Tag Archives: gardens

Gardening As A Whole Curriculum

Now that spring is here, most states are starting to thaw out and warm up. This an excellent time to begin a garden, no matter how small, and teach the kids about botany, art, vocabulary, water conservation, nutrition, and so much more. I’m a firm believer in getting the most bang for my buck and most use out of every moment. Each lesson you teach your kids can incorporate many subjects, not just the most obvious one at hand. Gardening is no different. The house we live in now has a nice back and front yard, but even when we … Continue reading →

The Delight of the Dandelion

Do you have a joyful little yellow flower sprouting on your lawn? The one I’m referring to is a couple of centimeters wide. It’s fluffy and has a cheerful, bright color. It’s commonly considered to be a weed, but it’s actually incredibly useful, if a little bitter. What plant am I talking about? The dandelion, of course! Today I walked over to our local recreation center and took a shortcut through the forest. I met a woman with a whole fistful of dandelion leaves. “Making salad?” I asked her. She looked surprised and nodded, then proceeded to tell me about … Continue reading →

Square Foot Field Trip – Backyard Exploring

Home schooling is, in my opinion, the best type of schooling there is. You can be certain your children are learning skills that are important for life such as filling out job applications, balancing checkbooks, cooking, frugal spending, and more. This is in addition to the typical education of Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic. But staying at home all the time can get boring for kids and parents. Field trips are excellent ways to get out of the house for awhile and incorporate fun with learning. But what if you’re simply too tired to drag the kids to a museum, library, … Continue reading →

Gardening With Your Preschooler: Easy and Early Plants to Grow

We finally have our garden started, a little late for the very early plants like mizuna and fava beans. My daughter has her garden started too, a pot of peas in her playhouse. She’s interested in having her own garden this year. If your preschooler is also interested in growing a garden, what foods are suitable? Out of the early crops, I’d pick peas, radishes, and lettuce. All of these can withstand cooler temperatures, so you can plant them in early spring or late winter, depending on your climate. All of them also do well in pots or planter boxes … Continue reading →

Would You Share Your Garden?

I’m a great advocate of yard sharing. In the suburban neighborhood where I live, most houses have large yards. Most of these yards are covered in grass and a few selected shrubs, annuals, and the occasional tree. In the spring and summer, people go out and dedicatedly mow this grass, remove the clippings, and fertilize what is left. It seems to be a form of madness to me, but then again I have always been more partial to moss and vegetables than to lawns. Our family lives in a townhouse. Our townhouse has the typical postage-stamp sized garden. On the … Continue reading →

Living Willow: Garden Furniture That Grows

Tomorrow morning I am going to stand solidly by my reputation as the oddest gardener in the neighborhood. A few weeks back, I ordered some living willow rods from a local supplier, and yesterday they arrived at out house. There are twenty seven-foot-tall, thumb-width willow branches waiting to be planted in my front yard. Tomorrow morning I will be out there with a long piece of metal bar, punching holes in the ground to put my willow in, in the hopes that it will root. Why am I planting seven foot tall sticks in my front yard? Well, I love … Continue reading →

Gardening With Your Preschooler: Supplies

Are you planning to garden with your preschooler this summer? Gardening can seem like an activity that requires a lot of supplies. What supplies are actually necessary to have a fun time in the garden with your preschooler? Very few, actually. We like to bring a small trowel into the garden. Preschoolers like to dig, and you can set your child to work digging up a garden bed, moving small rocks, and looking for worms. The worms, woodbugs and soil are the main attraction here. Watering cans are also very popular. Choose a child-sized one with very small holes or … Continue reading →

A Happy Accident Gives Free Passionfruit

Sometimes things that happen by accident turn out for the best. One time a friend was given several passionfruit in a paper bag. She put them in the fridge. They got pushed to the back as things often do in fridges and as a result she forgot about them. By the time she discovered them they were all shriveled, so she decided to see if she could grow a passionfruit from the seeds. She planted them all in soil in pots. Sure enough in time little green shoots appeared. When the passionfruit plants were about eighteen inches high she moved … Continue reading →

Want Free Flowers?

Do you want free flowers for your garden? This year we grew sweet peas and it cost us nothing. We grew our own sweet peas from seeds harvested from our own plants. Last spring we had an amazing display of sweet peas. Instead of being in a rush to take them down once they finished flowering, we allowed them to go to seed. Suddenly we had brown pods appearing everywhere. We picked a number of these pods. Far from all of them as they were prolific. The advantage was we were able to pick the colors we liked most. So … Continue reading →

Gardens Reveal so Much

It’s always good to branch out into other areas. That’s what I’m doing as I come to join you on the Home blog. Up till now, I’ve been writing for Marriage and Christian Family and I will still be doing that, but Michele thought I might like to contribute some ideas about home, so here I am. I’m planning on doing some articles about gardening. Gardening? I hear you say, as anyone who knows me knows me or has been reading my other blogs, know I don’t do gardening. But I do love gardens and do have a lot of … Continue reading →