Green Garden Fair Offers Healthy Food Growing Solutions

Eight spring rolls circle a bowl of soy sauce ready for the taking. In the first bite, the taker tastes the fresh, crisp, and sweet mixture of shredded zucchini, summer squash, carrots and cut green peppers finished with zesty basil to bring out the flavor. All ingredients grown and found in the backyard of Kim Marsin’s and Rachel Reklau’s home in Villa Park.

Marsin and Reklau, owners of Sweet Home Organics, started growing food back in 2009 at St. Charles Park District’s Primrose Farm to both increase their community’s access to healthy food and educate the public how to grow food free of pesticides, synthetic fertilizers, and genetically modified seeds.

“The thing that’s most amazing about gardening is that we are seeing something that started from practically nothing and a few months from now it will become something that we can eat,” Reklau said.

What started as a food selling operation, Sweet Home Organics has, since, transformed to a business that educates residents on safe and healthy farming techniques by selling organically grown seedlings and offering gardening classes.

“I really love getting people excited about gardening and being self-sufficient,” Reklau said. “Talking to people about the different plants and what might be the right plant for them, and what they then need to do in their garden to be the most successful gardener self.”

Reklau and Marsin will continue their gardening outreach at Elmhurst’s First Congregational UCC church (235 S. Kenilworth Ave., Elmhurst, IL 60126) during their Green Garden Fair from 10 am to 1 pm on Saturday, May 21st. At the fair, attendees can purchase seedlings from a selection of more than 40 varieties and receive more green gardening/living tips from local environmental action organizations such as Midwest Pesticide Action Center (MPAC), SCARCE, Elevate Energy, and Elmhurst Cool Cities Coalition.

“Americans apply approximately 89 million pounds of weed and feed products for their lawns and gardens each year,” MPAC’s executive director, Ruth Kerzee, said. “The successes of Sweet Home Organics to educate the public on alternatives to synthetic pesticides and fertilizers help ensure a safer environment for our children, pets, pollinators and other wildlife.”

MPAC, with the support of Elmhurst Cool Cities Coalition, organized and disseminated the “Keep ON the Grass” pledge campaign to educate Elmhurst residents on strategies to reduce potentially harmful lawn and garden synthetic pesticides and fertilizers. They will sell “Keep ON the Grass” signs and recruit more pledges at the Green Garden Fair alongside Sweet Home Organics (see bit.ly/MGGpledge for further details). For more information on the Fair go to bit.ly/Elmgarden.

“We’re happy to find an organization in the First Congregational UCC not only excited to host us, but, also, that holds a broader gardening event that educates people on a number of topics, not just seedlings,” Reklau said.