Growing Gardens with Kinship Farm

Bridgewell is going green!  Wooden garden beds were built at three of our residential programs in Danvers, Lynn, and Beverly in partnership with Kinship Farm.

Big thank you to Coast of Maine Organic Products, Inc. for donating soil as part of their Growing Good and Growing Goodwill programs and thank you to Mass Hydroponics and Essex County Co-Op for delivering the multiple bags needed! Craftsmanship and help with planting provided by Those Pesky Projects.

“We are so grateful to Kinship Farm and all the partners who helped provide these garden beds at a few of our Bridgewell residences, including a wheelchair accessible one in Danvers,” said Justine Rudgis, Residential Manager. “Gardening is a great activity for our residents to spend more time outdoors.  It gives them an opportunity to work in the gardens, harvest and enjoy the product of their work, too.”

The residents have been growing container gardens on our porch, planting a few herbs, tomatoes, and peas. Kinship Farm was fortunate enough to make the gardening process more accessible for our residents by building raised beds for our wheelchair users. These gardens will keep residents busy all summer and allow them to enjoy and harvest fresh produce this summer, including yellow squash, cucumbers, green beans, tomatoes, and potatoes fill the beds. Plus, culinary herbs such as cilantro, dill, parsley, and sweet onion.

Recently, Kinship Farm added cucumber trellis was just delivered to the Bridgewell group home and discovered Black Swallowtail Butterflies have laid their eggs on the curly leaf parsley, which the residents will love watching them grow and change in their garden all summer!

Enjoy the photo gallery: Bridgewell gardens from Danvers to Beverly! Plus a few photos of Bridgewell residents, Eric and Bill prepping their yard to relocate a large cluster of irises for the garden. And, then joined Rob and Chad to go plant shopping to fill the new bed!