Happy Gables Day!
by Susanna Brown
"Happy Gables Day" said my friend Casey (of Greenspace Dallas renown) with a big smile on her face. It is funny she said that, because I do feel like it is a major holiday for us at Friends of Bachman Lake, one that I have prepared for and celebrated these last 3 years! The 9 full hours of labor on November 19 does not include all the planning meetings and coordination sessions that each partnering group does on its own. Pricing plants, getting catering arranged, ordering signs, securing tables and chairs, submitting orders for equipment, flagging plant locations, pre-digging the holes, and on and on....Whew!
It rained the Sunday and Monday prior but we had a lovely sunny - albeit a little bit muddy - day on that Tuesday, the 19th. We staged the Gables Day event this time on the east side of the Embassy Suites. It was a little tight but it worked. By the end of the day my feet hurt but my heart was full. We planted over 250 plants, installed more signs and benches, mulched and re-seeded the wildflowers in the prairie. One of the most transformative jobs was the removal of privet at the western tip of the trail and the discovery of a lovely strand of baby cedar elms!
Fun, tiring and rewarding sums up Gables Day 2024.
By the way, if you helped with a donation during North Texas Giving Day, know that the $3800 that we raised went directly to the purchase of the Texas navite plants! We will be needing help watering and are setting up a schedule. So if you want to help with that, please sign up to volunteer for the Green Team because we will be sending that group an email for the sign-up calendar in the new year. The link to volunteer is: https://www.friendsofbachmanlake.org/volunteer
Thanks to The Gables Residential, Dallas Parks and Recreation, RootedIn and Greenspace Dallas for being such great partners and making this such a successful event!
