Kids in the Garden

Each month I try to post ideas for kids activities in the garden. I realized that I missed last month. I need to set a day each month to do it so it gets done. So, since I thought of it today and today is the 19th...the 19th of each month will be the official day for posting about kids in the garden. I know of other garden bloggers posting "columns" the first weekend of the month, the 15th of the month, and the 30th of the month. I figure no one has a lock on the 19th!

Before I start with some new ideas for kids activities in the garden. I must mention that our sunflower house seems to have failed. I have very bad luck with sunflowers. They grow short and scraggly or not at all. Next year I will try one more time in the sunniest location on my property. The sunflower plot is backed against the woods this year and I'm afraid it is not getting enough light. The year before I think the chipmunks stole the seeds. We also wanted to participate in the Great Sunflower Project, but since we can't get the sunflowers to grow we have to skip it. I figure at least my daughter has learned that gardening is not perfect. We will have some disappointments.

One more update about a past activity...the reading garden is a huge success! Yesterday my daughter pulled her best friend into the garden and announced "No grownups allowed!" They sat on the reading bench together READING! Woohoo! Freedom in the garden is important. Creating secret hideouts and exploration are all important parts of their outdoor learning.

A new found garden activity that we enjoy together is singing. I explained that gardening is fun because it is such a quiet activity that you can chat or sing while doing it. So the little one pulled on her gardening gloves and started making up songs about mother nature. "We love plants. Plants are gooood, ooooooo." I decided to turn it into a little lesson. I asked why she thinks plants are good and she told me they are pretty. So, I told her about how plants take in the carbon dioxide that we breathe out. They turn it into oxygen so that we can breathe. "Plants are good...ooo...they make oxygen. yeah, yeah! oooooo!" (sing this song to your own tune or try Twinkle Twinkle Little Star -- one of our personal favorites.)

Yesterday I encouraged my daughter and her friends to take a break from play to try some of the first raspberries and blueberries of the season. They clamored for as much as they could get. There is nothing like sharing fresh fruit off the bush with kids.

Playing with garden creatures is super fun stuff. (Just don't let your child name a frog it finds and then find one that looks like it dead in the pool the next day. "Mom? MOM! Is that Jackie frog? What's wrong with Jackie frog?!" Tip: The best thing to do is to empty the strainers and scan the pool before your child goes for a dip.) We've begun hunting for butterflies since they are starting to frequent the garden more regularly as their favorite plants are flowering. My daughter has a net to catch them. We then transfer them to a bug house and watch them for a few months before releasing. We have also included other bugs in our hunts. We had grasshoppers and ants visiting at one time. Hunting for small bugs is a great activity because a. It keeps the little one busy for an hour and b. it encourages the child to focus, looking really closely at nature to find really small things. Our intention is to pick up a bug identification book this summer so we can learn more about them. My sister Liz, who is still known for her butterfly catching prowess twenty five years later, sent my daughter a Live Butterfly Garden for her birthday. The set we have is made by Insect Lore. The box contains a cage for the butterflies, but you have to mail away a postcard and three dollars to get the caterpillars and food. (I thought it was a little cheesy that they want three more dollars from us after my sister bought this nice gift. If they really need the three dollars, why not charge it right off the bat? Three dollars isn't a lot, but it seems like they've already been paid...Perhaps I'm just being too cynical?) We will let you know how the butterflies grow.

We have also spent time pressing flowers. We have a fancy press (two pieces of woods with large screws at each corner) from Oriental Trading Company. Most of my life I've used heavy books with pieces of papers in them. My daughter and I go for bike rides and she collects the wildflowers in her front basket. We have wildflower identification guide that encourages her to check off what she finds. Some of the specimens we use for drying are also from my flower gardens. The skinnier the flowers work the best. Flowers with fat blossoms take longer to dry and sometimes mold or turn an ugly color before we complete the process. I'm sure there is a fancy way to prevent this, but this is a pretty simple project. The drying takes about a week. When the flowers are ready, we make collages, taking photographs of friends, cut pieces of colored paper, and adding our own drawings. These make great cards! When I was young, my mother and I put the flowers in our photo albums. As an archivist I must add that though this is quite pretty, it is very bad for your photographs. The organic matter will eat away at the papers. Instead, make copies of photographs or better yet, photocopy the flowers. (My high school art teacher makes beautiful pieces of art out of scanned flowers and has exhibited the work in SoHo.) Allow kids to be creative with the originals, scans, or photocopies. Hone their artistic talents while teaching them about science.

With bugs, fresh fruit, flowers, and musical entertainment we are having a great summer. I hope that you are too. Happy exploring!

