With many children out of school, we thought it was a good time to talk about gardening activities for kids. These fun activities are great for engaging kids with nature and keeping them learning while having fun. They are also perfect for spring.

For more advice on gardening with children check out our other post, Get Your Kids Involved in the Garden!

Start Seeds

One easy project to get the kids involved with is starting your seeds. For many areas, this time of year is perfect for starting seeds indoors though there are a few things you can be direct sowing as well.

For small hands, we recommend big seeds. Cucurbits (cucumbers, pumpkins, melons, and squashes) can be started indoors and are easy to handle. Giving your child a few of their own plants to name and nurture is a great learning experience. Letting them choose varieties also makes it fun. Cinderella pumpkins are a big hit with fairytale fans!

Depending on where you live it may be time to direct sow peas. Growing them on a tipi-like trellis makes a great fort later on.

Paint Flower Pots

This is a great way to spruce up your container garden or porch plantings. Terracotta pots can be painted with acrylic paint. Be sure your pot is fully dry before painting.

Chalkboard paint is also a fun option and allows your kids to redecorate them as often as they want.

Make Plant Markers

Plant markers can easily be made from a variety of materials. Sticks, pieces of lumber, rocks, paint stirrers, seashells, tiles, or even broken pieces of terra-cotta pots.

If you’re using sticks, slice off a piece with a sharp knife to create a flat surface. Always cut away from you and supervise children with this task.

All of these can be painted to create colorful plant labels. You may want to use a stencil to keep things neat. Chalkboard paint is another cool idea for seedling labels because you can re-use them for different plants each year.

Press Flowers

Spring flowers are starting to come up in many areas. Preserve a few of these beauties by pressing them.

Collect blemish-free flowers, on a dry day after the dew has dried. Place your flowers face down between two layers of paper in a notebook or book you don’t mind getting damaged. Close the book and weigh it down.

Check on your flowers after 7-10 days.

Spring flowers to try:
violets
daffodils
crocuses
snowdrops
sweet peas
forsythia

Make Wildflower Seed Bombs

To make seed bombs mix 4 parts potter’s clay (find at art supply stores), 1 part compost, 1 part seeds, and 1 part water. Mix these together thoroughly with your hands. It should be easy to form into 1 inch balls. If it’s not holding together add a bit more water.

Place them on a cookie sheet to dry for 24-48 hours. They can be tossed or set into flower beds or fields (only on your own property). They also make excellent party favors for zero waste birthday parties!

Make a Butterfly/Bee Watering Station

Butterflies and bees need water just as much as the birds! Unfortunately, they sometimes have difficulty getting water from deep bird bathes.

To create an insect-friendly water station you need a shallow dish or plate and some small rocks or glass pebbles. Fill your plate with the pebbles or rocks and then water so that the pebbles still stick out of the water a bit. It’s as simple as that!

Some folks glue the plate to a wooden dowel or stake so it sits up much higher, allowing you to observe your visitors.

Create an Insect Hotel

Insect hotels create habitat for beneficial insects like solitary bees, wasps, predatory beetles, lacewings, and hoverflies. These insects play an important role in your garden’s ecosystem.

They’re easy to create, check out our full tutorial here.

Make Garden Paper

You can make your own paper for cards or crafts and include dried plants and flowers.

Here’s what you’ll need:

a blender
a deckle
a tub larger than you’re screen
a sponge
a smooth board or piece of plexiglass
1 cup of shredded paper
2 cups of water
1 Tbs liquid starch
dried flowers or plants

Place your water and paper in the blender and let it soak for at least 30 minutes. After it has soaked, pulse it to puree. The more you blend it the smoother your paper will be. Then add your flowers and plants. You can blend them up more finely or leave the piece large.

Fill your tub with water and add the starch before pouring in your paper slurry. Mix it around.

Lower your deckle into your tub and gently swish it back and forth a bit. When it looks like there’s an even layer of slurry on it, lift it out of the tub.

Wipe a sponge across the back of the screen (non-slurry side) to remove excess moisture and remove the mold. Let your paper sit for 20 minutes and then press it onto your board or plies glass. A rubber roller is helpful but you can do this with your hand.

When your paper is completely dried you can gently remove it from the board.
Try some of these activities to help your kids learn to love nature and gardening!

Companion planting or interplanting is the practice of growing plants together that provide benefits to each other as they grow. They can help each other by deterring pests and diseases, providing nutrients, shade, or even a trellis. Practicing companion planting can help you have a more low-maintenance garden and improve your yields.

The History Of Companion Planting

In the United States, the most well-known example of companion planting is probably the three sisters garden method practiced by some Native American tribes. Corn, pole beans, and squash are planted together. The beans grow up the corn stalks while fixing nitrogen and the squash grows beneath both, shading the soil which keeps it cool and minimizes weeds.

Companion planting is not exclusive to North America. It has been practiced in different ways across the world for thousands of years – probably since the dawn of agriculture. Companion planting can be seen in the artistic blends of English cottage gardens and French potagers. It has been used for thousands of years in China where mosquito ferns are interplanted with rice crops. It can also be seen in modern-day permaculture practices like forest gardening and fruit tree guilds.

Companion Plant Pairs to Try

Companion planting is a really easy way to improve your garden! Try a few of the following pairs to get started companion planting this season.

