Transform Garden Chores into Joys

This Saturday, I spent the afternoon in one of Boise’s newest kitchen gardens. My friends Ben and Jamie let me install a twin garden in their backyard this spring, and I am so impressed with how it’s growing. They have 40 square feet of planting space, and this amount has quickly become my go-to for folks new to gardening, those with a small space or who just have busy lives.

Can you believe how much is growing in these 40 square feet?!

Ben and Jamie both work full-time and spend their free hours chasing after their active, adorable toddler, Brooks. While they love their garden, it has to be low-maintenance, and I am all about that approach to gardening. A lot of my clients ask me how raised beds can help them get more out of their garden productivity-wise. The evidence is in these photos, which show the garden just planted in mid-April and already well into harvesting in early June. A good setup is key to garden productivity, and I believe it’s the key to transforming garden chores into garden joys.

Some folks might look at this abundant garden and see a stacked list of chores: pruning, soil amendment, harvesting, cooking, etc. I look at this abundant garden and feel gratitude for the growth, and then I space out my to-do’s so I don’t feel like a farmer tending to this space. Here’s what I did on Saturday in the middle of barbecuing, splashing in the baby pool with Brooks and the pups and sipping on cold drinks. I hope it helps you find the joy in tending your garden space.

Calendula Corners are my favorite ways to keep pests off my plants - The more flowers you pick, the more they bloom

For 10 minutes, I walked around the two raised beds and pruned back the Brussels sprouts, picked calendula blossoms and removed yellowed leaves. We were grilling chicken for dinner, so a bit later, I spent another 10 minutes harvesting kale, lettuce, radishes, sugar snap peas, snow peas, cilantro, dill and onion tops. As I went along, I checked on sprouting seeds and the tomatoes and peppers we recently planted for signs of stress and pests. In 20 minutes outside, the garden was refreshed.

Inside, I made two salads from this space. (It hardly looks like I even made a dent!) It took me about 5 minutes to wash the harvest, and I let it dry as we played some more in the yard. Later on, I spent about 10 minutes chopping the vegetables. I massaged the kale for a couple of minutes with coarse salt and olive oil and made a simple slaw-sauce out of mayo, mustard and lemon juice and dressed the kale. I chopped half an onion and covered it in white wine vinegar with some salt and let it pickle on the counter while we waited on the chicken. When dinner was ready, I poured the pickled onion and vinegar over the green salad and tossed it with some olive oil, salt and pepper. I added a mass of chopped dill and onion tops to both salads and we ate every last leaf.

Maturing snow peas and flowers waiting to be filled

I hope that as your harvests come on this season, you take time to fit your garden tasks into your daily life. A few minutes of harvesting here and there, of pruning and adding compost will make the garden feel more and more like a place of relief and pride and less like a chore. Raised beds are my key to enjoying the garden, a place where I can walk around, take everything in and not spend time bending over into the dirt, pulling weeds. If you’re not pleased with your garden setup, let’s chat. Otherwise, happy tending!