Highline/SeaTac Botanical Gardens will be hosting their annual “Ice Cream Social and Plant Sale” on Sunday, Aug. 15th, with special guest Ciscoe Morris and FREE ice cream to the first 300 guests.

Here are the details:

WHAT: Ice Cream Social & Plant Sale with Ciscoe Morris.

WHEN: Sunday, August 15, 2010, 1:00pm to 4:00pm.

WHERE: Highline/SeaTac Botanical Gardens, located at 13735 24th Ave S, SeaTac, WA 98168.

INFO: From a flier (download PDF here):

Join us in the garden on Sunday, August 15th for our 4th annual Ice Cream Social.

This year’s Celebrity Guest will again be Ciscoe Morris, who hosts “Gardening with Ciscoe” on KIRO 97.3 FM radio and KING 5/NWCN television, and is the author of the best-selling garden tome, “Ask Ciscoe”, as well as a weekly column in the Seattle Times.

Ciscoe’s topic will be “Create a Hummingbird Haven in a Pot or Garden ”

The fun starts at 1:00 p.m., with Ciscoe taking center stage in the Celebration Rose Garden at around 2:30 p.m.

Local nurseries & designers will plant 10 gorgeous pots. Register to vote for your favorite container & get a chance to take it home for free. Door prizes & free ice cream to the first 300 guests!

More information: www.highlinegarden.org or 206-391-4003.

Other featured events include:

• Silent Auction
  Bid on a variety of great items including two Aw Pots personally planted by Ciscoe, a room at SeaTac’s Radisson Hotel, a sightseeing flight around Seattle with pilot Warren Hendrickson, an original oil painting by Kathy Wyckoff, garden art, garden tools, a complete bird-gardening kit, and more!
• “Humm-dingers!!!”
  Local nurseries and designers will again plant up 10 gorgeous pots donated by Aw Pottery. This year’s theme is plants that attract hummingbirds. Just show up and register to vote for your favorite container and get a chance to take it home for FREE!!! HGBF members get two extra chances to win! Memberships will be on sale the day of the event.

Participating designers and nurseries include Clinton Bamboo Growers, Design of the Times, Dogwood Design, Minter’s Earlington Greenhouse and Nursery, Furney’s, West Seattle Nursery, Herr Backyard Garden Center, and Branches Garden Center.

• Free Aw Pottery Pot to first 40 new members!
  Be one of the first forty people to join the Highline Botanical Garden Foundation during the event and receive a gorgeous, frost-proof Aw Pottery pot! (NOTE: IF YOU PLAN ON ENTERING THE CONTEST, BRING A VEHICLE LARGE ENOUGH TO TAKE HOME YOUR WINNINGS! THE PLANTED POTS ARE BETWEEN 24″ AND 36″ TALL AND MAY WEIGH AS MUCH AS 75 POUNDS!)
• Door Prizes Galore!!!
  Register to win two free passes to the 2010 NW Flower and Garden Show, a “Cascadia” compost bin from the City of SeaTac, and gift packages from Benson’s Best Bites, Hey Paison, The Tin Room Bar and Grill, 909 Coffee and Wine, Vino Bello, Mick Kelly’s Irish Pub, and Elliot Bay Brewpub.
• Free Ice Cream to the first 300 guests!
  Please join us in the garden for an afternoon of the very best in gardening “edu-tainment”, ice cream, and of course, brussels sprouts!

For directions to the garden, click here.

For years, families have been bombarded with messages about eating healthier.  More recently, revelations about pesticide use and the costs of fossil fuel have added new pressures to “go organic” and “eat local.”  Doing so seems like a luxury to most working families, and its true that the costs of purchasing healthy, organic food can be prohibitive.  However, as it turns out, there’s an affordable way to put organic, delicious food on the table without ever leaving home, and there’s a new program in White Center dedicated to helping residents do just that.

This summer, White Center residents who’d like to start growing their own food will have the opportunity to receive free, in-person guidance from an experienced gardener, thanks to the Garden Helpers Program.  The brainchild of Aviva Furman, the founding director of Community Harvest of Southwest Seattle, Garden Helpers is dedicated to helping locals grow their own food with the space and resources they have available.  Residents who contact the program will be connected with a volunteer who will help them figure out how to design, build, plant, and maintain their very own garden.

