Gardening With Emma: Grow and Have Fun: A Kid-To-Kid Guide

Emma Biggs’ book arrived in my mailbox at the end of January during one of the coldest winters Winnipeg has experienced in nearly 40 years. Outside, my flower beds are still snow-blanketed. The vivid colour photo on the front cover of Gardening with Emma: Grow and Have Fun is a welcome reminder that this seemingly-endless winter will end. The above pull quote not only provides a bit of Emma’s personal gardening history, but it also introduces the reader to her via her explanation of “Why I wrote this book.” She certainly packs a great deal into 140 full-colour pages that are organized into four chapters.

Gardening with Emma is definitely a “kid-to-kid” guide, and Emma begins with some reminders that kids have very different ideas about gardens than do adults, one of which is a lack of concern about how the garden looks to others. At the same time, adults have some valid reasons for going “crazy” when kid gardeners step on plants, pull the wrong plants while weeding, or use the mud as a mock construction site. To avoid that sort of conflict, Emma advises kids to stake out their own garden spaces where they can grow what they want, how they want, and have fun doing so.

Chapter 1 begins with Emma’s “Garden ABC’s”, the basics that any gardener of any age needs to know: the difference between annual, perennials and biennials; the dirt on soil (“it’s more than just dirt!” (p. 22); sunlight and water needs; and necessary equipment such as pots, plant supports, garden tools, and watering devices. Many of the photos in the book show Emma sporting a sun-deflecting hat, and I was also pleased to read her reminder that gardeners should wear sunscreen. Every gardener has to deal with weeds, and in Chapter 1, Emma explains the “why” of the less-than-enjoyable task of weeding: “weeds can squeeze out the plants you’re trying to grow. It’s like having ten kids trying to divide an eight-slice pizza.” (p. 18) She offers chemical-free methods of weed control as well as information on how to turn edible weeds into snacks. Various “critters” love to snack on garden produce; rabbits are my particular nemesis and apparently squirrels love tomatoes. Bugs can be a nuisance, too, but this chapter provides some “cool garden bug facts” (p. 37), and Emma celebrates the lowly worm whose excrement (called “castings”) is essential to the health of garden soil. Of course, there are bad bugs: aphids, slugs, cutworms, to name but three, and there’s advice on bug control without resorting to pesticides. She encourages her readers to make friends with bugs by planting those cultivars which will attract beneficial insects such as pollinators (i.e. bees) and to incubate caterpillars which will become butterflies.

Chapter 2, “Great Gardens for Kids”, is the longest chapter in the book, full of numerous colour and interesting garden surprises. There is an “A to Z” list of veggies, herbs, and flowers. When it comes to garden colour, most people think of flowers, but in Emma’s “rainbow” veggies collection, she has something for every colour of the rainbow, including a “blue” tomato (actually, it’s yellow, with indigo shoulders). Many people love bouquets of old-fashioned annuals and herbs, and Lina and Ella, a pair of sisters who run a roadside flower stand are encouragement both for budding entrepreneurs. For many people, a freshly picked garden tomato is the quintessence of summer flavour, and Emma really loves tomatoes. One year, she grew 68 varieties, and she likes unusual varieties, “small ones, big ones, round ones, long ones, and all sorts of colours.” (p. 68) Her photo lineup of “totally tasty tomatoes” is awe-inspiring, and, if you are hungry, you’ll be wishing that there’s something for a burger or sandwich other than the totally tasteless tomatoes of most supermarkets. And if you like pizza (is there a kid who doesn’t?), you grow your own herbs and tomatoes to top your pie.

Sensory gardens are an interesting inclusion in this chapter. We read about plants that can tickle, plants that can create sound, plants that dazzle with unusual textures, shapes, and colours (“wow” crops), and those gigantic veggies that are grown specifically for weigh-in competitions. At the beginning of the book, Emma talked about kids’ perspectives on gardening, and she is enthusiastic about the “fun” aspect of gardening. Yes, gardens take work and commitment, but Emma’s garden is also a play space for her and her brothers, with bean teepees, sunflower houses, and forts made out of straw bales. She also has ideas on how to create play and living space for birds, pollinators, and the good bugs. Many of us think fruit are tree fruits in orchards, but you don’t need orchard acreage for berries, melons, or bush fruit such as nanking cherries. Of course, flowers smell and look lovely, but Emma reminds us that many flowers are edibles. Herbs such as chives, dill, oregano and thyme all have edible flowers, and Emma has a page of “tips from a flower-eating expert” (p. 111) offering suggestions on how to use lavender, bee balm, rose petals, and nasturtium blossoms (I have made lavender shortbread cookies and can tell you that they are a special summer treat.)

