My town started its first community garden this May. With much eagerness, I joined the garden with bucolic visions of growing tasty, organic produce that my family and friends would enjoy over the summer. What a great opportunity to spend time outside with my daughters, I thought, as well as a great way for me to finally learn to garden.

Things began well. The girls and I created a circular garden divided into wedges just for them. We planted herbs: rosemary, basil, oregano, onions; cherry tomatoes, plum tomatoes, bell peppers, edible flowers, and eggplants. The girls had fun collecting rocks, digging with a trowel and a child-sized hoe, taking seedlings out of pots and placing them into our garden, discovering worms, ladybugs, spritzing each other with the hose, and watching the plants get taller and taller.  I loved the honest labor of cultivating the soil, crouching and digging, along with that smell of earth mingled with sweat. It beat going to the gym any day.

But weeks of torrential rain threw our gardening schedule on its ear, and plans to go to the garden each day got replaced by rainy day activities.  Our poor garden suffered from neglect, though nature prevailed and still produced a bounty of herbs and even a bunch of tomatoes.  The next few days will be full of heavy weeding. Thankfully, we can still plant some goodies in time for a fall harvest. In the northeast, where I live, lettuce, spinach, arugula, turnips, radishes and peas are amongst the things that can still be sowed. Visit your local nursery to find out what you can now sow in your area.

Some tips for involving your children in gardening:

1. Plan to be out during the more comfortable hours of the day. They will certainly wilt faster than you in the hard heat of the noontime sun. Earlier in the morning, late afternoon or early evening will make it more manageable for them.
2. Limit the time kids work in the garden. To avoid feeling frustrated, don’t count on having them work with you for more than half an hour. Our garden is near a playground. After the first half-hour, I let the girls go play and enjoy snacks while I worked for another hour or two.
3. Involving them at the beginning in choosing what to plant helps to keep them involved later on when it’s all work and not-so-immediate results.
4. Plan on doing the harder work of cultivating the soil and pulling weeds yourself. Let the kids do the framing of the plot with rocks they can gather, the planting, watering, and picking — under your guidance, of course.
5. Bring water and non-messy snacks to keep bodies and spirits up.
6. Have a simple first aid kit on hand, with bandages, tweezers for ticks and splinters, sting pads, and antiseptic ointment. Boo boos, wasps, and ticks do happen.