The Garden Helpers volunteers, 23 in all, are currently training with Seattle Tilth and Community Harvest of Southwest Seattle in sustainable, affordable organic gardening techniques. A devoted gardener herself, Aviva Furman remembers well the frustrations of her early attempts to grow her own food, and how instrumental the advice of veteran gardeners proved in helping her get her own garden growing.  “I would just love to see more people gardening, for a lot of reasons,” she reflected in a recent interview.  “To supplement their income, because its fun, because you can grow really healthy food, because I find it so much easier to have a salad for dinner, say, if you’ve got the lettuce two feet away instead of in the supermarket or rotting in your fridge because you forgot where you put it.  I find it to be very rewarding and I would like to see more people doing it.  That was the drive behind the Garden Helpers program.”  She points out that it doesn’t take a giant yard to grow delicious food at home: apartment dwellers can take inspiration from the example of Furman’s 98-year old father, who is “still growing tomatoes on his rooftop in downtown Philadelphia.”

The Garden Helpers program is administered by Community Harvest of Southwest Seattle, a three-year old organization dedicated to “reduc[ing] hunger by increasing access to fresh fruits and vegetables for [their] neighbors in West Seattle and White Center.”  Community Harvest organizes a yearly gleaning effort to gather and donate to the food bank fruit from local trees that would otherwise go to waste.  They have also established several community gardens in the White Center area, and made it possible for White Center and West Seattle residents to take gardening classes from the Seattle Tilth organization in their own neighborhoods, without ever crossing the bridge.

To learn more about Community Harvest’s Programs, visit their website at www.gleanit.org.  If you’re interested in getting connected with a Garden Helper, call Community Harvest at 206.762.0604, or email info@gleanit.org.

The announcement for the Garden Helpers program is provided below.

Want to grow your own food but don’t know where to start?  We can help!

Garden Helpers is a new program from Community Harvest of Southwest Seattle. Experienced gardeners, trained by Seattle Tilth, can provide you with free, in-person advice to design, install, or maintain your own vegetable garden. Whether you have a backyard garden, P-Patch, or container garden, Garden Helpers are mentors who can help you get started on a garden, choose the right plants, and answer all of your questions about growing your own vegetables. If you live in West Seattle or White Center and would like help from a Garden Helpers volunteer, call us at (206) 762-0604 or send us an e-mail at info@gleanit.org.

¿Quiere cultivar su propia comida pero no sabe en donde empezar?

¡Nosotros de podemos ayudar! Ayudantes del Jardín es un nuevo programa de Community Harvest of Southwest Seattle. Jardineros con experiencia, entrenados por Seattle Tilth, los pueden apoyar con ayuda y consejos gratis, para diseñar, instalar o mantener tu propio jardín de verduras. Si usted tiene un jardín en su casa, un P-Patch o un jardín en una maseta, nuestros Ayudantes del Jardín te pueden ayudar escoger las semillas correctas y contestar todas tus preguntas sobre como cultivar tus propias verduras. Si usted vive en West Seattle o White Center y quiere la ayuda de un voluntario de Ayudantes del Jardín, llámenos a: 206-762-0604 o mándenos un correo electrónico a info@gleanit.org

(Thanks to Andrea Fuentes-Diaz for translation).

The Highline Historical Society’s annual Highline Garden Tour fundraiser has been expanded to include five private gardens as well as the Highline SeaTac Botanical Garden, and will be held on Saturday, June 12th.

Garden Tour participants will enjoy outstanding gardens, artist displays, musical performances, two separate plant sales, Master Gardener advice and coupon specials throughout the day.

There also will be a screening of the Ken Slusher documentary about the piece-by-piece transfer of the lovely Seike Garden out of the path of SeaTac Airport expansion to its new home at the Botanical Gardens.

Here are the details:

WHAT: Highline Historical Society’s fundraising Highline Garden Tour.

WHEN: Saturday, June 12th, from 10am – 5pm.