Tomatoes & Basil

Basil is believed to repel flies and increase tomato yields. Plus they make excellent sauce together!

Carrots & Onions

Carrots and onions help protect each other from pests. Onions are believed to repel carrot flies and carrots are thought to repel onion flies.

Radishes & Cucumbers

Radishes are thought to deter cucumber beetles. Cucumbers can also be space hogs if they aren’t trellised. Growing a quick crop of radishes next to your young cucumber plants can help you make the most of your space. The radishes will be ready to harvest as the cucumbers are really starting to sprawl.

Sunflowers & Pole Beans

Mammoth sunflowers, in particular, make sturdy trellises for pole beans. While growing up the sunflower, pole beans fix nitrogen in the soil. You can also add vining squash to this combo for another version of the three sisters garden.

Melons & Dill

Many gardeners struggle to achieve good melon or watermelon yields. One of the keys to a productive melon patch is good pollination. Planting dill or another flowering herb can help attract pollinators to melons.

Peppers & Chives

Chives help deter aphids and other pests. They’re also believed to improve peppers when grown nearby. Chives will tolerate and thrive in a bit of shade from the peppers.

Buckwheat & Cabbages

Buckwheat attracts a plethora of beneficial insects including predatory wasps. Predatory wasps can help keep cabbage worms and other pests in check.

Collards & Catnip

Catnip helps repel flea beetles and can reduce damage to collards.

Cucumbers & Nasturtium

Nasturtiums benefit cucumbers in a few ways. First, they help attract pollinators. They also make an excellent habitat for predatory insects like spiders. Lastly, nasturtiums are thought to help repel cucumber beetles.

Carrots & Radishes

A common complaint among gardeners is struggling with slow or poor carrot germination. While they won’t necessarily improve germination, quick to sprout radishes make an excellent row marker for slower carrots.

Mix a bit of radish and carrot seed and plant a row. The radishes will come up first helping to mark your carrot row and aerate the soil as they grow. Most radish varieties will be ready to harvest before carrots start getting big.

Resources

Check out the following resources for more companion planting information.

Books on Companion Planting

• Native American Gardening Stories, Projects, and Recipes for Families by Michael J. Caduto and Joseph Bruchac
• Carrots Love Tomatoes by Louise Riotte
• Permaculture: A Designer’s Manual by Bill Mollison

SESE Blog Posts

• The Three Sisters Garden Guide
• 7 Benefits of Companion Planting
• 12 Strategies for Battling Cabbage Moths
• Planning a Fruit Tree Guild
• 9 Easy Permaculture Projects

Also known as pot marigold, calendula is one of those spectacular flowers that deserves a place in every backyard garden. It’s a truly multi-purpose plant and easy to grow. We carry two varieties Resina Calendula and Pacific Beauty Calendula.

1. Calendula makes an awesome healing salve for minor skin problems.
   To make salve you’ll need to begin by making infused oil. Start with dried calendula flowers, place them in a glass jar, and cover them with an oil of your choice like coconut or olive oil. Avoid fresh flowers as they can cause the oil to go rancid. Cover the jar with a lid and leave it on a sunny windowsill for 2 weeks, stirring occasionally. Alternatively, you can heat your oil and flowers in a double boiler to speed up the process but be careful not to fry the flowers! After they’ve infused, strain the oil and add it to a double boiler. Then, add grated beeswax and stir until its completely melted. How much beeswax you add will depend on how thick you want to make your salve. About 2 Tbs of beeswax to every 1/2 cup of oil will make a fairly firm salve. Pour into a container or tins and allow to cool and set up.
2. It’s edible!
   Calendula’s other nickname is “poor man’s saffron” because its flowers can be used in place of the more expensive spice. It can be used fresh or dried. Add it to salads, stews, and soups.
3. It can be used as a natural dye.
   Calendula flowers can be used to dye clothing, food, and Easter Eggs. It creates a beautiful brilliant yellow. To make dye, add fresh or dried calendula flowers to a pot and cover with water. Let soak overnight. Mash the flowers a bit and bring them to a boil. Simmer for 1 hour. Strain out the flowers and your dye is ready! To dye fabric or yarn you should mordent it before adding it to the dye.
4. Livestock can eat calendula too.
   Feeding calendula to your chickens is thought to help brighten their egg yolks.
5. Calendula flowers are great for adding to relaxing herbal baths.
   It has anti-inflammatory, anti-microbial, and anti-fungal properties. It’s wonderfully soothing for mosquito bites, dry skin, or rashes.
6. It’s an excellent cut flower.
   Though it’s typically grown as a medicinal herb, calendula flowers are long-lasting and make a great addition to bouquets.
7. It might deter mosquitoes.
   Some folks find that calendula makes good bug repellent. Grow it around your porch or patio.
8. Calendula is a great choice for herbal teas.
   As I mentioned above it has anti-innflammatory, anti-microbial, and anti-fungal properties. It has been used to help soothe sore throats and coughs as well as treat headaches, cramps, and fever.
9. It’s a great companion plant.
   Calendula should be planted with asparagus, tomatoes, and cucumbers. It’s believed to help repel harmful nematodes and asparagus beetles.
10. It attracts pollinators.
    Calendula’s showy yellow blossoms are good for more than looking beautiful. The fall blooms help attract pollinators like bees and butterflies.

Do you grow calendula? What are your favorite things about this awesome herb?