“Creating a Sustainable Gardening Community” will be the main topic at the next Sustainable Burien meeting at 2pm on Sunday, March 14th at the Burien Library.

The speaker will be Craig Bye, who will talk about:

• Creating a sustainable gardening community.
• Info about Community Harvest of Southwest Seattle (CHOSS), their mission, goal, and community outreach
• Mentoring programs and how the community can get involved

Here are the details:

WHAT: Sustainable Burien’s monthly meeting will feature Craig Bye, who will speak about creating a sustainable garden community.

WHEN: Sunday, March 14th from 2pm to 4pm; doors open at 1:30pm.

WHERE: Multipurpose room of the Burien Library, located at 400 SW 152nd.

INFO: From a press release:

CREATING A SUSTAINABLE GARDENING COMMUNITY

Our speaker will be Craig Bye, who will talk to us about:

• Creating a sustainable gardening community.
• Info about Community Harvest of Southwest Seattle (CHOSS), their mission, goal, and community outreach
• Mentoring programs and how the community can get involved

Check out their website at: http://www.gleanit.org/index.html

The remainder of the meeting will be covering our projects, such as our community gardening efforts and accomplishments; various projects toward the Wild Strawberry Festival (i.e., Bike Rodeo, Film Festival, our booth and free wild strawberry plants).

Please call Rebecca or Bill at 243-9366 if there are questions.

From their website:

Sustainable Burien is an organization started in January of 2008. We recognize the need to promote and participate in the creation of a sustainable community in Burien. We invite all residents and businesses to participate in creating a sustainable local community by sharing their ideas, passions, knowledge and talents.

At our meetings we will be collecting burned out CFL (Compact Fluorescent Light) bulbs and dead rechargable batteries. People are welcome to bring any extra food items [produce from your garden, fruit from your trees, etc.] that they have and barter with others. Also bring any coupons for food that you get in the mail or from the newspaper, we’ll pass them on to the food bank, who can make good use of them.

Gatherings are held on the second Sunday of each month, – from 2:00 – 4:00PM at the (new) KCLS Burien Library (doors open at 1:30PM). For more information, go to: http://www.sustainableburien.org.

The good folks at Sustainable Burien are holding a party to celebrate both their new garden beds (see our report here) as well as their one-year anniversary at the Burien Interim Art Space on Saturday, Aug. 8th, beginning at 6pm.

Here are the details:

WHAT: Sustainable Burien Garden/Anniversary Party

WHEN: Saturday, Aug. 8th starting at 6pm

WHERE: Burien Interim Art Space, located at SW 150th and 5th SW

INFO:

Come join us in celebration of our garden beds at the Burien Interim Art Space. Sustainable Burien also celebrates its first year. Exciting things are happening and we invite you to join us.

We’re hoping folks interested in creating a bigger, permanent Burien Community Garden by 2010 will come with your ideas and enthusiasm. Please invite friends that may also be interested.

LET’S PARTY — Bring some food to share. Bring your chairs. Bring musical instruments. We’ll have some small BBQs for roasting your veggies, or separate ones for meat. Have excess produce from your own gardens? Bring that to share or we’ll deliver to the food bank!

For more information, here’s a link to their evite, and one to their website.

Sustainable Burien has installed four community gardens at the Interim Art Space, with the hopes of developing a place where residents can grow sustainable food.

“Right now we’re just trying to show that this can be done,” said SuBu member John Feeney as he put the finishing touches on some lattice work. “And this garden is open to all residents, especially those who want to grow their own food – just come to one of our meetings.”

Some of the plants growing in the garden now include pumpkin, tomato, corn, mint, lettuce, peppers, chard, onion and others, along with one planter devoted to local, native plants like wild rose and black cap raspberry.

Sustainable Burien’s next meeting is Sunday, July 12th at the new Burien library from 2pm – 4pm. For more information, please visit their website.

The Parkside Garden Club will be holding its annual plant sale to benefit local charities as well as scholarships at both the UW and WSU on Saturday, May 2nd from 9am to 4pm in the Albertson’s parking lot at First Avenue South and South 160th Street (map below).

A large variety of plants will be available, all reasonably priced.

Come early for best selection or late for best prices.

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Welcome our latest Advertiser – Herr Backyard Garden Center!

You can always tell when Spring is upon us: the camelia buds are ready to burst open, the roses need their first hard prune, the primroses are adorning shelves and yards everywhere, the honeysuckle’s in bloom with bees abuzzing and of course:

For the past five years Herr Backyard Garden Center has its
NEW SEASON GRAND OPENING EVENT AND SALE!

This year the event will be Saturday Feb. 28 and Sunday Mar. 1 from 10am-4pm.

They’ll be food samples, BBQ hotdogs (weather permitting), paint-a-pot for kids, plus very special prices throughout the entire store.

On stock for the sales event are plenty of early spring annuals including pansies, primroses and violas. Plus they’ve got plenty of colorful containers, gazebos, yard ornaments, patio furniture, chemicals including a large selection of organics for the ‘green gardeners’ among our eco-friendly BTB readers. And they’ve got the staff to explain organic gardening to you. If you plan to plant a veggie garden this year Herr’s also got plenty of high quality seeds on hand.

Herr Backyard was started by two stay-at-home moms when there was no longer a reason to stay home. “Herr sister-in-laws” Diane Herr-Lorella and Lisa Herr started the garden and gift center when most of Diane’s three daughters and Lisa’s two daughters didn’t need them hovering about any longer. Diane explained that in the early 2000s she was quite ill, and felt that through her illness “there was nothing more positive than flowers.” Once well, she and her sister-in-law Lisa started on their journey into the garden business in 2003 in the Five Corners shopping area (1st Ave South and SW 160th).

