I plan to dedicate this blog to document my experience of gardening with young kids. I am by no means an expert, but I thought it would be so fun to get my toddlers involved in gardening-related activities and just record what we do.
It seems like a nice outlet during a pandemic.
Last Garden
I have had a little bit of experience planting a few things in my old backyard. My husband made two small raised beds out of salvaged IKEA bed slats! It was something he just wanted to do with the wood, and it turned out to be perfect.
Plants
- Basil
- Two baby lettuces
- Red peppers
- Ghost peppers.
I had my toddler daughter help me dig the holes and play in the dirt (while I did most of the planting).
We watered it occasionally… I honestly don’t remember having a set schedule, but we watered both beds about every other day.
Results
- The basil was incredible! I absolutely loved having this fresh herb on hand. It’s one of those grocery items that I buy often (organic sprigs for $1.99) – so this was the number one favorite!
- The red peppers grew okay – for how big the plants grew, which was about 3.5 feet, we only got about 4-6 red peppers total. I don’t know what my expectations were, but I thought we would garner more peppers than that. These sat next to the basil and were about the same height.
- The lettuce grew quick! I remember this was the first thing we were able to pick and eat. We ended up making a fresh yummy salad… but after that one day, the lettuce did not perform well. The remaining plant browned up and wilted away… I ended up digging it up and moving on.
- Finally, the ghost peppers grew amazing – almost too amazing! I remember counting over 30 peppers from just one plant! We had more little peppers than we could eat. In fact, we couldn’t even eat them because they were so freaking spicy!! For the record, I love spicy! I order everything extra spicy from Thai food to Tex-Mex food… spicy is my jam. I am half Mexican after all 😊. But I could not handle these… If only the red peppers did as well (sigh)!
Anyways, so that is my complete, one-season, experience gardening at home! Fast forward a couple of years and my family has grown and we have a new house in a new city!
Gardening with Kids
I want to start gardening with my kids. I think that there are so many benefits to gardening with young children. I’ve been wanting to pick up the hobby for a couple of years now and I would love to get my kids involved.
Gardening Goals
- First, I want to have my kids grow and eat their own veggies! I think it will be so amazing to see all our hard work come full circle. I believe they will appreciate it and enjoy it so much more this way.
- Second, I want to create a space that we can be proud of together! I want to walk outside my yard and admire our beautiful space. I envision a lot of greenery, a thriving veggie garden, beautiful and bright flowerbeds, and an overall calming and magical aesthetic. I might sound a bit like an overachiever, but I want to do a little bit of everything and see what takes off.
I plan to document the entire process! At the moment, my backyard is pretty much empty. Everything we have, came with the house.
As some initial next steps, I will share my “planning process” which will be sun mapping – to better understand what kind of light my yard gets and all the beginner information I’m consuming.