Theres still plenty of snow here. Nonetheless, it’s time to start our seedlings so they’ll be ready to transplant to the greenhouse come spring.

I am still a very novice gardener, but I’ve made it a priority since having kids. There are many reasons I’ve decided to take this on. All of which I questioned today when things went sideways and dirt, water and seeds managed to end up everywhere except the planters. I start to include my kids in gardening as soon as they are able to participate. Usually around 1 and a half. Each year, we start our veggies and flowers from seeds. We could purchase these plants from a local greenhouse, but this approach saves money and provides incredible learning for my children.

The seeds start to emerge from the dirt as these miraculous little seedlings usually within 3-5 days of planting, and every year my boys are exhilarated. They each have a spray bottle and they take tremendous pleasure is watering these plants and seeing them grow.

Today my oldest son and I talked about how crazy it is that a tiny seed with just dirt, water and sun can grow into a plant and even a food that we will eat later. And that food turns into cells that will help him grow bigger. I could see the wheels turning in his head while we discussed this. My middle child, meanwhile was creating s mud pie in one corner of the deck.

We also raise laying hens at our home. We have 12 hens and one rooster, Silver Steve. We are lucky to have their manure to use as fertilizer. Again, we try to connect that the manure is from the food the chickens eat. It has nutrients which will help enrich the soil and will help our vegetables to grow. Wherever possible we try to get our kids connected in a hands on way to these concepts. In the case of the chicken manure, they are less interested. I believe (hope) in the long run it helps them appreciate where our food comes from and what goes into a single tomato or cucumber.

My favourite part of gardening is when we get to plant the garden beds in the greenhouse and outside. The boys love getting dirty, and I love thinking about all that great bacteria they are being exposed to ( watch for a post on this soon).

As I mentioned, I’m a very novice Gardner, so the thrill of any plants growing or producing is equally as exciting for me as it is the boys. We check daily and when it’s time to harvest we have to divide-up who gets to take what because we are all chomping at the bit to get in there.

I often catch the boys pulling and eating carrots while they play, and this just makes my heart sing.

My boys are still very young, but even still, I can see how much they enjoy and benefit from being included in gardening. This being said, our garden is not the prettiest, often there are various varieties of seeds mixed together and each tray of seedlings is like a grab bag…… you don’t exactly know what you’re going to get. This imperfection in all its glorious mess, is worth the value of connection to our food and the earth to me hands down.

Here are a couple of the biggest lessons I learned last season:

1. Give your seedlings space when you transplant them. If you overcrowd them when you plant it decreases the yield. This also means, for things like carrots you need to go through and thin them out. You’ll have fewer carrots, but overall you’ll have more produce. If they are too crowded they won’t bulk up and you’ll be so sad when they come out like little strings ( I was ) instead of beefy delicious garden fresh carrots.

2. Don’t let your lettuce bolt. Once it does, the flavour becomes quite bitter. I planted a ton of lettuce and I would pick a head a day to make a fresh salad in the summer. This year I’ll increase my variety to create more variation in yield time to have produce ready throughout the summer instead of all at once. Luckily, our chickens were very happy to eat any lettuce that got away on us !

3. Fertilize a couple of times. I like good quality compost to keep it as organic as possible. However I didn’t fertilize my tomatoes enough and after a hot snap they became over run with afids. I’ve leaned that they will prey on weak plants and your best defence is a good offence so keep those plants fed!

4. Don’t go overboard with washing your food. A little dirt is wonderful for your gut! There is a ton of healthy bacteria in dirt and if you’ve not used any chemicals, your body will love the added benefit to the already healthy snack.

We are lucky to have space to garden in our yard, but you can do this on any scale with your family! If you live in an apartment an office indoor herb garden in a pit would be amazing and beautifully fragrant!

I hope this helps inspire you to get started or keep going or worry less about how perfect your garden is – if you’re doing something, no matter on what scale- it counts.

Your kids will thank you some day ( or here’s hoping anyway!)

As always, I hope you are flourishing lately.

Tiff