Gardening with Children

Gardening is fun for me, maybe fun for you too, and it can be fun for kids too. Just think of how fun it is to you to plant a tiny seed and watch it grow into a big plant that makes food for you to eat. Kids think that's awesome too. The last two years I have shown cub scouts how to plant seeds and given them tidbits of info about certain plants. Nothing is more entertaining than a bunch of boys asking crazy questions about things in the garden, and they learn about how things grow along the way. I always ask what are the three main things a seed needs to grow into a plant. Most know that it takes water, dirt, and sunlight. What they don't know is that it takes patience and work. They take their tiny cups home after they have planted their seed and put it in the window sill. I tell them to give it sips of water everyday and let me know when it has grown a bit. I have kids come up to me at school saying that their plant has grown and is out of the ground! They get so excited about it, but I do too. Here are some ideas on how to get your kids involved:
1.  Have them watch you play in the garden, and let them get dirty too. When we moved into our house several years ago it was the first time we had a yard in several years. It didn't take too long for them to start playing in the dirt. Then the next spring I started planting a garden. My boys had their tiny hoes and shovels and where out there with me. When I was planting something and they were with me I always explained what I was doing, what the plant would make and maybe how we would eat it too. That first summer I constantly caught them digging up the gardens. One day it was hot, I had been working in the garden all day and was tired. I heard them giggling around the corner at another garden spot and I just knew they were tearing it up. When I turned the corner I was shocked to find them standing by the broccoli, happily munching away on it. I just backed up and left them to it. After that year I started letting them pick plants they wanted to grow. I have learned that if they grow it they are more likely to eat it themselves. Without me making them or them sitting at the table for an hour staring at it on their plate.

Here they are writing corn on canning labels and adding the date.

Cosmos, my son picked these out years ago and we save the seeds for the next year.

2. Let them help pick seeds or plants. Since the above story, we have grown sunflowers (which are a big hit for kids), peas, gourds (can't eat but fun to grow), pumpkins, melons and many more items the boys have picked out themselves. Including flowers too, my favorites were mexican sunflowers and orange cosmos, which I still grow the cosmos. Now we have moved on to multi colored popcorn and jelly melons for planting this year. I always try to get them in on the seed buying, and they love planting them too. Don't forget seed saving either, they can collect pods or seeds off of plants too.
3. Give them jobs they can do well. My boys like to hoe and find worms to feed the chickens, when they start getting wild with the hoe and swinging it around I have them stop and do something else. They like to water and pull weeds, more so when a fancy or cute watering can is involved. They can also scoop dirt into pots and pick bugs off plants. Mulching is another entertaining job to give to kids.

Digging wild onions up.

4. Let them have their own area or specific plant. This year I have given my boys their own garden spot, which has seeds from the cub scouts planted in it. The food they grow in it is donated to the local mission, I took the first batch of lettuce there the other day. Granted my boys are 8 and 6 and I end up doing a lot of the work in their spot, but when school is out I think I will let them do it all.
 5. Save your back and let your kids do it. When the veggies or fruit start to grow and are ready to pick kids should be in on that too. You will have less bending over to do and they will have fun picking, especially if its fruit. When we hunt blackberry's my boys are purple mouthed and a little scratched up too, but they are very happy to help. I also get my kids in on preparing the food to eat or can. Children can shuck corn and snap beans. Just make sure you give them age appropriate jobs. One of my boys likes the job of finding worms in the corn and collecting them to feed the chickens or smash in his hands. I wouldn't give a small child a knife to go cut the okra off the stalk with but they can hold the bucket while you drop them in.

My boy getting ready to snap yard long beans last year.

6. Kids can help take the garden down too. In fall we clean are gardens up taking the old plants down and I sprinkle veggie bits on the dirt then we layer newspaper on it and cover it with hay or straw. I call it putting the garden to bed, and my boys help with this too. 

lol.

Mini Milk Jug Greenhouses

I decided to try something new this year, mini milk jug greenhouses. I started off by saving my milk jugs, didnt take too long to get six, we go through about two gallons a week. I washed them and stored them, well my fiance stored them after he got tired of seeing them dry all over the limited cabinet space. I started to cut them by looking at the bottom of the jugs, they have a nice ring around the whole thing.

So I hope you can see it, the sides are smooth and the bottom is bumpy, I cut right between them.



I am left with the bottoms, but I see myself growing something in those to make use of them. Next, I went out and planted my cabbage.

Then I pushed the milk jug into the ground around it and kinda buried it a bit. I have read to put another hole in the handle and put a stick in the ground to hold it. I sure hope I dont have to do that, and that this works.

On warm days you leave the lid off or even take the jug off, on cool days just take the lid off. When it freezes leave the lid on. One thing I did notice is that if you position the opening right over the plant and try to water it it pours right on it. You might be careful when you do water with the jug on. Also, if the weather is going to be around freezing over night, it helps to water your plants well so they are less likely to get damaged by frost. Have you ever used this method? If so how did it turn out, let us know.

A Froggy Garden

I reserved one of my raised beds for my boys to grow their cub scout garden in this year. I started cleaning it out today, its not too big or small. I guess about 5 feet long and 2 feet deep. It has an evil bush trying to grow in it and cat mint, morning glories too. I didnt do too much with it last summer, I was on bed rest most of the time. So I figured it would be a little weedy, apparently it was froggy too. I was happily hoeing along and pulling roots, when I saw something wiggling. I first thought snake and jumped a bit, then I saw webbed feet. It was trying to go deeper, so I picked it up, my six year old was helping so I showed him. "Cool" he said, I told him we should put it somewhere so it could finish sleeping until spring. We walked over to another flower bed that still had newspaper covered in hay on it, and he lifted the paper and I stuffed it under it. As I was patting the paper back down he said "Now I can step on it and kill it!" I told him no and that he would get in trouble if I caught him, silly boys. So back to work I go and a few minutes later I find another frog sitting in the grass. I put it in the same place that we had the other frog, which was gone. I didnt tell my boys about this frog, I wanted it to live. I didnt give them to my chickens, though I thought about it. It just felt wrong to give those poor little rudely awakened frogs to them. The frogs come out here in spring and happily sing in the evening, even though there is no creek or open water near by. I wonder if I woke the second one or if it was already out. Its nice to think that the other one was out already and that spring is getting closer.