Is there a greater joy than the joy of gardening? Maybe. But you’d have to try pretty hard to convince me. Gardening means we get to take part in nature’s seasonal magic show. Seemingly from nowhere we have brilliant red, orange, pink, and yellow tulips each Spring. In Summer, tall sunflowers shine bright on corner lots and peek in our windows.
It’s not always the big, obvious things that represent the joy of gardening, though. Sometimes it’s the sweet taste of a perfectly sun-ripened cherry tomato right from the vine. Or your favorite farmer giving you a packet of heirloom cucumber seeds. Other times, happiness comes when we see that last flower of the season or watching the bees drift quietly around the lavender.
There’s plenty of fun along the way, too. In Last Blooms, our gardening hero races against the rain to save the last daylilies of the season. And in Watering Cans and Rain Barrels, we learn that the joy of gardening is about taking things slowly and appreciating the quiet moments along the way.
Often, though, the joy of gardening comes from recognizing that no matter what we do, nature is still the boss. Or to put it another way, no matter how many plants you kill, Hostas will make you feel like you have a green thumb. Writer Sue Ellis reminds us of this in A Hosta for Mrs. Malloy.
These and other stories in this collection showcase the small moments when a tiny flower or the taste of a perfect berry makes the world feel like paradise, even if only for a snapshot of time. I hope you enjoy these stories and can give yourself a moment to share in the joy.
Feel free to stay a while and enjoy all the stories about the joy of gardening we have to share below. And be sure to check out our Joy of Gardening Freebie while you’re here, which features a hand-picked selection of our favorite stories from this category.
There’s a certain kind of magic that happens when your imagination takes flight—especially when it’s riding on the tiny wings of a ladybug named Lily. This week, I had the distinct honor (and delight!) of sitting down for a garden-side interview with the star of our newest GreenPrints StoryBook: The Adventures of Ladybug Lily: Discovering […]
Is there any friend better than a gardening friend? I think not. Over the years I have gotten bundles of seed garlic, bounties of heirloom seeds, and cuttings from my gardening friends. If you have gardening friends, you know what I mean! And in the piece I’m sharing today from C.J. Worby, (who claims it’s […]
Some days I feel like I’m mastering the art of flower gardening. Other days? Well, I do love them, but sometimes I feel like we would all be better off if I just dug them all up and stuck to vegetables. As much as gardening is a science, it’s also an art. And I think […]
There are some stories I share that make me laugh, and others that just remind me of the joy of gardening in more simple ways. For example, we have always had hostas around our home. They are one of the most sturdy plants you can plant in a yard. They grow big and cover a […]
I love gardening, and it’s easy to imagine that I’ll be gardening for life. Gardening gives us a chance to commune with nature, grow our own food, and grow our own beauty in the form of flowers, shrubs, trees, and all sorts of plant life. And that doesn’t even count the songbirds, bees, butterflies, and […]
I remember the day I learned how to be a human pollinator and pollinate flowers with a toothbrush. It was a hot, June day and I was eager to learn anything that could help me grow my corn. My gardening teacher, Mrs. Kipper, showed me how to use a toothbrush to transfer pollen from one […]
Smooth hydrangeas are beloved for their big, fluffy blooms and easy-care nature. But for years, gardeners have had to accept one major flaw: flopping. Heavy flowers and weak stems often mean plants that collapse after rain or wind. But Incrediball Storm Proof™ smooth hydrangea changes everything. Bred to outperform every other ‘Annabelle’-type hydrangea, Incrediball Storm […]
Some books are written quickly. This one took me about seven decades. That’s not because I’m a slow typist (though my fingers might occasionally argue otherwise). It’s because Food Gardeners Bible is built from a lifetime of real gardening—starting in a Sacramento backyard with my professional-chef father, winding through raised beds, containers, cold frames, greenhouses, […]
Some children might have sweet nostalgia of their parents working in the garden when they were young, which ultimately led to their love of gardening as an adult. On the other hand, some might have actively avoided working in the garden like the plague. Maybe their parents made them weed too much, or they never […]
The practice and joy of gardening come in stages. There’s no gardener that woke up one day and devised the perfect garden beds, chose the perfect seeds, grew them perfectly under a grow light all Winter, and then went on to produce a perfect harvest of disease-free exquisite fruits and vegetables. Heck, most of us […]
