4-H project yields benefits for youths, pantries

You'd expect farm dwellers to take to 4-H groups like ducks to water.

Jennifer Starai, though, doesn't live on a farm. In fact, she's never lived on a farm.

"I live in North Aurora in a subdivision," she jokes. "I guess it used to be a farm."

Regardless, she was determined to start a 4-H group for her own children and for other families with homeschooled children, like hers.

More than 15 kids and teenagers in Kane County now enter the local fair, show their pets and small animals in competitions, and are even growing a garden to help area food pantries. When they needed a summer project, the group looked to Plant a Row for the Hungry.

"We do try to incorporate some community service," Starai said.

Building a Plant a Row garden was pretty much good on several fronts.

Not only are the kids learning to help other people through their garden at Provena Mercy Medical Center's employee garden, they're using the experience to get their Junior Master Gardener certificate as well. And for many of them, it's their first vegetable gardening experience, Starai said.

No matter the enthusiasm, the experience has not been without its fair share of troubles. Take, for instance, their big day to plant the garden. It rained.

Then they got a little confused when creating their rows and accidentally took over the neighboring plot. Which had already been planted with onions and seeds that were not yet visible.

And when they noticed onion greens coming up between their tomatoes and knew there was a problem, Starai said, it was already too late.

"Vegetable gardening's new to all of us," Starai said apologetically.

To prepare for their great adventure, the group invited a Master Gardener from Kane County to talk to the group about the basics: how to plant, what to plant, how to keep it all alive and thriving.

In the end, they went with peas, corn and tomatoes with a few other miscellaneous vegetables thrown in for good measure.

Each family in the 4-H homeschool group is responsible for tending the garden during a two-week stretch this summer, whether that means watering, weeding or harvesting, explained Kathy Frezzo, another of the Kane County parents who helped start the group.

She said the kids thought a garden was a neat idea, until it actually came time to put spades to ground. Then it became work.

"But once they started digging in the dirt," Frezza said, "they started having fun."

Still have questions about Plant a Row for the Hungry? Call our Plant A Row hotline at (847) 806-4277; Northern Illinois Food Bank at (630) 443-6910; or e-mail us at plantarow@dailyherald.com.