|
April 3rd, 2015
Dear Gardening Friends,
Happy April!
 Seems impossible, but it’s here already! Easter, Passover, all the lovely traditions of early Spring… and oh, yes, and our Annual Spring Sale & Food Drive! This year, we had the best Sale and the best Food Drive ever!
It was really hot, but Alex and Charles put up our Market tents, and that helped; folks were patient with the heat and the crowd, and everyone had a great time. Alex and I really want to thank everybody who came and who brought so much food and who purchased so much product and so many seedlings, berries & trees!! Also, a special thanks to those of you who drove in from our Market locations.
 Our Food Drive goal was to fill 4 large donation boxes reaching the required 400 lb. minimum the Food Bank has in order to do a pick-up; I put the word out, and folks were arriving with 20- and 50 lb. bags of rice, tons of dried legumes and canned fruit… our final collection weighed in at 539 lbs!!! It was a beautiful sight!
Plus, along with our own 5% of Sale donation and some customers’ checks, we also delivered $536 in monetary donations! The Food Bank can provide 4 meals with every $1 donated, so this means we enabled them to serve 2,144 meals, AND stock the local Food Pantries!! Yay, and thanks again to all who helped!!
It takes us months to get ready for the Season Kick-Off, and as always, we’re way too busy to take any photos during the Sale weekend...…suffice it to say we were swamped on Saturday, and had a very good day on Sunday, even though the LA Marathon make it tricky for some folks to get here.
One photo we did get was of our very long time customer (going all the way back to the Larchmont Farmers Market days), Tim Johnson, was our EarthBox Winner from the random drawing of those customers who participated in our Annual Tomato Survey last Fall. If you haven’t redeemed your Free Tomato Coupon for taking the Survey, it’s still OK to do so, even though the “expiration date” has come and gone.
|
|
|
 We've been working on our own garden out front…it’s a big job changing out so many EarthBoxes and Smart Pots! Of course, we get lots of help from Charles, our assistant, who is also joining us at the Farmers Markets these days. Harvesting from our Fall crops is ongoing: I harvested most of our “Conehead” Early Jersey Wakefield Cabbages, Franklin Brussels Sprouts and Leeks today. They are in the oven roasting, with Beets, Potatoes & Carrots as I type this! Smells heavenly!! |
|
|
|
Speaking of Strawberries…
My determination to have lots of strawberries to offer has paid off! We've re-ordered the baby crowns several times over, and are about to receive one last (huge) order of the Sequoias, so we’ll have them for some time to come. The lovely French Mara Des Bois had to be ordered 3 times! We currently have just 7 or 8 six-packs of those still available; we planted ours out early, and oh boy, are they delicious! If you’re interested, email us ASAP!
|
|
|
|
HEADS-UP LOCAL PEEPS!!
Announcing...
SPRING and SUMMER
OPEN HOUSES!!!
Every time we have an event here at the Home Nursery, I wish we could do more of them! We have so many local customers who can’t drive out to our Markets, and sometimes it’s hard to schedule an appointment with us…as most of you know, I spend 3 days/evenings a week with my Mama (who just turned 93!), and with one 12-hour bookkeeping day, all the production scheduling, ordering, writing the Newsletter, updating the website and the 2 Market days, our time in the Nursery is just so limited!!
So, beginning on April 15th, we plan to hold a monthly “Wednesday Open House”…not a Sale, but just a day to come without an appointment, share some lemonade, and get what you need for an awesome Spring/Summer garden!! So, please plan to join us, and bring your gardening friends!!
April Open House
at the Two Dog Home Nursery
914 S. Cloverdale Ave.
Los Angeles 90036
April 15th (a little relief on “Tax Day”!)
No appointment necessary!
from 10am until 4pm
No Pets Please!!
By then, we’ll have Melons, “Winter Squash”, Okra, Amaranth & Corn ready, too!
We’ll announce the dates for May, June & July in subsequent Newsletters!
|
|
|
|
I shot this little video at our
warehouse yesterday.
I already put this up on Facebook, but I’ll share it here, too…
“Think having an Organic Nursery is all about tiny seeds and baby plants? Not if you want to be a One-Stop Shop for your customers!! Here's my multi-talented hubby forklifting in 13 pallets of carefully curated Organic Soil, Worm Castings, Seedling Mix & Compost into our warehouse. From the warehouse to the Nursery, to the truck, to the Markets, to your cars...he gets a workout!”
We bring in big orders like this very regularly, and we hope you will remember us when you have soil, compost, & fertilizer needs. We really appreciate your support of this 7-day-a-week, hard working, family owned & run business, now in it’s 6th year!!
|
|
|
That’s it for now… we do hope to see you here on the 15th, and as always, at the Markets!
Happy gardening, and many thanks,
Jo Anne, Alex, Jake, Lalo & Charlie
|
|
|
|
|
|
Don't Forget!!!
Annual Spring Kick-Off Sale
& Food Drive
NEXT WEEKEND!!!
