Grand Opening Garden Party

For all ages

Northern Dauphin Library
Wednesday, June 21 at 4:00 p.m.

Join us for a garden party at Northern Dauphin Library to celebrate the opening of the Lend & Tend Seed Library and Mary’s Garden! We will have games and crafts for all ages, as well as the musical stylings of Ray Holland. Come support the Friends of Northern Dauphin Library by purchasing and enjoying a PA Farmshow milkshake!

Registration is not required.

The Northern Dauphin Library is growing— literally!! The Northern Dauphin Library is instituting The Library’s first seed library this spring. Seed libraries are cropping up all over the country as a way to strengthen local crops, increase self-sufficiency, and combat food insecurity. The Library’s members are encouraged to “borrow” seeds and then harvest the seeds from those plants and return them back to the library. Doing so strengthens the plant and ensures a more robust crop going forward. The Lend & Tend Seed Library was established to help our community learn more about agriculture, grow healthier foods, and create a culture of sharing.

And that’s not all! Staff have been working closely with a team at Penn State Health– with funding from Rite Aid Healthy Futures—to establish a community garden behind the Northern Dauphin Library. This garden, consisting of 10 raised beds and two standing beds, will grow vegetables and herbs that will be available for community members to take home. The goal is to not only beautify the space, but also serve the community in another way, by providing them with free, healthy food. Members are also invited to volunteer in the garden through our Adopt-a-Bed program, which is available for individuals, families, organizations, or other groups, to take care of a garden bed for the season. Responsibilities will involve weeding, watering, harvesting, and weighing produce.

Additionally, we have been working with community members at the Northern Dauphin Community Garden in Elizabethville, as well as the brand-new Millersburg Borough Garden at the MYO Park in Millersburg. These gardens, which are also receiving funds from Penn State Health, have create a trifecta of Northern Dauphin County Gardening, and are all working together to bring healthy food and educational programming to the larger Northern Dauphin Community.

The Grand Opening for both the Lend & Tend Seed Library and the garden will be held on June 21st from 4-7pm. We will have lawn games, crafts, and music; and we will be selling PA Farm Show Milkshakes to support the Friends of Northern Dauphin Library! More garden-focused programming can be found at dcls.org/EventsCalendar or in our seasonal programming guide, Compass, on page 12.

If you are interested in volunteering in the garden, visit dcls.org/BecomingAVolunteer for more information.

Booklist for all your Gardening Needs

Young Adult Titles 

The Distance from Me to You by Marina Gessner  

Sugaring Off by Gillian French 

The Other Side of Lost by Jessi Kirby 

Hatchet by Gary Paulsen 

The Art of Holding on and Letting Go by Kristin Bartley Lenz 

Trailing Tennessee by Cori Wheeler Mimms 

The Island by Gary Paulsen 

Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World by Bejnamin Alire Saenz 

Braiding Sweetgrass for Young Adults: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teaching of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer 

The Young Adventurer’s Guide to (Almost) Everything: Build a Fort, Camp Like a Champ, Poop in the Woods—45 Action Packed Outdoor Activities by Ben Hewitt 

 Cool Careers without College for People Who Love Nature BY Gabrielle Navarre 

Juvenile Titles 

Mouse Scouts Camp Out by Sarah Dillard 

Out of Range by Heidi Lang 

The Call of the Wild by Jack London 

The Adventure is Now by Jess Redman 

Healing Breath: A Guided Meditation Through Nature for Kids by William Meyer 

Sing a Song of Seasons: A Nature Poem for Each Day of the Year by Fiona Waters 

A Year of Nature Poems by Joseph Coelho 

A Friend to Nature: Activities and Inspiration to connect with the Wild World by Laura Knowles 

The Nature Girls by Aki 

Why Should I Protect Nature by Jen Green 

Camping: Have Fun, Be Smart by Jacqueline Ching 

Graphic Novel Titles 

Bug Scouts Series by Mike Lowery 

Lumberjanes Series by Shannon Watters  

Survive in the Outdoors: by Mike Lawrence