Well, I am like over a year behind on the writing of this blog (life is busy, and actually running my programs take precedent to writing about them.) I will take you back to October 26th, 2013. This is the final weekend for the raingarden planning, and the official Citizen Science overnight. It is time for us to put on the final touches for the rain garden site planned out in Week 4.  But what to plant? First, we went on a field trip to a nursery to search for some potential plants that are local to the area, making sure that the garden has color and balance the entire year. We also need plants that don’t mind being in partial sun/partial shade, and can tolerate wet roots.

Grasses give fall color, and have roots can tolerate traffic and water, and most of the girls love them.

Once we returned to Camp Mary Atkinson, it was time to get to work on research for all of the different plans.

Time to consult the internet! Each girl got to pick a few plants that she loved best and add it to the short list.  They did a very good job combining plant heights and dimensions, sunlight, blooming times and colors. This was a LONG process! Not because the girls couldn’t get along, but because there are a ton of plants out there to pick from.

Phew, it was quite a day. Time to relax! We then had a ton of fun swinging from the adventure tower, and doing a campfire and cookout before bedding down for the night.

The work wasn’t quite finished though… the girls had to spend several hours deciding where to put each of the plants so everything looks visually balanced with our design. This was by far the most tedious part.

But, from there, we were ready to give our designs to the landscaping firm, and it was time to wait for our spring 2014 planting date.