Delmont Library volunteers host ‘Grab and Grow’ garden kit distribution

Patrick Varine
Tuesday, May 19, 2020 2:14 p.m. | Tuesday, May 19, 2020 2:14 p.m.

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Courtesy of Diane Resnick

Madison Resnick, 12, poses with some of the sunflower seedlings she helped grow as part of the Delmont Diggers volunteer group. The Diggers will distribute "Grab and Grow Garden Kits" on Friday, May 22, 2020, at Newhouse Park in Delmont.

Tribune-Review file

Sunflowers are great plants for pollinators, and are among the plants that Delmont Diggers will be giving away for free at Newhouse Park Friday.

Courtesy of Diane Resnick

Madison Resnick, 12, poses with some of the sunflower seedlings she helped grow as part of the Delmont Diggers volunteer group. The Diggers will distribute “Grab and Grow Garden Kits” on Friday at Newhouse Park in Delmont.

The Delmont Public Library’s volunteers the Delmont Diggers were already looking at alternate plans for 2020, since the new library is being built where their butterfly garden once stood.

“We’d planned to do container gardens around the library, but when covid-19 happened, we weren’t even able to do that,” said the group’s coordinator, Diane Resnick.

Instead, the Delmont Diggers began growing seedlings at home in order to host a “Grab and Grow Garden Kit” distribution event Friday.

“We have so many great volunteers with the Diggers group, so we asked them to grow seedlings,” Resnick said.

Kits include a young plant — sunflowers, flowers, peppers or mint — along with a few live worms, a bird-watching journal and instructions on how to use everything.

From 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Friday, library patrons can stop by Newhouse Park, just off Stotler Drive, and pick up one kit for each child in the family. Social distancing guidelines will be followed, and those who attend are asked to wear a mask.

Resnick said Diggers are excited to give out the roughly 100 kits they created.

“We had sunflowers in the butterfly garden and had kept a bunch of the seeds,” Resnick said. “I volunteered to grow those, someone volunteered to grow peppers, and then all throughout March, everyone was growing seedlings in their homes.”

Families who contacted the library by noon Wednesday could reserve a “Take 10” bag of library materials about birds, bugs, butterflies and gardens.

“We wanted the kids who have worked in the garden over the last few years to be able to do something at home in their gardens and use the skills they’ve learned here,” Resnick said. “So it just all came together.”

The building remains closed due to state covid-19 guidelines.

For details, call the library at 724-468-5329 or see Delmont Library.org.