We Love Barnum!

Hello! My name is RB Fast. I am a longtime Barnum resident and a new contributor to Welcome to Barnum. I am so excited for the chance to support this amazing place we live and connect with our neighbors. There are several ideas floating around in my mind about content that would be valuable to the neighborhood. But for my first blog post, I figure I should just go ahead and introduce myself to you.

We bought our West Barnum house in the summer of 2006. We abandoned the hip but cramped Lower Highland/Jefferson Park neighborhood in favor of some space for the baby we were expecting that fall. We instantly fell in love with our little brick house and our love for the neighborhood has consistently grown since day one. We have never looked back!

I live with my husband, Steve, and our eight-year-old daughter. Steve and I are both self-employed
(because apparently we are very comfortable with unpredictability). He is a professional woodworker and he owns a company called Fast Industries. You can find more on that at www.fastindustries.biz . His work is in homes and businesses all over Denver. You can find his work in places like The Denver Beer Company, the Monkey Barrel, Steep Tea & Coffee, and in February 2015 at Ratio Brew Works on 29th and Larimer.

I own a consulting firm that offers structure and support to non-profit organizations, Montessori schools (I was a Montessori teacher for many years), and early childhood education programs. You can find more about my work at www.beelineconsulting.net .

Our backyard garden nestled against the garage.

Our little Barnum house has been a labor of love as we have slowly remodeled the inside over the past eight years. We have also torn out a lot of our grass and added raised beds for growing food and flowers, a large chicken coop, and two bee hives. It is so fun to walk the neighborhood and see how many other folks are doing the same thing!

We live in a neighborhood full of people who work hard and live an honest life. It is such an honor to live among you and I so look forward to the many chances we will have to come together and get to know one another as we support each other and this special little spot in the corner of Denver that we call home.

Cheers!

Barnum Garden Tour: The Barnum Community Garden

Today's Barnum Garden Tour comes from the Barnum Community Garden, located on Lowell between 1st and 2nd Ave.

I met with my neighbors for a neighborhood plant and seed swap, enjoyed some delicious cider (thanks, Wendy!), and had an opportunity to meet Jack, one of the Community Garden's regular and long time gardeners.

Jack gave us all a tour of what's growing this year and filled me in on the garden's policies: the very generously sized garden plots are $40 for the entire season to cover watering expenses (this fee might be waived if you're unable to afford it). To reserve your plot for next year, send me an email for the number to contact, or get the number from Denver Urban Gardens. Otherwise, talk to Jack if you see him in the garden!

This was the perfect time of year to see the Community Garden in all its bounty. It was bursting at its seams with sunflowers, potatoes, tomatillos, squash, corn, cosmos, and a bagillion other sorts of lovely things to eat and admire. Be sure to wander through to see for yourself before the weather turns! For more information on seed/plant swaps and other meetups, join NextDoor Barnum -- an online neighborhood forum.

While there, I also heard a rumor that a Community Orchard is in the works for the adjoining vacant lot. I'm waiting with baited breath for more details. 

And, one final bit of news: The Barnum Neighborhood is in the early stages of planning for a Barnum Farmer's Market next summer! If you're interested in helping to make this a reality, please email welcometobarnum(at)gmail.com to get on the email list and/or come to our next planning meeting!

Barnum Garden Tour: "Barnum House" Front Yard Garden

Today's garden tour looks at the so-called Barnum House front yard garden. The Barnum House is named after the story that P.T. Barnum once lived here (he didn't). Currently enjoyed by only the second family to live there, the original family, the Failings, built the house in 1872 and moved it from 6th and Knox when the 6th Ave. freeway was built.

Our Names: Wendy Lu, Scout and Eva

Edible flowers and some veg - a salad garden!

Garden Style: Mish-mash, xeriscape cottage garden

How Long We've Been Gardening Here: 3 summers

What's New In The Garden This Year: This year, inspired by neighbor Kaye, I installed drip irrigation and what a difference in yield and time spent watering!

A passerby told Wendy Lu this vase was found by
P.T. Barnum in Africa, but the stamp inside reads "New York."

What We Love To Grow: Drought-tolerant perennials, especially flowers, and vegetables. There are also baby fruit trees (peach, green gable plum, service berry bushes) and raspberries. Just added blackberries from the Barnum plant swap, so looking forward to more berries next year!

