What Matters Most to You?

What kind of garden matters to you?

Do you want to grow your own fresh, healthy food?

Or create places where you can watch the butterflies and hummingbirds?

Would you like to feel more grounded and connected to nature? It’s so easy to lose touch in today’s busy world.

Maybe you want to see your children unplug and play outside more often, too.

Do you want to be self-sufficient and make your garden more resilient to climate change? Or find real ways to live more sustainably?

Perhaps you just want to make your life a little more lovely.

Coming Soon

Welcome to the beginning of Gardens That Matter. This is one of our first posts, and I’m hoping to give you an idea of what we’ll be doing here in coming months. We’ve planned blog posts, videos and classes that look at the many aspects of gardening.

Food

We are trying a bit of everything here on the farm. We’ll tell you more about our annual vegetable gardens, small orchard, and perennial food gardens. You’ll find tips about starting, growing, harvesting and preparing fruits, vegetables and herbs.

We also raise animals for food. Right now, we have a flock of chickens for eggs and we raise chickens for meat in summer. We’ve kept pigs nd sheep in the past and we’re looking forward to having them around again as we get settled.

Family

We are often gardening with small helpers. We are learning about family-friendly gardening by necessity! We also think it is really important for children to spend time in nature. So, we are intentional about getting the boys outside. Even the baby spends time checking out the tree leaves bundled in his bassinet. We’ll share ideas for getting your kids involved and we’ll always be thinking about how to make projects safe and simple for everyone!

Beauty

As Joyce Kilmer said, “I think that I shall never see a poem lovely as a tree.” One of the biggest benefits of gardening is the beauty intrinsic in living things. Now, you wouldn’t call all of our farm projects beautiful, but we try to keep aesthetics in mind as we add new plantings and structures. Plus, my artistic second half, Colby, is often thinking about how to add interesting art to our space. We’ll share some step-by-step instructions for our best creations. We’ll also share our plants picks for great color, seasonal interest and more.

Serenity

I sometimes need a reminder to slow down and enjoy the present. To be a human being and not always a human doing. We’re planning to add some meditative spaces in our yard to help us find that stillness. I love how the practices of gardening and composting and even just noticing help me tune out the noise. (I’m thinking of the noises from media and advertising and expectations here. No garden could really mute the noise of small children!) We’ll talk about ways you can add serenity to your life through your garden.

Wildlife

We often choose plants and garden features that attract animals, like bees, butterflies, hummingbirds, songbirds, and even slightly scary orb-weaving spiders.

We’ll help you do the same, if you’d like.

We probably won’t talk much about getting rid of pesky wildlife. No yard or garden exists apart from nature, so our usual approach to pests is trying to tip the balance in our favor. For example, we encourage predatory insects and plant a little extra for the rabbits and squirrels. We do sometimes actively discourage wildlife–Hey, raccoons, stop ripping up the corn!–and we’ll share those tips with you, too.

Sustainability

One of the best ways to get better at something is to teach others. I know that this project will help us grow in so many ways, and I’m betting that one of the areas we’ll grow the most is in living greener. Sure, we recycle and try not to buy stuff we don’t need and do most of your usual “green” actions. But I know we can and will do more. As we stretch ourselves to be more self-reliant, more resilient and more sustainable, we’ll share those stories with you here.

Community

Do you know what I hope most of all? I hope that you, dear reader, will share your own stories with us through comments and on social media and as guest writers. We want Gardens That Matter to be a place where gardeners from beginner to expert can interact and learn and share. An online community to complement our real-life ones.

So now it’s time for me to ask for your thoughts:

Do you have ideas for topics you’d like us to cover? Or questions that you’d like us to answer?

Thank you for telling me in the comments below!