OUT and ABOUT with Seeker Chick Mai-Liis at Seedy Saturday

I don’t know about you but to me Winter always seems long (especially this year) but just the mention of the annual event “Cornwall Seedy Saturday” makes me feel like Spring is just around the corner.

This year’s event marked the 7th year that Transition Cornwall+ has hosted this event which leads into Spring and the “Season of Seeds”.

I remember going to one of the first events hosted in a small room at the Agape Centre here in Cornwall and then in the following years I attended the event at the Benson Centre. This has always been one of my favourite Trade Shows where you got to talk and learn about gardening through various workshops, where there were lots of fun activities for the kids to do while at the same time learning and you could check out all kinds of seeds, soils and products and ask the Experts all the gardening questions you needed answers for.

The photo above is from the Seedy Saturday in 2019.

I talk about the show in the past tense as of course because unfortunately times have changed due to Covid and this year’s event was the second year that Cornwall Seedy Saturday has been presented on a Virtual Platform. This show is very different from the past years when we all got together in person but one thing that has remained constant is seeing Kat Rendek’s smiling face, as she hosted Saturday’s presentation. For those who don’t know Kat, she is the lady who walked around at the live event organizing and making sure that everything ran smoothly plus wore that wonderful dress with butterflies on it. Consequently while watching the Webinar this past weekend, I visualized Kat in that exact dress which you can see below from the Cornwall Seedy Saturday show in 2019.

Webinar 1 began at 10:30am, lasted an hour and was titled, Plan Your Garden and Support Local. This was the first part of Cornwall’s Seedy Saturday which continues for the next 2 Saturdays (March 20th and 27th).

Despite the fact that I missed visiting with everyone at the booths as I did in the past, I do like the fact that I could concentrate on the talk given by Pat Lucey, an Organic Gardener here in Eastern Ontario as well as a member of Transition Cornwall+, who says “Gardening is in my bones, heart and soul (and under my fingernails). It’s always a great pleasure for me to share my love of the soil with others!”

Pat definitely had a lot of great Tips and Tricks on Planning your Garden! Being an avid gardener myself I did know a lot of what she talked about but of course with gardening as with anything else there is always so much more to learn. Gardening to me is my therapy as when gardening, I am away from my computer and my office and out in the fresh air, listening to the birds singing, the sun on my face, with the feel of soil in my hands, all connecting me with Mother Earth and nature.

When attending the event in the past there were always so many great workshops going on at the same time and it was hard to choose which one to attend while missing many others. With the virtual format you get to hear all three talks and visit virtually with the Local Seed, Gardening and Produce Vendors that include:

Beyond The Garden Gate, Bird & Bee, Bonville Gardens, Cornerstone Organics, Ferme Tournesol, Greta’s Organic Gardens, Heritage Seed and Produce, Kitchen Table Seed House, Pitt Street Garden, Radical Roots and Springfield Farms.

I especially enjoyed the easy way Pat explained everything with multiple slides and after each set of slides there was time to ask questions about what she had just talked about. The hour flew by and I took many, many notes about pointers which I will use when I plant this year. If you missed this first of 3 webinars, you can watch the replay on the Transition Cornwall Facebook page.

Sponsors of the Seedy Saturday event are Canadian Organic Growers, Eastern Ontario Agri Food Network and the Social Development Council of Cornwall & area. Local gardening partners are City of Cornwall – Grow a Garden with Free City Compost and Seeds Change – Seeds of Diversity.

The next 2 Webinars will be: Starting Seeds Indoors – March 20th at 10:30am

and on March 27th at 10:30am the Webinar is “Seeds – Connecting Family and Earth.

You will not want to miss these and you can get more info on the website at: transitioncornwall.com or on the Transition Cornwall facebook page.

I am so looking forward for gardening season to start but for now am enjoying my little corner of garden in the entrance of my office. I call it “Bringing the Outdoors Indoors” and above is what I am talking about. It is still a bit too chilly to be working outside but Spring will be here before we know it and yes – I love garden gnomes …