Home&Real Estate
OPEN HOME GUIDE 70
Also online at PaloAltoOnline.com
Home Front
SPRING FLING ... Filoli’s Spring Fling fundraiser is set for 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. on Saturday, April 6, at 86 Cañada Road, Woodside. The annual event is very familyfocused, with docent-led nature walks, the Bubblesmith (who creates giant bubbles), dogs in training, a clown, Easter bunny and lady bug. Children can even pot a spring plant and decorate the pot to take home. Tickets are $25 for adult nonmembers, $20 for members, $5 for children ages 5 to 17 and free for children 4 and younger. Pre-ordered boxed lunches are $18 for adults and $10 for children. Information: 650-3648300 or www.filoli.org
Veronica Weber
THE DIRT ON DIRT ...U.C. Master gardeners will offer a free workshop on “Building Healthy Soil” from 10 to 11 a.m. on Saturday, April 6, at the Palo Alto Demonstration Garden, 851 Center Drive. Focus is on prepping beds for bountiful crops, how to dig and amend clay soil, when and how to prepare cover crops and using compost and fertilizer. Information: Master Gardeners at 408282-3105, between 9:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m., Monday through Friday or http://mastergardeners.org
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GROWING ORCHIDS ... Longtime orchid grower and award-winning exhibitor Weegie Caughlan will teach a class on “Growing and Dividing Cymbidiums” from 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. on Saturday, April 6 or April 13, at Gamble Garden, 1431 Waverley St., Palo Alto. Caughlan will talk about temperature, sunlight, growing medium, watering, nutrition and pest control. Cost is $35 for nonmembers, $25 for members. Information: 650-3291356 or www.gamblegarden.org
MANAGE A REMODEL ... Mollyanne Sherman, who is certified in Kitchen, Bath & Interior Design and Green Building, will teach “How to Manage Your Kitchen or Bath Remodel!” from 6:30 to 9 p.m. on Tuesdays, April 9 to May 7, in Room 1706, Palo Alto High School, 50 Embarcadero Road, Palo Alto. Designed for people who want to be very involved in their projects, the class includes constructing a project budget and (continued on page 47)
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by Elena Kadvany
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n a small East Palo Alto street, just blocks from U.S. Highway 101, 15 people share three houses, a trailer, a diverse fruit and vegetable garden, meals and household tasks. Like a tightly knit family, they shop for groceries together, make dinner for each other, watch each other’s children and support each other. These 15 people live in what is called an intentional community, where participants choose to “cohouse” together under common purposes: a certain lifestyle, as well as a commitment to each other and their shared space. Dubbed Greenwave by one of the property’s three owners, this East Palo Alto intentional community has many functions. It is one part cohousing community, one part green living, one part social contract, one part support system. Diana Bloch, one of the founders of Greenwave, says the main appeal of cohousing is not only sharing resources, but also having a built-in social group. “One of the attractions is the college-dorm atmosphere, where people sit around and casually discuss whatever comes up,” she said. “It’s also a simpler life. Part of the discussion involved is simplifying and using less space.” Cohousing’s Northern American roots can be
Veronica Weber
THE BEES’ KNEES ... Longtime beekeeper Jeffrey Warnock will teach a class on “Keeping Honeybees” from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on Saturday, April 6, at Common Ground, 559 College Ave., Palo Alto. Topics range from the fundamental of beekeeping and the basic parts of a hive to how to wear a beekeeping suit and honey extraction. Cost is $31. Bees and equipment can be ordered from www.koehnen.com/packages.html or www.beekind.com/orderbees. html.
A group of 15 people in East Palo Alto commit to shared living, values and community
Top: Members of the Greenwave intentional community, as well as three visiting guests, sit down to eat in the community’s kitchen, where they share a meal once a week. Above: Greenwave founder Diana Bloch, left, and resident Barbara Wallis look out at their communal garden. traced back to two California architects, Kathryn McCamant and Charles Durrett, discovering “bofællesskaber” in Denmark in the 1980s. “Bofællesskaber,” translated as living communities, became cohousing — groups of people deciding to live together in an intentional community where activities such as cooking, clean-
ing, maintaining a garden and purchasing food are shared. Bloch happened to attend the first seminar that McCamant and Durrett gave on cohousing in the United States, in the mid-1980s at the Friends (continued on page 47)
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