The Mid-Prairie Homeschool Assistance Program is holding its third-ever flower sale out of their greenhouse, selling a variety of spring flowers including hanging baskets, petunias, geraniums, lantana, dahlias, corkscrew grass, potato vine and other plants and blooms.

The sale started the weekend before Mother’s Day, but due to rain on Saturday, May 8, the sale will continue into the next week. The greenhouse will be open, although unstaffed. Customers should put their donations into a drop box.

Homeschool teacher Laura Mallory leads the Roots and Shoots club, the group responsible for growing the plants from tiny plugs into full-grown, beautiful flowers. She said she enjoyed seeing families come before Mother’s Day to pick out gifts for their loved ones.

“It’s been really fun to see a lot of parents coming to buy for grandmothers, putting combinations together,” Mallory said. “It’s fun to hear them talk with their kids about “What does Grandma like?” or “What does Aunt Suzie like?” and making it very heartfelt, not just picking something out because they need to give her something but making it personalized.”

Enrichment classes ended about when the flower sale started and one of the groups made decorative 10-inch pots. The students were able to pick out a four-inch square of flowers to fill their newly made pottery.

While this is the second year the Homeschool Assistance Program has held a spring flower sale, it looked very different during the pandemic lockdown in 2020. At that time, the program had to take online orders and deliver the flowers to customers’ homes.

“Last year we took orders online and we had the option of us creating pots. This year, we’re hoping people will actually bring those same pots back that are empty now and refill them in person and we can help them design, or they can just bring the flowers home and do it at home,” Mallory said.

Although this year’s sale is entirely in-person, the club was able to learn a lot from the previous year’s sale. The club also held an in-person mums sale in the fall.

“The virtual sale was a standalone, but we learned what people liked,” Mallory said. “We were able to order more based on what people were asking for and what sold fastest. From the fall sale, it was more in-person and we saw how to run it that way, how to manage having the kids carry the pots to customers’ cars and things like that.”

The students have been involved in the entire process of growing the flowers, from planting the tiny plugs in the early spring, to watering and pruning, to finally helping customers take their flowers home.

“It’s really fun to see them come and help in the greenhouse, when they look at the plants,” Mallory said. “They say, ‘Oh my gosh, remember when it was just a tiny little plug and look how big it is now!’”

Growing flowers is a lesson in patience, said Gabby Feller, 12.

“You have to let them grow for a while,” she said. “You can’t always have everything right when you want it. It’s worth it to wait… It makes me happy to see the customers come and pick out flowers. It feels good to give back and make other people happy.”

The Roots and Shoots club is self-sustaining. From the flower sales, the club is able to raise funds to buy the next batch of plants, soil, fertilizer and other necessary supplies. The club is also planning to have a student design and paint a mural on the back of the greenhouse as soon as the weather permits. Also, this summer, the club plans to purchase and install a rain barrel to collect water to be used to water the plants.

“Obviously, it won’t sustain every watering opportunity, especially for the mums because they sit outside, spread out, but it will be really nice to utilize the rainwater to nourish many of our plants,” Mallory said.

The Roots and Shoots Club is able to operate thanks to community donors and sponsors, including Farmers Electric Cooperative, Hardman Painting Co., Highway 1 Discounted Surplus, Joe Gingerich and family, JW’s Foods, KCTC, Pleasant Valley Greenhouse and Dawn Bouslog, Spring Hill Gardens, The Smith and Mallory family, Sustainable Landscape Solutions, Yotty’s Hardware and many MPHSAP families and friends.