March 14th & 15th
10am - 3pm
at the Two Dog Home Nursery
914 S. Cloverdale Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90036
(we will not be in the Markets that weekend)
Friends, please don’t forget that our our Annual Spring Sale is also our most important Food Drive (benefiting the
Los Angeles Food Bank). We hope you're putting aside some quality packaged or canned food for your Food Drive donation, which will earn you 10% off EVERYTHING we sell! Plus, it's a lovely way to begin this season of such abundance with a grateful heart!
And if you participated in our Tomato Survey,
DON'T FORGET YOUR COUPON!
In addition to this year's 51 varieties of Certified Organic Heirloom Tomatoes, Cucumbers, Peppers, Eggplants, Seed Potatoes and Summer Squash, we’ll also have several varieties of Basil, gorgeous Lettuces, Kale, Chard, Carrots and, my favorite, Green Beans galore!
The Tomatoes are alphabetized on the driveway, starting with Amos Coli up by the garage, and ending with Zebra Rita and the Tomatillos down by the gate. Make your Wish List now!!
Street parking is available.
Bring all your Gardening Friends, but please, no pets...thanks!
Sale prices will be given at the Sale only.
Regular pricing applies to all Pre-Orders.
|
|
|
|
|
February 14th, 2015
Dear Gardening Friends,
HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!
Things are heating up here at Two Dog as we prepare to launch our Spring season next month…thousands of Tomato, Peppers & Eggplant seedlings are getting ready for transplant, Cucumbers, Squash, Strawberries, etc., are filling the tables and light shelves, Basils are burgeoning, and in a week or so, we’ll be sowing the first rounds of my beloved Green Beans! Yay, I can’t wait!!
We recently had that huge Tipuana Tipu tree in our back yard pruned way back, and now the sunlight is pouring in! Alex made new risers for four more tables, and Pre-Orders for Tomatoes and Strawberries are appearing regularly in our email now.
I’ve got our own personal Tomato list narrowed down to 24, but I think I may be overestimating our front yard! I know I want to try lots of the "New" ones, though. I'm happy to see that, in their Pre-Orders, folks are interested in our new Tomato varieties. Not only the new Cherries, but some of the “Heat-Tolerant” ones, as well! Please be sure to check those out, especially if you are a Market customer … we know how hot it gets in the Valley! And don’t forget to have shade cloth at the ready. It could save your entire crop.
You can see the whole Tomato line-up here.
|
|
|
Hopefully, all of you who participated in our
Annual Tomato Survey received your Free Tomato Coupon in an email last month; we sent it out the same night we sent the last Newsletter.
Be sure to print it out to redeem your Tomato Seedling at our Sale (March 14th & 15th) or at one of the Farmers Markets.
Now, drumroll please… the Winner of the Random Drawing for a FREE EARTHBOX KIT is
Tim Johnson!!
Congratulations, Tim!!!
We’ll see you at the Sale, I’m sure!
|
|
|
|
Don’t forget to mark your calendars for March 14th & 15th, when we hold our Annual
Spring Kick-Off Sale and Food Drive!!
Bring a donation of canned tuna, dried beans, rice, lentils, fresh packaged bread, or whatever you can offer to our needy Angeleno neighbors, and that’ll get you 10% off everything we offer…and at the end of the weekend, Alex and I will donate 5% of the Sale profits to the Los Angeles Food Bank as a cash donation.
I’ve lost track of how many years we’ve been holding Food Drives for the L.A. Food Bank, but those folks do some very important work!!! We do hope you’ll join us in showing them some LOVE! You can see more details here:
|
|
|
|
In the spirit of the awesome EarthBox, of which, Alex and I now garden in 40+, I’d like to share this photo of one of our newest customers, Nate, and his first EarthBox. Actually, he and his Mom bought two, and he planted them up (and also built an amazing compost tumbler!) I’m not sure that he wanted us to use the photo of him rockin’ his headgear, but I couldn’t resist! Just look at the satisfaction in his eyes!!
Congrats, Nate, you did a great job, man!!
Just a Side Note about Kids & Gardening...
Parents, please, please let your kids garden when they ask. Alex and I see it nearly every weekend at the Farmers Markets: a child (of any age) comes in all wide-eyed, checking out the different varieties, and begs the parent to buy him/her some plants, any plants, “just one plant, Mom/Dad”…and that parent says, “Not right now...” “ We’ve got to figure out the yard first”, “Maybe next weekend”…blah, blah, blah, and that moment vanishes. It absolutely kills us. Just last Sunday, a boy came in and, I swear this is true, began exclaiming, “Mom, look, broccoli, Mom look, BROCCOLI!!, and it fell on deaf ears, and the ship sailed. And our hearts sank.
Helping your kids learn where food comes from, how it looks when it’s growing, what time of the year it grows in, and how much better food tastes when you grow it yourself, is the greatest gift. Please don’t miss the opportunity; they may not always be wide-eyed about it. It’s really not that hard (we’re here to help!), and the reward is very great.
|
|
|
|
That’s it for now, Friends. Please do try to come to our Spring Sale & Food Drive, and bring your Gardening Friends!
Many thanks, as always, Garden On!
Jo Anne, Alex, Jake, Lalo & Charlie
|
|
|
|
|
