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The Garden Project
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Working together with the local community to create a colourful, sensory and environmentally friendly garden.
We have a lovely garden in Sutton and over the years have made improvements, such as weeding, replacing a pond with a beautiful water feature, and potting new plants. However, we wanted to put together ideas of how we could make the garden more colourful, sensory and environmentally friendly.
I had a conversation with support staff Kim and Lynne, who support people to visit the Garden Centre and take care of the wildlife in the garden. We also presented the idea of a Garden Project with our new caretaker, Nigel. Choice Support’s Environmental Group are also involved and are providing support and valuable feedback.
We are excited about the plans for our garden, which include:
- creating a vegetable patch
- a greenhouse, bug house and butterfly garden
- a hedgehog house with a periscope, so people can look at the hedgehogs without disturbing them
- windchimes and hanging mobiles made by local scouts
- murals painted by local college students.
Curates from the local church have also visited and will help us connect with the community and offer volunteers to help us tackle the gardening. They will also offer spiritual services to those who would like them. We agreed that we all have different beliefs, so the garden will be a place to share common ground, such as noticing nature, caring for the environment, and having space for peace, as well as enjoyable activities.
There are so many positive outcomes for our garden project. We are already planning an open day in the summer.
Growing Concern
We support autistic people, people with learning disabilities and mental health needs to learn skills in horticulture.
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