Category: Gardening

My Kids Can’t Get Enough KALE!

Kale Is Among The Most Nutrient-Dense Foods on The Planet

Early Summer, I planted a good number 10+ Dinosaur Kale plants into our community garden. It was ready to pluck this week with the heat creeping higher. It doesn’t like over 90 degree weather and we are getting 100’s this weekend. A good rule of thumb is to harvest it when it’s about 10 inches high. In taking off the outer leaves, the plant will produce more inner leaves and a larger harvest.

I know some don’t like Kale but I do! You can eat it raw, saute it, dehydrate and bake it. One way I alter Kale up for my family is by presenting it to them in a snack format that is great for at home or for all those on the go travels and adventures.
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West County Gardener Review

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All year round, I enjoy working in flowerbeds and in my own personal garden, though after getting married, I’ve had to make due with apartment gardening. Currently I’m growing three tomato plants, a bell pepper, and an aloe  on my third story deck. My vegetables and aloe will soon be joined by several pots of flowers as long as I leave space for my husbands grill.

I have small hands so it’s been hard to wear gloves that fit while I’m gardening.  I love the feel of the earth just as much as anyone else but I don’t quite enjoy getting pricked by thistles or getting dirt under my fingernsm-glove-classic-apails. What to do? Those garden gloves from Wally World just weren’t cutting as they were way over sized and kept slipping off, filling my gloves with dirt, and getting me filthy!

I recently came across the company West County Gardener. They offer a variety of gloves for all sorts of tasks! Their many syles include; Classic Glove, Landscape Glove, Rose Glove, Waterproof Glove, Work Glove, and Kid’s Gloves.


About the Company:

Our Goal is to design and engineer the best fitting high performance gloves for you and your needs. We listen to our customers and continually make small ‘running changes’ based on user feedback. Which means, we make the best gloves you’ll ever wear. More than that, West County continues to invent and innovate to help make your time outdoors more enjoyable, productive and comfortable.

“I Can Fix This”, said Beverly Schor one day in early 2001 when she had a “light bulb” moment as she was out gardening and noticed the sorry state of her month-old conventional garden gloves. As a cyclist and sports apparel designer, she observed many of the qualities she loved in her sport gloves were missing in her garden gloves. Why couldn’t garden gloves have the features of sports gloves and last as long too?

Combining Her Skills And Experience as a gardener, sports apparel designer and national champion cyclist, she set out to create high-performance gloves for both avid and weekend gardeners. The result is a line of lightweight gloves that uses the best technical fabrics and design know-how that has traditionally been reserved for serious sports enthusiasts from cyclists to rock climbers.

West County Gardener was founded out of Beverly’s love for the outdoors and her extensive experience and knowledge in product design and development. Her skills and experience helped her produce not only state-of-the-art gloves, but also create a company whose mission is to provide the most innovative men’s and women’s garden and work gloves with the highest level of quality and customer service.

Based In San Francisco, designer and founder Beverly Schor is a Bay Area Active Sports apparel designer and cyclist—not always in that order! Before opening her own design studio, she worked for Esprit, The Gap, and The North Face. She brings a passion for sports and an extensive knowledge of technical fabrics and construction to every project.

When She’s Not In Her Studio, she’s out training on her bike where she has earned many State and National Championship medals in her age group. In June 2002, she set the National Time Trial Record in her age group. West County Gardener was founded out of her love for the outdoors and her extensive experience and knowledge in product design and development.

My Thoughts:

I was able to review a pair of Apricot Classic gloves for myself thanks to the generosity of this company. First and foremost, I love the color varieties that these gloves come in! Where else can you get garden gloves that come in fun fashionable colors of Apricot, Berry, Lime, and Slate? It should be pretty obvious by now that these gloves were created by a woman with an eye for style as well as function.

I found these gloves extremely comfortable and they fit me perfectly…never have I had a glove fit like a glove should. They specifically state in their bio that their women’s gloves are tailored specifically to fit a woman’s narrower hand and longer fingers. Having the right fit means no blisters and no extra bulk to get in the way! I can not count how many blisters I have gotten by doing yard work in my younger day! I could have used these back when I was a kid for sure. Now, I know what gloves to purchase for my kids…as my children will work along with me gardening and I want to keep their hands protected from thorns, thistles, and blisters!

Features:

* made with 100% synthetic materials
* machine washable and can tumble dry low
* Padded palms and reinforced finger pads provide all the protection of leather but last significantly longer
* Light weight, durable, flexible and abrasion resistant
* first recycled content gloves in the United States!
* can be used for more than just gardening, some other uses could be cross country skiing, snow shoeing, horse back riding, mountain biking, walking, jogging, yard chores and more…

You can purchase West County Gloves at their online store. What a wonderful gift these would make! I couldn’t help but mention that Father’s Day is coming up soon! Does your Dad have a green thumb like mine?