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Grow Kids

Grow Kids

Grow Kids is a growing session for pre-school children and their carers, held in our community garden.

Grow Kids is about children and family learning together to grow fruit and vegetables. We run structured activities led by an experienced mentor in the community garden, so parents and children can take the skills they have learnt home and share them with their families. At the end of each session, children and parents harvest vegetables they have grown to take home.

Grow Kids first began as part of a National Lottery funded project back in 2016. When funding was finished, parents loved these sessions so much we were able to continue these as a paid toddler group. Thank you!

Our current sessions are on Tuesdays 9.30-10.30 and 11-12, and Thursdays 10-11. Each block runs for 10 weeks, costing £40 for one child or £75 for two siblings.

Today you can get involved by signing up to our waiting lists by emailing info@greenerpeebles.org , and ‘like’ the Greener Peebles Facebook page for updates.

Grow Babies

In 2022 our garden team was approached by families desiring opportunities for outdoor activities suitable for babies too little for Grow Kids. We put our heads together and came up with Grow Babies! Thanks to funding from the Cattanach Trust – Grow Babies will be free of charge to all families from 2022-2025.

Grow Babies is a hour long session for babies from birth up to 1 year/walking stage, and their carers.  Sessions are gentle, relaxed and informal, with a focus on wellbeing, sensory outdoor experiences and connection with each other and nature.  Each session involves a simple gardening activity which can be done while seated. We have plenty of grassed areas to sit, various outdoor seating plus a cosy yurt for shelter, privacy and relaxation.

Email info@greenerpeebles.org to register your interest.

Seasonal Recipes

In previous years we offered free cooking sessions using produce grown in the garden to cook with. Parents and children worked together to learn new cooking skills, and were given the recipes to try at home. For many years we ran these fun and engaging cooking sessions. The delicious recipes by Hilary are available to download from our Cooking page.
"At Grow Kids both the kids and the parents learn new skills, whist having fun in a relaxed sociable environment. From our first session we were welcomed and assured that it was perfectly acceptable for the kids to play and run about when they get distracted, they soon join back in again as they don't want to miss out on too much of the action!"
“Our knowledge has vastly improved by attending Grow Kids. My 2 year old is a pro at sowing seeds and weeding gardens. Even my other three children have benefitted from the things I have learned at Grow kids and really enjoyed themselves in the process. Thank you so much to the whole Grow Kids team.”
“Grow Kids is a great way to show young children were some food comes from. My granddaughter thoroughly enjoyed eating everything growing in the garden.”
“The boys and I have loved the Grow Kids sessions. It has encouraged them to eat more healthily, they have loved being able to cook with produce from the project. I have learnt a lot and we are looking to replicate growing things at home as a result. The boys have also loved looking after plants they have brought back home. A favourite part of our week – thank you!”
“We have learned so much from attending Grow Kids. Our love for the outdoors has grown and our knowledge of growing our own food expanded. As well as this, our diet has improved and we have loved using what we have produced at home to cook. Amazing community group.”
"Before coming to Grow Kids he didn’t like potatoes but since digging them up and taking them home he now loves them. He loves being outside and having jobs to do such as watering, weeding, planting etc. He has loved tending to the plants he has brought home and seeing them grow from seeds to plants that he now eats produce from."
"It is really important for children to appreciate where the food they eat comes from. I have found all the people there very welcoming and have learnt such a lot about growing produce that I had no idea about before Grow Kids."
"Grow Kids gives children important outdoor time to get muddy and wet and see where a lot of the food they eat comes from. I have learned a lot myself about growing and nurturing fruit and veg. Everyone there is very friendly and the kids are all lovely."