There have been some years where I’ve debated having a garden, but as summer approaches, I always want one.

There’s something about planting seeds and small plants into the ground, tending them through the season, and watching your children become part of the harvest.

I don’t think I garden because I have a deep desire to grow all of my own food, but it’s the satisfaction of tending something and watching it produce fruit.

I love watching a garden begin as nothing more than a patch of soil. Then you and your family are out there on your knees planting seeds and seedlings into the ground. There’s an excitement in seeing that first seed sprout, watching tomatoes grow tall enough to need cages, and spotting the first blooms on a pepper plant, tomato plant, or cucumber vine.

Those blooms are exciting because they’re a sign that all your time, and hard work is going to pay off soon.

Why We Keep Planting

I think gardening helps us live in the moment more than most things we can do in our back yard or house. You have to be intentional when you’re gardening, but even if you’re not, a garden is still so forgiving. Forget to water the garden? That’s okay the rain will water it and things will still grow.

Every year we manage the weeds the best we can, and by the end of summer they’ve mostly overtaken the garden. But everything still grows. You just have to hunt a little harder for the vegetables hiding beneath them.

Last Year’s Garden

Last year we went all out on a garden.

We picked the sunniest spot in the yard and fenced it in to keep the deer out. My husband tilled the ground. We let it sit for weeks, cleared away the dead grass, picked rocks from the soil and tossed them over the hill beside us.

As a family, including my toddler who wasn’t quite one yet, we were all out there together, hopeful for what was to come.

My son was excited to plant carrots and peas.

My daughter was excited to planted sunflowers along the fence.

My husband was excited to plant corn because we finally had enough space for it.

I was excited to plant pumpkins, hoping we’d have our own little pumpkin patch for the kids.

We planted cucumbers, squash, onions, garlic, watermelon, tomatoes, peppers, and marigolds too.

The tomatoes and cucumbers took off.

Our two squash plants didn’t quite make it, I think the deer killed them off before we got the fence fully up.

The watermelons took a while to get going, but when they did, they did.

The pumpkins outgrew the fence, threading through every crack they could find before spilling into the yard.

We were out there every other day picking tomato worms off the plants, and watching little green tomatoes turn red and ripe.

Our tiny watermelons grew from a bloom into fruit no bigger than our thumb.

And our pumpkins were taking off too, it was exciting to see our tiny pumpkins forming.

Then the squash bugs arrived.

They ate away at the leaves until our pumpkins finally gave out. We managed to save a few for the porch, but we were all disappointed that nature got the best of them that year.

The watermelons struggled to grow too, and we never harvested any to eat.

But the cucumbers and tomatoes, my they grew.

They outgrew everything else we planted and gave us our biggest harvest.

Making tomato sandwiches with your own tomatoes fresh from the garden, with mayonnaise, salt, and pepper on white bread, is a taste that’s hard to explain unless you’ve had it yourself.

And the cucumbers were eaten as fast as they were picked.

The kids would bring them inside, we’d slice them up, make homemade ranch dip, and they were gone shortly after.

The Garden Through Their Eyes

My toddler wasn’t crawling yet and he wasn’t walking yet.

Instead, he scooted on his bottom everywhere he went.

I had no problem sitting him down in the dirt, knowing his clothes would be stained by the end of the day.

By mid-July everything was so tall it towered over him. He could practically disappear beneath the tomato plants.

He scooted through the garden, picked up rocks, and threw them.

The marigolds had taken over.

Honestly, I couldn’t tell you what grew more aggressively: the tomatoes, the cucumbers, or the marigolds.

Those were the three stars of the garden.

My toddler picked marigolds and smelled every one of them before reaching his little hand out for me to smell them too.

My daughter checked on the sunflowers and watermelons daily.

When the first sunflower opened, she squealed with joy and talked about how pretty it was.

My son pulled some of his carrots too early.

The carrots were tiny, and the look on his face was priceless.

He’d been sure they were ready because the tops had grown so tall.

The kids wandered through the garden every day, checking on everything they’d planted and pointing out each new bit of growth.

One day my son looked at our corn and proudly announced,

“I’m proud of our corn.”

I even captured that little moment on video.

Letting Nature Be Nature

About halfway through the season, all of us went out and weeded the entire garden.

It took a long while, but when we finished, all that remained was what we’d planted.

Every weed was gone.

We hoped it would give everything room to breathe and grow.

But by the end of summer the weeds had returned.

They always do.

And we just let nature be nature.

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When I think back on last year’s garden, I remember the tomatoes and cucumbers.

But more than that, I remember the children checking on sunflowers, tiny carrots pulled too early, little hands reaching out with marigolds to smell, and a boy proudly announcing,

“I’m proud of our corn.”

Those are the things that made the garden worth planting.