Posts Tagged ‘Daisyboots’

Kids Gardening Activities for Outdoor Fun

With the right equipment, gardening with kids can be both safe, fun and an excellent children’s activity. It’s commonly recognised by most parents that children lack an interest in vegetables, but we also know that the flavour of home grown produce can’t be beaten.

So read on and watch the videos to find out how gardening with kids can be fun!

Preparing for the Garden Centre
 
A good idea is to start at the very beginning with your child. I decided that with my son Sam who is three, we would try planting up a set of Hug Pots as a fun children’s activity. I began by taking him along to the Garden Centre to choose some plants.
 
As an idea I would suggest to any parents who are deciding to do some gardening with their children to select plants which are either quick to grow, or are already looking interesting such as strawberries, peppers, tomatoes or seeds such as salads and cress.

There is nothing worse that staring at a blank patch of soil with nothing happening. Even as adults I think we can all admit to getting over-excited at the sight of a brand new shoot poking through the soil. For myself, it usually involves me shouting ‘shoooots’ in an odd high-pitched voice and dragging my other half into the garden so he too can understand my joy.

If I said the trip around the garden centre was without the stresses and strains usually associated with shopping with a young child I would be lying. Having to keep one eye on him and one eye on where the trolley was going is surely testing my multi-tasking abilities. Overall it was however a really enjoyable experience for both of us and it was good to see an inquisitive little mind at work having fun and wanting to learn.

As an additional treat, albeit a compromise so we could actually leave before the Garden Centre shut, we also went and looked at the ‘fish-ies’, you may notice we spotted some ‘coral chicken’.  
I fear that’s a phrase I wont be allowed to forget in a long time!

Planting up the Hug Pots

Planting was fun and it turned out to be a good children’s activity. We planted some peppers, tomatoes and chillies. Sam loved his Hug Pots and in turn enjoyed his gardening becoming chief dirt digger and deliverer in no time! This was a great opportunity for him to make a mess, learn about planting and also as a result to take an interest in caring for the plants later on.

Being a creative child, Sam also found that the Hug Pots were ideal for building sand castles!

So I finally got round to digging out the wellies.  Look out garden here I come!

In April I was able to do a fair amount of prep in my garden, planning the size and location of my newly expanded Cultivation Station, I was even successful in recruiting myself a little help setting it all up. I say help, mummies little helper is not so helpful after all, good boy raking my dirt but bad boy for taking a hammer to my Cultivation Station! Thankfully it survived his bashing with just a few dents and scrapes.

I planted my seeds in polystyrene seed trays and to my surprise they all started shooting and growing quite enthusiastically (Yep I’ve still got it!) However long bank holiday weekends camping with the family and work commitments meant I still hadn’t managed to get out there and plant my seedlings.

But now I’M BACK, I have now planted out some of my seedlings I planted in April YAY!. With mummies little helper again helping, but not so much! I have put the little babies in my gargantuan Cultivation Station. I have tried listening to the Virgin Gardner (she cracks me up) and tried to do companion planting to ensure bugs etc don’t eat my veg but only time will tell if I got it right (indeed if she got it right). Our Virgin Gardner keeps talking about a plan but I must admit I have no plan. What with mummies little and big helpers not being so helpful I plant what I can when I can where there’s space. Maybe next year!

I still have a lot of work to do ie completing filling in the centre of my raised bed but at least I have done some planting now. I’m also very pleased with my pretty flowers along the top of my sunken deck and I’ve also got a Lucky Clover hanging basket with pretty flowers in (I like pretty flowers). Last year it successfully grew tomatoes which our Virgin Gardner was quite jealous of because hers got blight.

I’ll blog off for now but look out for my next post where I’ll be getting fruity!

Well, if you haven’t already seen it, visit the Potty Innovations YouTube Channel (or look under Essential Links on the right) to see our set-up and planting videos for the Cultivation Station and Clover planters.

We were lucky enough to have a lovely weekend last weekend and so I put my plan of action into play. This involved informing my other half that I thought it would be a good idea to expand the raised bed to accommodate the extra plants I had grown. Much to his dismay, he agreed and you can see the results in the video!

