Liberty Prairie hosted spring plant sales for many years, though it changed during the pandemic. This year’s plant sale made a rousing return.
2018 Plant Sale
We supported our Liberty Prairie friends through marketing and sharing spaces, being respectful to only sell products that would not compete with plants grown and sold to fundraise in support of Liberty Prairie’s educational programs. We kept ourselves plenty busy feverishly planting our fields with spring crops, harvesting, and preparing for the first spring CSA pickups.
In 2020, Liberty Prairie made the difficult decision to transition the plant sale from an in-person event to a pre-order sale with scheduled, staged, and masked pickups. During the pandemic years, this was only one of the many accommodations required to pull off some of the spring plant sale as students and staff masked in the greenhouse together. Throughout those years, there was a sincere desire to be outside and build resiliency in the garden so there was continued support of the annual plant sale.
In 2023, the Grayslake High School District 127 took over Liberty Prairie’s plant sale and offered pre-ordered plants and some limited in-person sales for the first time in years. What a breath of fresh air — literally and figuratively! Jeff and I opened a Garden Center at the farm that also offered in-person sales.
Once Jeff joined District 127 as a teacher in the summer of 2023, it was time for Jeff to take over the spring plant sale project for 2024 and since we work as a team, we started brainstorming immediately.
In the winter of 2024, Liberty Prairie and District 127 staff collaborated to dream up a new event: the Spring Plant Sale and Farm Festival. We reflected on the years of plant sale iterations. We were inspired by fond memories and best practices. We did our best to honor these traditions, adding bits of ourselves and the talent of students in the process.
We hoped the plant sale would accomplish a key goal we identified in early brainstorming meetings: bringing people together again at the farm. Rather than a pre-order sale born of necessity from the pandemic, we dreamed of gathering together as a community to celebrate the start of the planting season. We hoped the event would be educational, help with sustainable education fundraising, and most importantly, offer a fun day at the farm!
The heart of this event — students!
One tractor team planting, one tractor team seeding!
Now, we and our farm crew are feverishly catching up on planting, seeding, and harvest work in the fields. We’re doing so with gratitude in our hearts. Thanks to all who believe in supporting hands-on learning and sustainable agriculture education, not only this year but throughout the years, at Liberty Prairie. We’re not done dreaming yet!