Gardening for Kids
 Children of all ages can enjoy gardening. The knowledge of gardening is a great gift to give your kids and grandkids. The secret is to keep it fun, simple, and easy. Children gain the knowledge of where their food comes from when growing vegetables. Growing flowers can also be very rewarding to them and teach them about nature.
If they are growing vegetables, make sure their garden has at least six hours of full sun for best results. You may want to give them their own little corner of your garden. If you don't have an actual garden spot, you can easily tuck in a few seeds or plants among your flower and shrub beds.
Children want to see results. Choose quick sprouting seeds such as marigolds, sunflowers, beans, peas, etc. If you have a lot of space, watching a huge pumpkin grow or zucchini plant grow is fun and incredible.
Children like to have fun, so keep a light approach. Try to spend short, frequent periods in the garden, remembering that children become bored easily.
 This is a great opportunity to teach your children to properly store their tools - hoes can be very painful when stepped on and shovels should always be turned with the sharp side down when laying them on the ground. Gardening tools make great gifts for children.
Give guidance when asked, but try to let your child make the decisions on how their garden should grow. Expect high enthusiasm at the start, but realize like many of us, interest will wane towards the end of the season.
Expect some failures. These may be due to the weather, insects, over or under watering or any number of things. Discuss success and failures with your children. They can develop their problem solving skills by finding out what went wrong and what can be done differently next year.
Have fun! Children are naturally excited about growing things. Share this excitement with them. Look at something wonderous and wonder about it together.
 Pinehurst has a great selection of kids gardening tools, gloves, hats and many gardening supplies and toys. They make great gifts for the young gardeners in your life.
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