What started with selling plants on a matt of AstroTurf in the parking lot in 2003 has turned into a full-blown nursery business. The nursery is in the old lumber yard base and is stocked with “climatized” perennials, shrubs and annuals that are native to this area. We were told that “if plants could talk they’d say ‘take me home and plant me today.’” This means you can go home and plant them the same day, rather than “season” them first. Diane tells BTB that this year they’ll have a “bigger and better array of sustainable natives like red twig maples, vine maples & salal.

As if running a nursery wasn’t enough for these two hard working women, Lisa and Diane opened Herr Backyard Garden Center’s Gift Shop shortly after the nursery. The shop sits where the ‘molding bay’ was when it was the lumber yard. They pride themselves on offering extremely unique gifts that are bought in the northwest. We at BTB were especially curious about the Northwest Slug Butter. Doesn’t that sound like something to spread on your bagels? We hear it’s pretty good. In addition to this they offer Braswell’s Select preserves, private label BBQ sauce and chocolate syrup. They’ve got a large selection of Root Candles and artificial flowers (for those who can’t wait for their own garden to bloom). From Huckleberry Haven, Herr offers huckleberry syrups and jam.

Diane is a two-year breast cancer survivor. Having been through chemo herself, she invites women in treatment at Highline Medical Center to stop by after chemo to enjoy the flowers.

“Being sick is a negative. Plants are a positive,” states Diane.

When asked what Diane would like BTB Readers to know about Herr Backyard that they wouldn’t find on their website, her response was “I have the cutest, brightest, smartest grandkids of anybody.” So far her girls have given her 3-3-1/4 grandaughters!

The Herr family has been part of the Burien community for over 50 years. And if these two ladies have anything to do with it, they could be here another 50 years. So far they’ve suffered through two years of road construction, two snowed-out winter storms and now the downturn in the economy–and they’re hanging in. Keep them on their corner.

This year buy locally and buy from the experts at Herr Backyard Garden Center. We can state with pride that we’re regular Customers, and we encourage all our Readers to support local small businesses like this over those big “box stores”!

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It actually “soft opened” somewhat quietly on Jan. 2nd, but we wanted to make sure everyone knew that Burien now has its very own hardware store – Ace Hardware, located at 14930 4th Ave SW, near Saars Market and Staples (map below).

The “Grand Opening” festivities will start Friday, March 20th and run through Sunday, March 22st. Activities will include:

• Special sale items
• Meet Ed Hume
• Enter to win a $750 Weber BBQ
• Complimentary refreshments

And while we’re big fans of McLendon’s Hardware in White Center, it’s nice to have a neighborhood joint when you absolutely, positively have to have an inflatable garden snake.

Here’s the Ace press release:

America’s most celebrated “helpful place” opened its doors on January 2, 2009 in Burien. The new Ace Hardware store, located at 14930 4th Ave SW, will bring the company’s unique blend of nationally recognized customer service and quality home improvement knowledge and products to Burien residents.

The store is designed to reflect the needs of the Burien community, including solutions to everyday home improvements needs, as well as an extensive array of high-quality products in categories such as paint and lawn and garden. Ace’s mission is to provide customers with convenience combined with superior service through one-on-one expert advice and assistance.

The almost 13,000 square foot store with a 2,500 square foot garden center is packed with thousands of essential products and supplies, including some of the most respected brand names and best-selling items in the home improvement marketplace. Key product offerings include paint, lawn and garden, hardware, electrical, plumbing, automotive, home décor and one of the largest selections of nuts, bolts and screws in the Northwest.

The Grand Opening festivities will take place from Friday March 20 and run through Sunday March 22. Activities include special sale items, meet Ed Hume, enter to win a $750 Weber BBQ and complimentary refreshments.

Store Hours:

• Monday through Saturday, 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m
• Sunday 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.

Address & Phone:

• 14903 4th Ave SW, Burien WA 98166
• Phone: (206)242-8700

About Ace Hardware:
Throughout its 80-year history, Ace Hardware has been known as the helpful hardware store by both customers and communities. In 2007 and 2008, Ace Hardware was ranked the “Highest in Customer Satisfaction among Major Home Improvement Retail Stores” by J.D. Power and Associates in its inaugural study of the retail home improvement industry. With 4,600 hardware, home center and building materials stores that generate annual retails sales of more than $12 billion, Ace is the largest retailer-owned hardware cooperative in the industry. Headquartered in Oak Brook, Ill., Ace currently operates 14 distributions centers in the U.S. and a warehouse in Shanghai, China, and its retailers’ stores are located in all 50 states and 60 countries. More information about Ace can be found at www.acehardware.com.

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Local volunteers assisted Eagle Scout Michael Wines on July 26th with his project, which involved installing a park bench and landscaping at Lake Burien School Memorial Park.

Here’s a slideshow courtesy Burien Parks:

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

Highline SeaTac Botanical Garden is hosting a special hands-on rose pruning demonstration (Editor’s Note: Ouch!) this Saturday, March 8th, from 10am to 2pm.

Hosted by the Seattle Rose Society and Valley Rose Society, this is a great opportunity to learn how to prune all types of roses, modern and old.

Novice gardeners can work alongside an experienced veteran or, if you are an experienced Society member, you can work one-on-one with someone who wants to learn.

If all goes as planned, they will also be re-installing their climbing roses beneath the new Rose Garden Arches.

No registration is required, just show up and bring your pruners and gloves. Rain or shine!

For more info, contact Lori White at rosefame@comcast.net.

For directions to the garden, click here.

SOURCE:

• Highline SeaTac Botanical Garden