, given that those are some of my own main missions in life, it looks like this gig will work out pretty nicely for me! The Kid's Garden, specifically, helps children from area community centers plant and maintain their own garden beds and participate in arts and crafts and cooking projects. So I'll be helping out with all that, and hopefully picking up some gardening skills of my own while I'm at it.

Which leads me to the next exciting part of this post, which is that I've acquired my own little 7' garden plot here at Lakewood Gardens, where we live. They have a few community garden plots, and I've managed to get one for myself. So, even though I doubt I'll be able to get out there to dig around in the dirt at all before May 14 (when I finish with my prelims, after *hopefully* passing my oral defense), after that date, I'll have a garden! And, thankfully, you can plant stuff a lot later around here than we did in Arkansas, so I think I'll still be ok getting some cucumbers and tomatoes and peppers into the ground in the second part of May. I've consulted this handy Dane County Planting Guide just to be sure.

And finally, to continue with all the excitement regarding fresh produce around these parts, today was the first day that the Dane County Farmer's Market was back outside, on the capital square! (there's a hint for all your wedding invitation acrostic puzzle-solvers!) And even though I was stuck inside working all day and couldn't actually find time to go to the market (which is a pretty big deal, as it's both the highlight of spring/summer in Madison and the largest producer-only market in the nation), just the very thought of all that asparagus and onion and winter spinach and rhubarb and cheese made me grin a little more than I might've otherwise.

Yay for vegetables!