GARDEN TIME
a workshop to nourish your creativity
SUMMER 2025
Thursdays, 5:30-7:30pm PST
June 5th, 12th, 19th, 26th, July 3rd, July 10th, July 17th, July 24th
course summary
Since 2021, I have had the privilege of creating a garden around my home. I am not an expert— it is patched together by random online blogs, friend’s advice, and old memories of gardening with my mother as a consequence for my adolescent missteps.
I have planted seeds and purchased half-dead discount plants from hardware stores. Nothing is planned. I have to wait until the next year to see what takes. Truly, it began in 2020, when I planted calendula and cornflower in pots outside my apartment, in honor of my dad’s passing.
The garden and the physical act of gardening has become a deeply meaningful metaphor for personal experiences of my own. Last year, I attended a series created and hosted by Rory Sparks called A Garden Is An Event that included dinners, literature, art, conversation, poems, and more. This series further expanded my ideas of what a garden can contain, what it can mean, and how it becomes.
For this workshop, “Garden Time” is simply time to “garden” – to create, to plant seeds, to till, to harvest, to notice, to just be. It is time for us and our creative practices, wherever we find ourselves on the cyclical nature of growth and decay. It could be literal gardening or it could be writing, reading, drawing, painting, resting, meditating, book making, and more.
As the instructor, I will bring us poems and prompts that thematically engage with the idea of a garden and its sub themes of growth, decay, time, weather, seasons, transforming, and gathering. These materials will be loose, varied, and interpretative, but always meant to inspire and offer you fodder for your own creative “garden.”
When I describe this workshop as a “creative (writing) class” it is because while its foundation will be poetry and writing, I ALWAYS encourage folks to create in ways that speak to them in the moment, as I am an interdisciplinary artist myself. I try to create prompts that could be expand into more visual or somatic forms of creating.
course goals
to engage weekly with your creative practice
to engage with others and experience moments of community, connection, and inspiration
to read, write, discuss, and share
to engage with prompts and materials
to practice agency in your creative practice
to ask questions, plant seeds for the future, to create something
“Summer Sky” from Garden Time by WS Merwin
course structure
2 hour ZOOM meetings on Thursdays, 5:30 - 7:30pm PST
June 5th, 12th, 19th, 26th, July 3rd, July 10th, July 17th, July 24th
Each session I will provide creative (writing) prompts, journal prompts, and poems/readings for us to engage with, in themes of gardens, growth, decay, time, weather, seasons, transforming, and gathering, and others.
Collectively, 1 hour will be spent with check in, check out, discussion, and sharing. The other 1 hour will be uninterrupted generative time.
I will mail a physical welcome packet with materials to enjoy throughout the workshop, in line with our themes : )
There will also be a digital platform/scrapbook for us to share our work, inspiration, and curiosities.
This is a new workshop offering, but I encourage you to look at my Dark Forest / Light Forest workshop for testimonials of my teaching.
registration
The cost of this 8 week course is $250.00.
If this cost is a barrier, please reach out. I can provide limited low-no cost spots, prioritizing BIPOC folks. I also provide flexible payment plans (2-6 installments) with an initial deposit. I do consider partial or full trades.
I am also offering a discount if you register for Dark Forest / Light Forest, my other 2025 workshop offering. Registration for both workshops is $400.00 ($50.00 discount). Please email me if this is your preferred option.
If you are ready to register, please fill out the registration form below and Venmo or Cash App the course fee of $250.00.
Venmo: @catie-hannigan
Cash app: @catiehannigan
PLEASE NOTE: Your spot is not reserved until I have received the course registration fee, course deposit (for payment plans), or email confirmation between us of a low-no cost spot/trade. There are no refunds.
Instructor: Catie Hannigan
As an instructor, I pull from years of experience teaching, studying education, and as a practicing artist.
I received my MFA in Poetry in 2017 and a Death Doula training completion in January 2021. I am currently studying to become an Art Therapist and Licensed Professional Counselor, projected to graduate in 2026.
Most recently, I was the instructor of the year long Portfolio Program in Poetry at the IPRC in Portland, OR, from 2018 - 2023. I have also taught workshops and mentored in the MFA in Writing program at PNCA. Additionally, I have taught at local community colleges, alternative education spaces, and my own courses.
I am influenced by Liz Lerman’s Critical Response Process, The Anti-Racist Writing Workshop by Felicia Rose Chavez, and teaching to transgress by bell hooks. I have completed Bystander Intervention Training and a workshop on how to teach creative writing from a trauma informed perspective.
It is my hope to be less of an instructor and more of a guide. I try to create a container for students and artists to explore material from a point of meaning that is unique to them. I believe in a classroom that deemphasizes white supremacist values (perfectionism, independence, etc.) and emphasizes intuition, collaboration, and care.
You can read more about my personal art practice on the main page and view my work in artist books, paintings, publications, shop, and project archive.