Totally Tomatoes! How to Grow Heirloom Tomatoes in the Desert
10:00 – 11:30 am
Tomato growing success starts here! This is a one-stop adventure in Tomatomania where you’ll learn how to grow juicy, delicious, and colorful organic heirloom tomatoes. Leslie will answer those vexing questions – to stake or not to stake? determinate or indeterminate? when to plant? and much more. You’ll meet The Farm’s grower, tour their greenhouse and get the best tips in town on how to grow tomatoes in the desert. A free heirloom tomato transplant from The Farm’s greenhouse is included!
$30 pp
Instructor: Leslie Honaker, Master Gardener and Owner of Lauren Brooks Life
Class Fee includes Heirloom tomato transplant! (Additional plants for sale at Farmers Market)
About Leslie Honaker, Owner and Chief Happiness Officer of Lauren Brooks Life
How one girl on a mission to grow a tomato in the desert transformed her life from marketing maven to garden goddess.
I have known since the age of five that I would have dirt under my fingernails the rest of my life!
My gardening journey began in Connecticut at my cold, gray New England home with a 4×4 plot and a fistful of seeds. When my family moved to Arizona all the green thumb goodness went bad. Discouraged with multiple gardening failures under the hot searing sun, I gave up and focused on a corporate career in marketing, advertising and international event planning. A family came next. Then the desire to raise my sons around vegetables, herbs and flowers as well as grow a juicy tomato led me to discover the Maricopa County Master Gardening program and I gleefully became a Master Gardener!
The awakening began and I devoted 15 years as a Master Gardener volunteer, conference organizer, school garden advocate and 10 years as the co-founder/owner, of Garden Territory, an organic lifestyle store and education center at the Farm at South Mountain in Phoenix. I wrote Plant of the Week articles for the East Valley Tribune for three years, testified in Washington D.C. on how school gardens can transform a classroom and have been an inspirational speaker to shine a light on how anyone can transform their life to achieve bliss they didn’t think possible.
I love to teach on many topics – cooking, aromatherapy, décor and organic gardening as well as holding blissful lifestyle events and workshops. Leaving the traditional classroom style behind, I invite students to hands-on experiences combined with simple techniques. I’ve taught hundreds of students, teachers, and desert dwellers how to garden under our spectacular Sonoran sun! Transforming a student from frustrated to enlightened is the ultimate joy.
This glorious life journey has led me to open the doors to Lauren Brooks Life – a lifestyle business, online store and education center dedicated to helping others capture their bliss every day. I write, speak and offer real life experiences through workshops, travel, and curated products. Lauren Brooks Life is a place to find joy through gardening, cooking, travel, home and wellness. Where it will go and grow – I don’t know! But I can assure you it will be authentic and an exhilarating place to open yourself to a new ideas, options and ways to get on with the life you’ve meant to live. My wish is that through the connection you will rejoice in the sky above you, be grounded with the earth below you and find the fire within you.
I see you, I hear you and feel you! I’m on fire – let’s go! I hope to see you at one of my blissful lifestyle and organic gardening workshops at The Farm at South Mountain soon.
Life is Beauty Full, Leslie
FAQs
Where is this class held?
Classes will be held at Family, Friends, Fun area to the west of “The Shed” near the Farmer’s Garden. Check out the Map at the front of The Farm if you are not familiar with the grounds.
Where should I park?
Parking can get full early on weekends. The closest parking will be to the back of the property near Morning Glory and Botanica. If this lot is full there is a dirty lot just to the South as you are looping around the back parking lots its just to the south behind the South Grove.
.
What should I bring?
Wear comfortable walking shoes and clothes to get dirty in. Shading is limited so bring sunscreen if needed. Feel free to bring your camera to take pictures on the property before or after class. And Remember water, but please no outside food and beverages, as we have several options property.