Gardening & Growing with the kids....

[MrsMotherHen]

Following on from a thread heres a thread for updates on our plants fruit and veggies or garden projects with the kids...be good place to get ideas for starting out. Just to add am a crap gardener so hopefully I can pick some good tips and ideas along the way 🌱

We have just moved our tomato plants from the window sill to the shelf under the boiler they have now started to sprout which suprised me.

What?! I thought this thread was much longer than one page and didn't think I'd have chance to read it before I popped out

Ah @cloudtree thank you I didn't think about that. Are the flowers toxic as well as the pods?
Are marigolds toxic?

I don't know about the flowers but the pods are poisonous and certainly if you are planting something like mange tout with little ones it wouldn't be a good idea to have sweet peas close by in case they got mixed up between the two types of pod.

I believe marigolds are edible.

I didn't know sweet peas are toxic, thanks for that. I think I'm too late to plant any this year anyway.

I have some herbs on my kitchen window. I'm not sure about the hassle of putting them outside where I'd have to remember to water them!

sticking no its not too late to plant peas and courgettes. Courgettes grow very quickly and with peas you can succession sow so that they are ready at different times and you don't get a glut. You can quite happily start both from seed at the moment. Don't bother buying plants, they are so much more expensive. I only buy plants if Ive forgotten something and its too late to start from seed (or they're a really good bargain)

Some are good outside grainne Chives, mint and parsley come back on their own easily each year so its good to plant them out. Rosemary is a good year round shrub. Other tender things like basil and coriander are better on the window ledge IMO. I can't seem to stop my coriander going to seed at the first glimpse of sunshine if I plant it out.

Thanks cloudtree I postponed my trip to the garden centre until tomorrow so I'm going to get seeds. Looking forward to it! Got visions of a massive haul already

I love growing vegetables. We have 5 10ft x 8xft beds, however I hope to expand this in the future. Our aim is to grow everything that we eat, and we are nearly there. This year we are growing

Coliflower
Spinach
Potatoes
Butternut squash
Caugette
Pumpkin
Tomatoes
Turnips
Sprouts
Cabbages
Asparagus

Can’t wait for it to start producing

Kursk I know from the prepper boards that you're in the US (or Canada?). Do you live somewhere with similar weather to the UK?

cloudtree

I live in Maine US, climate is similar with warmer summers and colder winters. Hopefully we had our last frost at the weekend. I plan on planting out in the next couple of weeks.

I must get my second crop of peas out, thanks for the reminder.

Am I too late to sew tomatoes? I can put them in a very warm conservatory for as long as needed.

I didn't know about sweet peas being toxic either we planted ours in today next to the rhubarb DS3 will stay away from it if I tell him not too touch most of the time Not a chance he will eat them I can't even get him to eat a veg as it it although hopefully growing his own will change that.

We put all our bits in today loving the rhubarb already I haven't used compost and put them straight into our garden soil. So maybe might throw some plant feed ontop??? havent got a clue if it will work am just winging it

Our tomatoes under the boiler are ready to be transferred from the tray to small pots I think so that's a job for tomorrow.

We are doing some hanging baskets tomorrow aswell which will be good fun and very messy.

Here's a pic of our rhubarb today. Oh and our mini herb garden so far.

Not too late for tomatoes Grainne but I wouldn't leave it much longer. mine went in late last year and were not a great success.

Plus we then got blight and it affected the potatoes.

I always cringe when i see peas and sweet peas together for that reason.

Another top tip - buy a packet of popcorn seeds not sweetcorn, sow them and grow but leave the corn on the plant to dry. Once completely dry, knock off the seeds, leave to really really dry out, wash and pop with oil and salt and syrup. I buy a small packet from a local farmers market type shop each year. Which i then give away to teachers that come on any of my courses.

I love this idea. Gardening with my daughter would be fun. I would love to have this kinds of moment with my daughter. :)

Lovely

We have windowsill growing action! I swear I checked the propagator yesterday & there was nothing, today we have tiny beetroot sprouts!

This is why I love growing things, I'm always amazed that you add water & life appears from these tiny, dry seeds. It's a mini-miracle

The evidence.

This is a great thread!

We've been doing a bit of a fruit garden - our rasps and strawberries have been in for 3 years now, so got tons of fruit last year, but now we've planted some of those Lidl fruit canes that you get for like 3.50, red and whitecurrant and gooseberry, to take over the space after the strawberries go. We also have a 3yo redcurrant and a 1yo blackcurrant, looking forward to getting some blackcurrants for the first time this year. Oh and three blackberry canes this year and a rhubarb crown, which went in at the last minute at the end of March and is now going like a train.

For veg we're doing peas, potatoes and tomatoes (the tomatoes are going in a greenhouse on the other side of the house away from the potatoes to try and avoid one spreading blight to the other - I have high hopes, as we get a lot of hot, sunny weather. I've also got 2 pumpkin plants ready to put out in a week or two and a bloody watermelon! Apparently where we are watermelons can grow in the greenhouse so we'll see.

I think growing edible stuff is a great idea when you have little kids especially - time permitting of course - because you can at least be sure if it's edible it won't be toxic! (Other than maybe potato plants). DD2 when she was about 2 was extremely enterprising at going out in the garden and stripping the raspberries and I had to teach her early on what was good to eat and what was toxic, but she always seemed to err on the side of "try it and see what happens". We arrived at this new house when the kids were 3 and saw to my horror that the neighbours had a yes hedge bordering our fence but luckily it was a male one so no tasty looking little berries on it

Yes hedge? A yew hedge!

Posting to see if anyone has any gardening updates!

We have sugar snaps!
But don't mention tomatoes