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GARDENER'S
READING ROOM
The Art of Gardening
Grow
a Garden with Your Kids
 Creating
a garden with your children can be a very enriching experience
for both of you. The garden is essentially an outdoor learning
lab that involves all of their senses including that of adventure.
They can imagine they are searching for buried treasure while
digging homegrown potatoes. The many smells of herbs, the
taste of freshly picked carrots or beans, and the chance to
get their hands dirty all appeal to little ones. Who knows…
their palates may even become more refined. (Kids are more
likely to be excited to eat veggies they have grown themselves.)
To help them reap the most benefit from a gardening experience,
give your children their own plot to plant. Child-size is
best, say 4X4 feet. Make sure that it has good soil and plenty
of sun exposure to ensure success. If space is a problem,
grow vegetables and flowers in pots and containers on your
patio or deck.
Help
personalize their plot with their own homemade sign. Kits
are available in our store.
Choose
easy to grow plants. Here are a few fun suggestions:
•
Sprouts in themselves are an excellent way to begin and can
be grown indoors and eaten all year round.
•
Vegetables: Sweet 100 cherry tomatoes, carrots, potatoes (they
even come in blue!), Scarlet Runner Beans—make a vine-covered
teepee! Imagine their pride when you ask your child to pick
the salad for dinner from his or her own patch of green.
•
Flowers: Sunflowers come in a wide range of sizes and colors.
Forget-Me-Nots, Johnny-Jump-Ups, California Poppies, and Nasturtiums
are all very reliable. Patience is not exactly an attribute
of childhood but if you want to teach them the merits of delayed
gratification, bulbs planted in the fall will amaze and delight
them come spring.
• Culinary
herbs: chives, mint, parsley, garlic that can then be braided.
•
In the fall they can enjoy Indian Popcorn, pumpkins to carve
into jack-o-lanterns, gourds that become birdhouses with a
little help.
Of
course anything that’s creepy-crawly is popular with
kids so it’s a good idea to enlist their help in setting
up a worm bin. Sky has ready-made bins available as well as
how-to information if you want to build your own. Your kitchen
scraps will provide food for the worms and the worms will
provide fascination for your youngsters as well as castings
to enrich your soil. We even sell worms.
Some
items that you might consider to help you get started are
a reusable planting tray with a clear greenhouse cover, kid’s
gloves, and child-sized tools (don’t forget a small watering
can). Some wonderful books carried at Sky include Rainy Day
Slug, New Junior Gardening Book, and Bug Bites. Check out
the "For Kids" shelf in our book area, which also
includes children’s gardening kits.
A
garden is a perfect environment to nourish the budding parent/child
relationship. Use gardening time to talk about nature, school,
friends, and hopes and dreams. Always try to answer their
many questions. If you don’t know the answer, call us
at the nursery. We are happy to "field" all sorts
of queries. Don’t forget, your local library and the
Internet are excellent resources as well.
By Val Heer.
Skylights Spring/Summer 2000, Vol 14, No. 2
Other
articles on the art of gardening
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