The raised bed itself took us about 15 minutes to take apart (with two people) as I had already filled most of the planters, so they were a bit heavy. It then took another 10 minutes to decide on a layout and five minutes to put it together. I thought it would take longer but it really was that quick and easy.

Here’s Daisy Boots Assembling her new 8 Piece Compact Cultivation Station

After finishing the raised bed assembly I realised just how much of a slope our garden is on as the planters are slightly staggered, hopefully they will sink into place soon.

I also realised that the bed is, well quite full of onions. There is something about having a large bag of onion sets that just wants to make you keep on planting them.

I have tried to be super organised this year and have labelled all the planters up so I know exactly what’s growing where. Unfortunately I have noticed that the kitties have been trying to pull the labels out and have run off with some of them, so maybe a mental note would be good too!

In other news I have been reading up on companion planting and have got as far as planting mint near cabbage which should deter the cabbage white butterfly and planting rosemary near carrots which will deter the carrot root fly. I am in the process of adding more herbs to the raised bed, so if anyone has any advice that would be gratefully appreciated.

Found my first snail in the garlic which Rich insists must be French, and also found two lovely little pesky slugs trying to breach the giant mighty walls of Castle Cultivation Station.

“Away with you, you unruly fiends”

I shouted from the Castle tower, before unleashing a wave of pellets.

That’ll show em!

Slugs, seeds, pests and itchy eyeballs – ah…… you know its Spring!

Okay so I agree the title is a little….odd. But if you are thinking of planting your own sweetcorn, this one is for you!

After being given exactly four seeds by Daisyboots I was tasked to start growing some sweetcorn. I have to admit that unlike Daisyboots I do like to read the instructions and read up fully on whatever I am planting. I would like to claim it was a new years resolution but in reality it’s probably because of last years failures.

So far I have found two tips, summarised they are;

1. Sweetcorn likes to develop a good root base which will help increase the yield of the plant. Use deep containers to sow seeds and even try using a toilet roll.

Wasn’t too sure about this and I hope its not a joke as I have recommended the same tip to my colleagues. Anyway I thought I would give it a go, so I have planted up two toilet rolls and two 3 inch plastic pots.

2. Sweetcorn is pollinated by the wind so it is therefore best planted in blocks.

So in short it doesn’t like to be lonely…

Instructions for the sweetcorn emphasised the importance of warmth during germination. Whilst I have a small patio poly-greenhouse I wasn’t convinced it would be warm so naturally I went hunting to make myself a home-made propagator. Whilst routing through the plastic recycling bin, not something I do on a daily basis I can assure you, I came across a clear plastic container that I thought would nestle perfectly within my biscuit tin (where my containers are), covering up the toilet rolls and pots a treat.

I have to report that the propagation went well and two of the seeds germinated within 8 days and those plants are now looking super healthy!

Looking forward to corn on the cob!

DB: I really need to sort out my Cultivation Station.

VG: Have you planted the cabbages I gave you yet?

DB: No not yet I need to sort out the Cultivation Station.

VG: Have you watered the cabbages yet?

DB: It rained…..

VG: *blank look*

DB: (Changing the subject) Do you know what attacks cabbages at this time of year?

VG: You are asking me? Slugs probably, they attack everything. I even spotted one after my pepper plant this morning, luminous orange it was and I could see it from the patio window.

DB: Hmm….. (wishing she hadn’t asked).

VG: You know what? I don’t understand this annual wall planner for growing vegetables.

DB: How’s that?

VG: Well it says I should be planting cabbages in February, but I got mine from the man down the road who said I could plant them now.

DB: The man down the road?

VG: Yes.

DB: Ok (puzzled). Anyway that means planting seeds and your cabbages are already grown.

VG: Oh right, so when does that mean I can harvest them?

DB: Well the best thing to do is look on the packet.

VG: But they didn’t come in a packet.

DB: I don’t know then.

Note to self: Ask man down the road when I can harvest the cabbages – usually before or at purchase – not after.
Note to readers: The man down the road is actually an employee at a plant nursery.