TICKETS: Advance tickets are $12.00 for parties of 4 or more, and $15.00 for individual tickets.

Day of sale tickets will be $18.00.

Tickets may be purchased at Burien Bark and Herr Backyard Garden Center in Burien, or from the Society by telephone at 206-241-5786.

INFO: To join the Highline Historical Society (we’re members), click here.

The Society thanks business sponsors John L. Scott Real Estate agent Susan Plecko, Burien Bark, Herr Backyard Garden Center, The Bean, and Sal’s Deli for their generous support of the Garden Tour.

White Center Heights Park Community Garden is back for a second year, and there is still some space available.

The garden is located by the White Center Food Bank, at SW 102nd and 7th Ave SW (see map below).

Each raised garden space is 7 feet by 3 feet and assigned at no cost to community members or groups.

The goal of each garden, according to community distributed flyers, is to “enable families to be self-sufficient, well nourished and connected with the larger community.”

Gardeners can plant and manage their spaces between April 21st and March 14th, 2010. Each bed is organic and only organic fertilizers and non-toxic pest control can be used. While pesticides are not allowed, organic resources and tools will be made available for gardeners as needed.

For more information contact Audrey Zemke at 206-762-2848 or email Audrey@whitecenterfoodbank.org.

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The White Center Blog gives a big green “Thumbs Up” to Clean Air Lawn Care, our latest Advertiser!

Do you know that 5-10% of the Nation’s Air pollution is attributed to small engines like the ones used in gas powered lawn care equipment – mowers, blowers, edgers and trimmers?

Or that gas lawn mowers consume some 580 million gallons of gasoline annually of which 25-35% escapes unburned – that’s on top of the 17 million gallons that are spilled annually by people filling up gas mowers?

Clean Air Lawn Care of West Seattle is “Changing the Way America Mows the Lawn” by using only battery and electric operated equipment powered by renewable energy sources. The solar panels on their trucks are used to harvest the solar energy and recharge their equipment throughout the day.

Adam Werner, Owner of Clean Air Lawn Care, has been a Seattle resident since 1995 and a West Seattle resident in the Riverview Neighborhood since 2004. He has been involved with his Riverview Neighborhood group to help save the Sound Ways property from private development. He is also a member of the Highland Park Improvement Committee and a new member of Sustainable West Seattle.

In 2008, Clean Air Lawn Care was able to reduce air pollutants by 2289 pounds or the equivalent of 70,158 vehicle miles driven. According to the EPA, in 1 hour, 1 gas mower:

1. Pollutes the same as 40 late model cars.
2. Emits the amount of hydrocarbons as a SUV driven 23,600 miles.
3. Contributes 93 times more smog-forming emissions than 2006 cars.

Another huge advantage of the electric equipment is the lack of noise – it’s 50-70% quieter than traditional lawn equipment. So not only do you not have to smell the gas burning, you don’t have to hear it either. This is great for working from home, napping children, and not disturbing your neighbors on a nice sunny afternoon.

Adam says that their equipment is so quiet, “We’ve had several customers tell them that they did not even know we were at their house!”

Adam and his crew are knowledgeable, professional and courteous. They provide all of Burien, White Center, Des Moines (and beyond) spring and fall clean ups, mowing, blowing, edging, trimming, weeding, mulching, hedge trimming (up to 7 ft) and other hourly work as required.

Outside of the electricity generated by the solar panels, Clean Air participates in the Seattle Green Up program and all additional electricity used is purchased from a renewable energy broker. The windpower they purchase is used to power the lawn equipment and offices, qualifying the entire organization as carbon neutral.

Be sure to stop Adam, Josh, or Chelsea when you see them in your neighborhood to get a look at the truck with the solar panels (see photo above). Josh would love to talk you about his passion for photography – his work can be seen at www.joshuakenneymiller.com/Abstract.html.

Chelsea would be more than happy to show you some of the jewelry she makes or even teach your kids to play the piano. Check out her work at www.seatemple.etsy.com.

Help your neighborhood become clean and quieter and help Clean Air Lawn Care “Change the Way America Mows the Lawn” – please click on their Ad, check out their website, or contact Adam directly at 206-941-4180!