Kids in the Garden

It's been over a month since my last installment of "Kids in the Garden." Here are some new ideas for the month:

Turn on the sprinkler! Do you remember running through the sprinkler as a kid? (Are you from the "Slip-and-Slide" generation like me?) Well, encourage your kids to get in touch with the simple life. But, don't just run...discuss the feeling of the grass between your toes. Encourage kids to catch water on their tongues like a flower catches the rain. Look for rainbows. Talk about the warm sun. A good old-fashioned romp through the sprinkler is a great opportunity to experience nature.

(These plants were spotted in our latest garden survey)

As the flowers are popping, my daughter and I have been "surveying the property." I remember doing this as a kid with my dad. He would announce, "it's time to survey the property!" And I would follow him out of the house to see how things were growing. It was a great opportunity for parent-child bonding, as well as a good way to develop my nature observation skills. Today my daughter and I walked the yard and then stopped for some wonderful swing time and some baseball practice. (The kid is developing a great batting stance. Like mother like daughter...she throws like me too. I think we need to get dad out to help her with that.)


A few weeks ago we planted sunflowers in a square. The goal is to create a sunflower house, where my daughter says she will play "Little House on the Prairie" once the sunflowers are full grown.

Our herb garden is in full swing and I'm encouraging the little one to sample. Last month I talked about her passion for onions. She will graze on them straight from the garden, so we planted a second onion patch near her swing set. This month we planted new perennials and also put in our tender annual herbs. Basil is a personal favorite. After putting ours in, we created a pot full of basil for granddad. He will use it to make tomato, mozarella and basil with oil for himself. Not only is my daughter learning to appreciate diverse flavors herself, she is learning to share with others AND is learning that plants are something to be cherished. They make great gifts!

We've visited many garden centers this month. I am letting her help me pick plants. While strolling through Home Depot, she announced "I want to make a sign." Last year I started a "reading garden" in the shade for her in an attempt to make a space of her own. She has renamed the garden the "princess garden." We picked out a concrete stone for her sign (cost = $2.69.) She had me write "If you are a fairy princess, please come in." We painted the words with "Once Upon a Time" (hot pink) Disney paint, which was leftover from painting her room earlier in the month. The sign as at the entrance of her garden. She's got plans for more signs in the works. One she mentioned is, "Princes are welcome too."

As always, I encourage you to go with the flow. Follow your child's whims and learn what aspects of nature excite him. The more you teach, the more your child will pick up on your ideas and run with them. Nature offers an unlimited playground and a parent need only open a child's eyes to some of the possibilities.

More Kids' Garden Activities

Raking in the yard is fun for a short spell. Digging in newly dug gardens can be fun too, but how can we really engage our kids in garden activities? Last month, I discussed starting seeds, nature visualization, books and photography as ways to get kids more engaged. I also discussed fairy houses a few days ago. The key is to give our children hands-on activities that feel like their own. You can be your child's helper and give her a sense of responsibility. Don't expect the act of filling the wheelbarrow with your trimmings from the forsythia bush to turn your child on to nature.

Check out The Great Sunflower Project the project sends your free sunflowers to plant. Your family's assignment is to count the bees that visit your sunflowers after they've grown. Because of the apparent decline in the bee population, the project seeks to understand the challenges that bees face and how we can help them. This is a great learning opportunity and what child doesn't love sunflowers?

We have also begun a garden diary where we draw pictures of what we are doing in the garden and write about them. The diary can include photographs. It can be detailed or loose. with older kids you can check out the changes in the garden every day, record the weather, record how much things have grown and what new creatures you find. With younger children, like mine, you can make entries less often so the changes are more obvious and the task doesn't becoem boring. We went from recording snow in March, to noting our raking last week, and today we will note a new garden we have dug.

Give your child a spot all his own. My daughter loves to graze through the vegetable patch. She remarked the other day how she remembers chomping on onions last year. So, I raked a spot near her playset and we planted her very own patch of onions. This way, when she gets a little munchy on the swing she can hop off and have an onion break! (I've also planted berries nearby, so she gets a little variety in her diet.) She was so exited about the idea that she "planted" trees next to her garden, taking little sticks, poking them in the ground, hanging last year's dead leaves on them, and claiming the spot as her own.

The idea of our own space also spread to relaxation. This year I cleaned out under a tall pine. I trimmed low branches and raked to make a little hideaway. I placed small chairs under the tree near the driveway where my daughter can wait for daddy to come home in the evening. I'm encouraging her to spread blankets and bring favored outdoor toys to her new spot. Her "old" spot is on the other side of the house. A hideaway shade garden where she can sit and read out of the sun on a hot summer day. We also placed her very own bird feeder near here, so she could relax by watching them and listening to bird songs.

If you make children space in the garden, they will take to it like bees on sunflowers. Help them feel the garden magic. Recognize that kids need their own garden spaces and activities, Just sharing yours may not be enough for them to grow an interest in gardening.