Volunteers from the Green Team refreshed the play sand with a tamper and hand tools at Marbles Kids Museum in Raleigh, N.C. They also added new mulch to landscape beds.

 

Greenscape Inc. and Weed Man® team members got together to refresh the Castaway Cove Kid's Garden at Marbles Kids Museum in Raleigh, N.C. Green Team participants included (left to right) Keith Updyke, Melanie Mixon, Kim Holmes, Jason Ward, Greg Smith, Paul Brooks, Santiago Palacio, Daniel Currin, and Tony Gregory. Not pictured are Scott Holloman, Ron Dunn and Alais Fankhauser.

Giving back to the community has always been important to my family, and that conviction is one that we have carried through into the business. Greenscape was founded by my father, Michael Currin, in 1979. We have grown and added new team members, we have encouraged that spirit of service. Greenscape funds multiple outreach projects each year, inviting Green Team members to join in and help.

It can be really hard to choose a handful of projects from the many worthy causes in the area. We chose the Marbles Kids Museum in Raleigh, N.C. for one of our 2013 projects because of their focus on engaging kids and its fit with the Come Alive Outside project where Greenscape is a partner. The museum is a great asset to the community, giving kids a place for hands-on learning.

Greenscape donated landscaping services for the original building of the Castaway Cove Kids Garden in 2009. Now, five years later, the garden was due for a facelift, so the Green Team coordinated with the museum to schedule the work to refresh the Castaway Cove Kid's Garden.

A dozen Green Team members spent a full day in spring working hard on improvements. We brought in tools, wheelbarrows, tillers, mulch, play sand and plants. We tilled vegetable beds (one of the hands-on activities is planting and growing vegetables), refreshed mulch on the trails and plant beds, added new sand to the play areas, trimmed all the bushes and trees. Our floriculture team created five large pots of flowers for visitors to enjoy.

As we finished up the project, several Green Team members jumped right in to do some quality checks, including testing the play sand and ensuring the new mulch didn't leave splinters! Team members wrapped up in the late afternoon, reloaded our equipment into the trucks and went home with a sense of a job well done.

Marbles Kids Museum provides innovative experiences for both children and adults through hands-on children's exhibits, creative programs and events, and larger-than-life IMAX films on a giant screen. Marbles offers playful learning adventures for children and families, museum and IMAX field trips, summer camps, family events, targeted outreach programs and exceptional spaces for meetings and parties. For more information, visit www.marbleskidsmuseum.org.