What We Cannot Grow: Since adding in the irrigation, and because I favor plants with low watering needs, we've done pretty well. I do need to start growing melons earlier, because we often just barely harvest a tiny watermelon in early September.

Biggest Battle: We mulched the entire yard two years ago and since, weeds have been minimal. That said, the so-called "tree of heaven" is constantly trying to stage a hostile takeover.

More edible flowers & kale, tomatoes peaking out.

Our Advice To New Gardeners In The 'Hood: Use mulch, drip irrigation, amend the soil and plant ever square inch to grow food and flowers!

Mini-pumpkin patch.

Favorite Nursery/Supply Shop: I have to stay away from City Floral, but it is coming up on the annual 50% off perennials sale, so I'll be grabbing a few plants to put in before it gets cold.

Bees & other pollinators heart the hollyhocks.

Do you garden in Barnum or Barnum West? Send your pics into the blog! Selected gardens will be featured throughout the summer. Pics can be emailed to welcometobarnum (at) gmail.com. 

Barnum Garden Tour: Charlie's Charming Cottage Garden

This hill took FOREVER to dig up. Totally worth it,

Remember when I said I have zero journalistic objectiveness? Yeah, here I go again. Today's garden tour is my very own. I'm rather proud of myself for waiting this long to post it.

When we first moved in, the entire front yard was sun-baked dust and weeds. The backyard was worse -- 12" of sand that even the weeds refused to grow in. And, of course, no trees. Each summer, we fill in a little more empty space with something either pretty or delicious.


Our Names: Charlie and Keegan

Garden Style: Cottage Garden and kitchen garden

How Long We've Been Gardening Here: 6 years

The internet tells me this is feverfew.

What's New In The Garden This Year: We just planted a little hedge of Coralberries beside our front door. I'm pretty excited to see them festooned in pink this fall. And, I'm hoping to extend my flower garden a little later in the summer -- maybe a row of delphiniums, hollyhocks, and foxgloves behind my peonies.

What We Love To Grow: My favorites are normally whatever is blooming or fruiting at the moment. If I had answered last month I would have said lilacs, strawberries, and peonies. But, right now, I have to say I'm in love with my Pink Grapefruit yarrow. Also, there is a volunteer feverfew growing behind my blackberries that is charming as hell.

What We Cannot Grow: I'm originally from the East Coast, so when I first started planting six years ago, I learned the hard way that in Denver, rhododendrons and azaleas need more attention than I'm willing to give them in the winter. We also have one of those little hills in the front yard that I tried to keep grass on for four years. Last year I finally gave up, dug it all out, and covered the hill with mulch. I planted some cotoneasters that I'm hoping will grow up to take over the whole thing.  

Biggest Battle: Bindweed. I fucking hate bindweed. And squirrels.

Our Advice To New Gardeners In The 'Hood: Lots of plants are pretty, but how and where you plant them matters too. Step back across the street and look at your garden as a whole.

Favorite Nursery/Supply Shop: O'Tooles is wonderful, but Echter's in Arvada also rocks.

Do you garden in Barnum or Barnum West? Send your pics into the blog! Selected gardens will be featured throughout the summer. Pics can be emailed to welcometobarnum (at) gmail.com.

Barnum Garden Tour: Danielle and David's Earth-Friendly Edibles

When I visited Danielle to photograph her lovely organic kitchen garden in Barnum West, I was instantly charmed. No neat lines and strict compartments separated her plants. Instead, her garden is a riot of colors and textures, full of abundance and stunning variety. Chinese Cabbage lay hidden under Egyptian Walking Onions, exotic-sounding varieties of radishes and salad greens crowd around lush walls of raspberries. Danielle's young son happily ate peas right off the vine, his brightly colored toys scattered about, forgotten in favor of fresh vegetables. Her family's backyard garden felt like a home.

Her ambitious side garden that lines the street is still in it's infancy, but already shows careful consideration for sustainability. Danielle has laboriously reshaped her slope into swales and hugelkultur berms that will conserve Denver's meager rainwater. Young jujube trees, cardoons, yarrow, squashes, and service berries line the swales, ready to turn a sun-beaten hill into an urban oasis. Looking at her new project, I couldn't help but think her garden will someday grace the cover of Mother Earth News.


