Let it Grow

Today was a special day for a number of reasons. For one, today is a Haitian holiday. It’s either Labour day or Agriculture day. I never quite figured out which; one is today and the other is tomorrow.  Kenol and I decided that we would celebrate both by labouring in our new garden! It was a perfect combination in my books.


Some of you may know that I enjoy gardening, and have for a few years now. The garden in my old yard was looking pretty good after a few years of serious trial and error. Gardening in Haiti is so much different than Canadian gardening! I still don’t have it all figured out, but I have a much better idea now.
 
Since moving to our new house we have started a few new projects, specifically in the yard. We unfortunately had to cut down three beautiful and humongous bougainvillaea’s as they were literally ripping the metal fence down. One they were cut down and the fence welded back together we bought a load of rock, 3 truck loads of fertilizer and a dump truck sized load of top soil. Over the past few weeks we have laid out the rocks, tilled all the soil and started shoveling in the fertilizer. Last week Kenol went out and bought a truck load of trees and flowers. (I couldn’t go if we wanted to pay the regular price vs. the white price so Kenol brought home a whole bunch of surprises!)
 
Yesterday three tween girls came running up to me asking if they could help work in the garden. I was flabbergasted to be honest. The three girls who were asking to help are three young ladies who frequently get into trouble and often don’t show much interest in helping. I blame adolescents and their ever changing hormones but please understand these girls offering to help was a BIG DEAL!  I invited them to come up today after lunch and sure enough pretty much at 12:01 they wandered in ready to work. We spent the next few hours laughing, sweating, reenacting wedding dances and shoveling dirt together as we planted the garden.


It was a day I will always remember. Our yard is looking beautiful and I hope our relationship with these girls with blossom a little more each day just as the flowers we planted today will.

Peace, love and planting seeds,

Rachel

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