Some of my earliest childhood memories involve me, my mother, and my grandmother working in the garden. My grandmother always had a yard fill with the most beautiful flowers, one couldn’t help but want to have a part in bringing all the beauty to life. My mother, on the other hand, was more into growing her own vegetables and herbs, which was interesting to me as a child. I mean, it’s cool growing you own veggies right!
I did not start gardening on my own until my husband and I bought our house, and after I had my daughter, I developed a whole new respect for gardening. Gardening is not only something I love to do, but it’s also something that has to mean and takes me back to the happy times when I was a child, it’s something my kids learn and grow from, and we are building memories together.
I remember being with my grandmother, those memories mean more to me than any material thing, and I want my children to have memories to carry with them forever. Which is why I put so much focus on doing things my children can be part of.
Now that I am a mother I am gardening with my children, and we are growing more than our own plants, and flowers. When we grow, we are growing memories we can hold for the rest of our lives and powerful life lessons.
10 Things We Grow When We Garden With Children
My family loves being outside in the spring and summer months, and gardening is one way we connect as a family. Rather than sitting inside watching movies together, come 6:00 pm (once it cools off) we are outside playing in the garden. Dad is home from work, the kids are ready to go outside, and I just love spending time with my family, and I am truly blessed to be part of it.
I can think of tons of things we can grow when we garden with children, and here are ten of my favorites.
Helps Them Love Their Veggies
When kids have a hand in growing things, we eat they are more willing to try them. Since the kids started helping me in the garden, they eat more veggies, and even requires certain ones. Not to mention the fact that fresh fruits and vegetables taste amazing!
Education
Learning to grow food is an excellent skill they can use into their adult years. It will also bring up questions about what you are growing colors, and the animals they might see outside. This year my oldest daughter did her since project on plants and their growing environment.
Responsibility
Gardening is a fabulous was to teach your children how to take ownership and be responsible for something. My kids all have their own set of gardening tools –rake, shovel, gloves, and all the stuff they will need to keep track of and learn how to use responsibly. They also have a few plants that they are to take care of. Every single day they go out and check on them, give them water, and give them Miracle-Gro when it’s time to feed them. They get excited when it’s time to pull out the Miracle-Gro, just like I did when I was a child.
Gardening Helps Children Learn To Be Patient
They plant a little seed, and no matter what they have to wait for this seed to grow. They will see being patient pays off because they will have watched a tiny seed grow into a beautiful flower, watermelon, cucumber, or tomato. Gardening helps children see for themselves that certain things take time, and in the end waiting was worth it, and is more beautiful than you could have ever imagined.
Exercise
If anything is work, it’s pulling weeds! My kids love to pull weeds, which is entirely fine with me lol. Gardening provides us all with exercise, it’s a healthy way for all of us to stay active, get some sun, and fresh air while doing something we enjoy. Between the raking of dirt, digging holes, and planning we all get plenty of exercises, fresh air, and of course vitamin D. I try to give my kids different chores to keep things interesting for them, and always involves dirt, lol. I do not know about you, but I have found kids of all ages love to play in the dirt. I still do, lol.
Life Is Fun, So Is Dirt I Do Not Care How Old You Are
I do not care how old you get, playing in the dirt is fun. Gardening is a great way to have your cake and eat it too. It’s the perfect excuse to get your hands dirty, dig in the dirt, and have fun doing it.
Summer Activity
With the kids being out of school all summer long, they need things to do. Gardening is a great summer activity because it gives them something to do daily, and they can learn new things about what they are growing and about the world around them.
Respect
Gardening teaches children, and adults to respect living things, and see the beauty that comes from nurturing something until it is grown.
Appreciate the Beautiful Things Around Them
Since my children have started gardening with me, they notice flowers in other people yards, or when we visit the store, they see how green and lush the grass is. Gardening helps not only them, but I remember how beautiful this world we live on is, and to play our part in keeping it that way.
Bonding Time
For me, gardening is about teaching my children things, and bonding with them. One of the most important things to me is not losing my children
They grow up so quickly I want to be sure I know who they are, the things they like, how they are feeling and being outside gardening is where we have many mom daughter talks, laugh and learn. I think it’s because it is a comfortable place for all of us, when we are outside playing in the garden everyone is in a good mood, and it’s a comfortable place for all of us. The kids feel comfortable to talk about things they might not want to talk about because they know Shawn, and I are calm, and relaxed lol.
When I started gardening with my children, all those memories of being out in the yard with my grannie and mom came back to me. I even remember little tricks they would teach me. I remember they would both use Miracle-Gro, fill up a gallon make a small hole in the bottom, and place by whatever needed to be feed so it would drain nice and slow. It’s something I still do to this day.
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4 comments
I garden with my grandkids I could not do it much with my Daughter she was allergic to most of the plants in the garden she could plant flowers so we did that but if she picket tomatoes or corn she would get a rash my grandson loves to help me and then go look every day to see what’s coming up its funny how he watches them thinking the will be there right after we put the seed in the grow end
I love to plant flowers with my son 🙂 it’s so much fun and it’s great for quality time
That’s right. Bonding time with the little ones or even by myself, I find it therapeutic. I love that you said it teaches the little ones patience, respect, and appreciate nature.
Growing up we always grew tomato and green peppers. Now, I live in a somewhat warmer climate (zone 7) so we grow more vegetables and flowers that couldn’t be grown in Ohio.