Our Names: Danielle and David

Garden Style: Permaculture

How Long We've Been Gardening Here: 3 years

What's New In The Garden This Year: We have added perennial greens like sorrel, Italian dandelion and lovage, as well as medicinal perennial herbs like motherwort, skullcap and astragalus to our cooler weather polyculture garden. But the biggest change is turning our hot and sunny side yard into a permaculture garden where we aim to create a more complete ecosystem with perennial crops that play diverse roles like nitrogen fixing, attracting pollinators, drawing up minerals from deep in the earth, providing beneficial insect and animal habitat, confusing pests, creating more soil fertility, and suppressing weeds. We've added jujube trees and serviceberry bushes for fruit, surrounded by a number of supporting perennials, with our hot-crop annuals mixed in. We also did a lot of earth-moving, creating sunken beds that are more water efficient than raised beds.

What We Love To Grow: We have lots of great early spring crops like arugula, lettuce, orach (similar to spinach but a lot more productive), and snap peas. Later in the season we make a lot of salsa with our chiles, tomatoes and tomatillos. Cucumbers (pickles!), raspberries and winter squash (especially delicata) are also big favorites.

What We Cannot Grow: We have struggled to get New Zealand spinach to germinate. It's supposed to be a great hot-weather green but we've only been able to get one little plant to grow. Generally each year will be good for some crops and not others. Last year our tomato crop was limited but we were swimming in cucumbers. The year before it was the opposite.

Biggest Battle: Slowly building up our soil. We've sheet-mulched with compost and manure but it'll take time for the earthworms and other helpers to break up the hard clay underneath.

Our Advice To New Gardeners In The 'Hood: Carefully consider the water needs of the plants you want to grow. "Full sun" plants may thrive with more shade than you think. Building up the organic matter in your soil will dramatically increase the amount of water it can retain, and be sure to mulch deeply. Consider sunken beds instead of raised beds. Finally, don't bite off more than you can chew at first--we speak from experience!

Favorite Nursery/Supply Shop: Timberline, though in Arvada it's not the closest.

Thank you very much to Danielle and David for their hospitality and for sharing their garden with Welcome To Barnum!

Be sure to leave a comment for the gardeners below!

If you live in Barnum/Barnum West and would like to submit your own garden for a garden tour, please email a couple of photos to welcometobarnum (at) gmail.com. Selected gardens will be featured throughout the summer.

And, as always, if you are a Barnum or Barnum West resident who would like to contribute content to the Welcome To Barnum blog, please email us!

Barnum Garden Tour: Devin and Daniel's Dreamy Cottage Garden

Devin and Daniel's cottage garden is absolutely stunning. Plants can be beautiful by themselves -- and D & D have many pretty plants -- but it's the combinations they've created that makes this garden truly fantastic.

The shrubs and trees, the vines and hedges, and all of the clusters of color and texture between show a true talent for design in addition to a quite obviously green thumb.

What a dreamy place to begin our Barnum Neighborhood Garden Tours.

Our Names: Devin and Daniel

Garden Style: Cottage

How Long We've Been Gardening Here: 5 years

What's New In The Garden This Year: This year we are planting a part sun garden on the north side of our house. We also did a raised vegetable garden bed where we're planting a few different varieties of cucumbers and squash, Brussels sprouts and eggplants.  

What We Love To Grow: Everything! We've always had an extensive vegetable garden and also perennial gardens. Some of our favorite plants include bee balm, lavender, meadow rue, columbines, bleeding hearts, and peonies.

What We Cannot Grow: We've had success with almost everything we've planted considering we select plants that thrive in our climate. We stray away from exotic or tropical plants that have a hard time adapting to our swinging temperatures.  

Biggest Battle:  We're fighting a constant battle with mallow weed.  It's our number one offender! 

Our Advice To New Gardeners In The 'Hood:  Amend your soil if you need to, select drought tolerant plants and use mulch or a ground cover to conserve water!     

Favorite Nursery/Supply Shop: We love O'toole's on Colfax/Quail.  

Their pup, Atlas, looking especially handsome.

Thank you both for giving us a peek into your beautiful Barnum garden!

Have a lovely Barnum or Barnum West garden of your own you'd like to share with your neighbors? Submit your photographs to the blog by emailing them to welcometobarnum (at) gmail.com. Don't forget to leave your comments for Devin and Daniel below!