It was a sunny hot day in Northern Ontario. 29 degrees celsius is a rare temperature to have during the spring season.
We wore dresses and sandals. Frankie with her little straw hat. We packed bottles of water and pears for the trip.
It was the perfect day to head out to Aidie Creek Gardens. A place to purchase an assortment of plants from flowers to trees, herbs to vegetables and even fruit.
On our way we picked up and her daughter. An adventure is often quite fun when I can share it with a friend.
The drive was about half an hour to 45 minutes and upon arrival the sun was in full shine. It was hot!
We chose our buggy and headed on our way to browse the plants.
The most flowers we saw were the pansies. I am guessing they are quite popular in the area. Not my kind of flower but they are nice.
There were nice displays of flower arrangements in the large pots. Some ranged from $22 all the way up to $90!
!
Beautiful arrangements they were, but I still prefer to make my own. Much cheaper that way.
It was blazing hot under those tents. I could still feel the sun rays piercing through the tent. If it was 29 outside with full sun, you could just imagine how hot it was in those tents.
After gazing in a few tents and grabbing a few plants, we let the kids have their turn at having fun. We let them play at the itty bitty mini park they have. How thoughtful of them to have that for the kids. We usually spent several hours there so this is quite welcoming for the children.
We were all sweating and for me, it was beginning to be uncomfortable. I saw a woman that was watering the trees, so I made a joke and asked her if she watered humans as well. And even though we laughed she was so kind to water us down. It was so very refreshing and very much needed!
Continuing on our journey I spotted one of my favorite flowers. Fuschias look like such elegant flowers and have a nice variety of colors. I bought a small fuschia plant where the top part is purple and the bottom being pink. The plant is quite young still so there are no flowers to show. I had also grabbed a few different flowers for the raised bed like lily of the valley, different types of lilies, calendulas, some that I don't remember the names of but have little tiny flowers that grow vines (not the climbing ones), ground covers really.
We also grabbed the herbs and veggies that were on the list. Bell peppers, hot peppers, tomatoes, cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, spicy basil, lemon balm etc.
When browsing the squash, we found something quite surprising. Some of the seeds were still intact, holding onto the plants leaf. The seeds were coloured blue and red. Chemically treated seeds. and I were quite devastated to find this. We thought this little haven of a garden was organic and just beautiful. It was our 2nd year going, just to be crushed knowing that everything was chemical. With the information given, we are not to eat from the plants until 45 days after growing. Not to be fed to animals either. So many questions came to mind. Then A thought popped up. The tomato plant I grabbed has a 45 day growth. I will have to be careful with that. The problem is that this 45 day chemical treatment was never advertised, people don't know this unless you find out like we did and ask questions. We also don't know the age of these plants as well, if the plant is 2 weeks old or more. And then what those chemical carrying seeds put into the soil, now putting in the soil of my garden. Very alarming.
We took another break from the heat. Sitting on the grass in the shade, drinking water, eating pears and just enjoying each others company. It was lovely. We even had a pinecone battle. Frankie filled her hat with pinecones and handed them to me so I could throw them at Tammy and Avia. We had many laughs and lots of fun.
I also tried to take a nice picture of Frankie. She kept pushing me down as to have me lying down and she would be on top of me. I saw what would be a wonderful picture. The background being the sky and the pointy tips of pine trees. It didn't work out very well, Frankie thought it was absolutely hilarious to press her face against my phone and say cheese. Funny girl she is. So I let the phone be and just hugged her, my baby girl
took the opportunity to take the shots of this precious moment.
Good memories in the making.
We headed back and paid for our items. This will be the last times we buy edible greens from this place. We will come back for the strawberry pickings only, but before I decide to do that, I will need to know if they spray the crop with pesticides and whatnot.
The one thing I am proud of them for is for their help with reforestation.
All these greenhouses hold thousands of little pine trees in each one. No one can purchase these ones since they are reserved only for the purpose of reforesting all the clear cuts.
The road that I drive on most often has already started being cleared and it is such a hurtful sight. I have great respect for trees and to see these images breaks my heart. I have no words for this kind of destruction. The homes of animals destroyed, the earth being ripped apart root by root.
Can any of you feel the pain just from looking at these pictures? Even though Aidie Creek is growing pine trees to help these areas, it will only help the industries as they will use these trees to cut them down again in 20 yrs. Also, has brought up that they only grow pine trees as it is bigger money. If the purpose was to really reforest the area, perhaps it should be more than just pine trees. They are not the only tree that make up the forest as she has stated as well.
Despite the downs we have experienced throughout the day, we still had a great time and made the most of what we had.
Now we take the next few days to plant our newly purchased items. I have plants already started from seeds and planted in the greenhouse and outside as well and these new items will fill in the gaps of what I have not grown myself. With everything I now have twice the amount than I had last year and I hope that I will have enough items to give me new seeds and some food throughout the winter.
Happy gardening everyone _