Saturday

We're taking on the Garden Challenge This Year!

We are participating in The Homeschool Village's Garden Challenge this year. This will be our first year participating (and our 2nd year gardening)! I'm not sure yet if we're going to do a big garden with the neighbors, but regardless, we're going to try some square foot gardening even if we still do a large garden. The reason we're going to try our hand at the square foot gardening is because from what I've read, it can yield just as much as a larger garden, but in a smaller space!

Here's the small area next to our raspberry patch that we'll use for our square foot garden



our garden from last year

I know gardening is so important because, although it's a lot of work, it's the most economical way to get healthy food. Plus, there's so much for the kids (and us!) to learn. They loved looking in the garden last year to see how things were growing and they were such a help (honestly) when it came time to pick things.

Some of our first produce from last year

Thankfully, this year I was able to get 25 packets of organic seeds for only $4.99! This will be a good start to getting our plants and seeds together. Since we live in the north we won't be doing too much planting for awhile yet, but probably by the end of April or beginning of May we'll be able to plant our peas and lettuce since they do well even when it's cold out. I think last year I was still picking lettuce into October!

As for what we'll be planting this year, we'd like to do: cucumbers, tomatoes (we plan to learn how to can these this year!), lettuce, peas, beans, zucchini and summer squash.

The kids are super excited about all this gardening talk and we even got started with our unit by planting a few wildflower seeds for Mother's Day gifts. I found some great gardening supplies in the $1 section at Target! (The kid-sized garden tools were in the gardening section and were only $3.99 for a pack of 3 tools.)


 Putting the dirt in the bucket. Hopefully the flowers will be
growing in time for Mother's Day to give to the Grandma's! :)

 Carlee working hard!

 Adding the seeds

 Adding the Wildflower sign

Also, to start off our Gardening Unit I checked the Plants and Seeds Theme Kit out from our local library. The kids always enjoy these!



I love the book that Carlee is holding. It does such a great job explaining on a child's level the parts of a flower and how a plant grows.

Well, that's the start of our gardening unit. I'll be sure to add posts as we go to keep you updated. :) Plants and seeds were always some of my favorite units as a teacher and now I get to do them with my own kids. And, if you want to particpate in the Garden Challenge you don't have to have a large garden! It could just be a pot of your favorite vegetable, flower or herb that you're growing. To join along, click on the link below!


HSV Garden Challenge

Do you plan to have a garden this year? If so, what are you planting? Do you do square foot gardening or just the usual garden?

7 comments:

Zonnah said...

Look at those smiles! They sure are enjoying planting :)

Melissa K Norris said...

We do a large garden every year. Last year I went beyond canning our heritage green pole beans, stewed tomatoes, strawberry jam, and blackberry sryup. I ventured into pickling and am so hooked. I did garlic dill, bread and butter, mustard pickles, and hot mustard pickles. Can't wait to add asparagus to that list this year. I haven't had much luck w/ broccoli, it always goes to seed to fast, so we don't do that anymore. My garlic is going great and I can't wait to harvest it this early summer.

becky@purposefulhomemaking.com said...

Melissa,
I really hope I can learn how to can this year! And I would LOVE to learn to do garlic dill pickles. Those sound amazing! Are you doing bulb garlic. Wow...it's already planted. What state are you in? Did I read Texas one time maybe?? Maybe I'll try my hand at garlic. You mean bulbs right???

Stef said...

good luck at the square foot gardening! I'm interested to see how it turns out!!

Thanks for linking up - next link up April 28th!

Stef -HSV TEAM

Melissa K Norris said...

Becky,
I'm in the Pacific Northwest of WA state. We live in the Cascade Mt. foothills. I planted my garlic bulbs in late September. It's my first year w/ them. It should be ready in June for harvest. We'll see. Go for it w/ the pickling. I did about two heads of dill (from my garden) and about 4 to 5 cloves of garlic per quart jar. Was just right for our tastes. :)
Any you can can! Invest in a pressure cooker (it makes things so much faster) Or, you can sometimes find them at garage sales. You can purchase new gaskets, usually that's what needs replacing.

durga said...

Really well done for the blog.these are so sweet and pretty!

Booklet Printing

becky@purposefulhomemaking.com said...

Thanks durga. :)

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