My Day with Traditional Home at Gerritsen Beach Community Garden with We Rebuild

If you visited yesterday, you would know that I spent the day on Thursday in Gerritsen Beach, a town devastated by Hurricane Sandy and still today feeling the pain from that event.

 



At the invitation of Traditional Home Magazine, Meredith Corporation and WeRebuild, I was able to take part in the rebuilding of the Gerritsen Beach Community Garden that flank the public library and partially open to the public.











Still, the public library for all those in this town, is a BookMobile as they still try and rebuild the space that was so badly damaged by the storm.
This touches my heart specifically, as our own town library was the only refuge my family and I had for nearly 2 weeks without power. Where we stayed warm, had a place to have a hot drink, see friends and neighbors and most importantly not sit in the dark.. which I can tell you is very difficult after days on end and when the sun sets so early.

The big problem with the gardens is that when the ocean waters came in, the salt water killed a lot of plants, trees, shrubs, etc... We had to pull out all the weeds (this may sound like an easy task, but I can assure you IT WAS NOT!) 

Traditional Home's Instagram shot of Beth Brenner & I weeding 

Our GOAL: To create a beautiful space with low maintenance plants and to add a variety of trees, shrubs, and colorful perennials.. all low-maintenance. 
So much of the garden had an underlying tarp that made it very difficult to pull the weeds out (this tarp is meant to stop the weeds from growing, but was in pretty bad shape so it became intertwined with the weeds instead.



So throughout most of the day, the Garden Team made up of many different members from the Meredith Group, all pitched in to at least allow for the garden to be planted the following day. 
We did get to plant a few flowers and trees and what a difference that made..

BEFORE

AFTER

My Partners in Crime - Kari Costas and Clara Haneberg from Traditional Home .. these girls meant business! 

We pulled out trees, and plants that were not in great shape, ..

Mountains of mulch and soil..

all made it possible to begin the replanting..

Out with the OLD.. and in with the NEW

Please Support this Cause by REPINNING this image onto your pinterest boards.. or Facebook, Twitter .. whereever you are socially.. and use the Hashtag #WEREBUILD to help bring awareness to this event and cause. Thank You!

I am so thankful to Traditional Home for inviting me to take part in this event, helping others REBUILD.

The other teams were busy rebuilding homes, the town center and the Kiddie beach.. which are up on the blog next. So stay tuned for that as well as an exclusive chance encounter with a lovely lady that invited me into her home, to see how she is still trying to rebuild After Sandy.