Chapter 2 concludes with “small surprises” (p. 112) and “delightful discoveries” (p. 114) Yes, we’ve all seen pictures of monstrously huge pumpkins, and any gardener who doesn’t check his/her zucchini patch regularly will end up with fruit the size of baseball bats, but there’s also real charm to tiny peppers, mini tomatoes, and “mouse melons” (also called Mexican sour gherkins or cucamelons). Other surprises include exploding seedpods, the vile smell of the “voodoo lily”, using immature silver maple seeds as miniature squirt guns, the anesthetic properties of the “toothache plant”, (aka“Szechuan buttons”), and, if you want forked carrots, the trick is to grow them in rocky soil. When carrot roots hit a pebble, they can split, twist, or take a detour, resulting in multi-pronged produce.

The penultimate chapter, Chapter 3, offers “A Bit of Practical Advice”. Once a young gardener has a garden of his/her own, expansion plans are usually in the works. Emma teaches her reader how to create a new garden from an area which may have been a lawn, how to start gardening with large containers, and how to create raised beds. Those who live in areas of the country with shorter growing seasons, or who just want to jump-start their plants, need to know how to start seeds indoors. Some seeds are happier starting life outside, but whatever the case, Emma provides simple but clear instructions on how to transplant seedlings, care for the garden, create more plants through division, cutting or layering, and, best of all, harvesting the fruits (or vegetable, or herbs) of one’s gardening labours.

The final chapter is entitled “Fall and Winter Fun”. It’s short and gives advice on the necessary clean-up preparations to get the garden ready to go in the spring, and how to start planning and planting for the next year. I can attest to the value of planting garlic in autumn (it’s a Ukrainian thing), and, although Emma doesn’t mention it, floral bulbs such as tulips and daffodils must get into the ground in autumn. For those who can’t let go of the need to see something emerge from the soil, there’s a page on sprouting microgreens. Lentils, chickpeas, and similar legumes produce greens that are great additions to salads and sandwiches. Once Hallowe’en is done, “it’s neat to watch the pumpkins slowly rot. First they sag around the holes in the faces. Then the top falls into the pumpkin. . . . Eventually they become slimy blobs and then flat pancakes of dried rind.” (p. 139) Watching rotting pumpkins isn’t something I do, but we have two bird feeders hanging outside our kitchen window, and in winter, we enjoy seeing the birds that stop by for seedy snacks. A couple of pages of information on seeds, avian housing, and bird species offer advice on how to entice winter visitors. Finally, there’s a page on how to force bulbs indoors. It’s easy to do, and a series of winter-blooming bulbs are a reminder that spring will arrive, eventually.

As a child, my first forays into gardening consisted of growing radishes (they come up quickly) and peas, helping my dad, and enjoying the roses that my mom cultivated. I never had a garden space of my own until I was an adult, and I must confess to a bit of envy as I looked at the photos of Emma’s garden haven. The subtitle of Gardening with Emma is Grow and Have Fun, and, if this book doesn’t convince the reader that growing plants is fun, I don’t know what will. Emma’s advice is practical, her ideas are rooted (sorry, couldn’t avoid using the word) in real-life experience, and her enthusiasm is absolutely contagious. Although the intended audience for the book is ages 8-12, gardeners of all ages will learn something from Emma, and it’s definitely a book that an entire family can enjoy. Many schools are encouraging students’ horticultural ambitions through the establishment of community gardens, and this book provides plenty of guidance for that endeavor. Gardening is a hands-on science experiment, and, although the terms are never actually used in this book, Emma’s gardening information teaches lessons in biology, chemistry, mathematics, and even physics.

Gardening with Emma: Grow and Have Fun is a book to inspire young gardeners to grow and have fun, and a book for teachers in the upper elementary and middle school grades, whether they teach science or take on the management of a school gardening program. Buy more than one copy and then – get growing!