A beautiful day to work in the yard

For the first time this year, I went out and worked in my garden.  It felt so good to pull up weeds, gather up dead and broken limbs from winter, plant summer blooming bulbs, and feel the sun on my back.  So what if it's supposed to rain tomorrow.  Today it was beautiful.

Yes, we have slugs too!

Chuck (4), Lilly (3), and Marie (5) joined me outdoors and helped me with my projects. I showed them how to identify the weeds that I was pulling and which plants to stay away from.  They caught on quickly...I only lost a few daffodil shoots.  :)  Then I gave them each a trowel and let them dig in an area where I was going to plant later.

Kids can be good helpers if you give them directions of what you want done, where and how you want them to do it.  They probably won't know the difference between a weed and a prized rosebush unless you teach them.

Outfit the kids with kid sized work gloves to protect their hands and kid sized tools to make them feel like they are doing real work.  Make the job as easy as possible for them.  Kids love to imitate their mommies and daddies.

Who knows?  You might be fostering a life-long love of plants and nature in your children!