gardening makes for a community

Blair and I spent some time yesterday digging through a neighbor's garden. Mostly digging up hostas and mint, and plating flox, irises and daylilies. This is one of the things Blair had been hoping would happen, and was looking forward to when we became founding members of a neighborhood gardening club.

This year, Blair has done a lot of informal flower-trading with neighbors. Giving them flowers that they like, and getting others in return. And in many cases that has also resulted in her (and, less often, her and me) doing the planting in our neighbors' yards. This is something that we really love, as it helps make the neighborhood feel like a community. Some of this has come about through the gardening club -- because some of these are "tradeds" we made with people we met through the club. But a lot of it has come about more organically. Blair will be out digging in the yard or watering. A neighbor will walk by and start to chat. And, since Blair is obviously gardening, that will be the topic. Before long they've exchanged suggestions, and we've either gotten a plant or given one away (or both).

It may seem like a small thing, but it feels really nice.

I don't have pictures of what we did in the neighbors' yards, but here are a couple pictures I took in our yard.