Feeling overwhelmed by the ever growing and bountiful garden? Think back to those cold, dreary winter days when you were dreaming of the gardening season. Remember how you couldn’t wait for the ground to thaw enough to sow those first early cool season seeds? Think back to the excitement you had looking through all the seed catalogs filled with so much promise and hope. Thinking back to these times can help you make it through the growing seasons when it gets busy, hard and the weather just isn’t cooperating with your warm season plants. When you discover a pest issue that is overtaking one of your beds, think back to how you longed for this time. Think back to when you longed for a garden. You have the garden now and this season may not be turning out to be like you had envisioned, but hold tight, it will get better.

This season has been the weirdest and most challenging in all my years gardening that I can think of. There may have been years when the boys were little that gardening was a challenge, but that was more because of parenting duties than challenging growing conditions for the plants. I can not recall another season where we have had so much hail or the threat of hail or tornado watches and wind warnings. I have spent a good amount of time covering and uncovering my garden beds this year. My vining tomatoes are at a point where it is a struggle to cover them, but when I think about how long they’ve been growing, I still do my best to cover them when we have a threat of hail. (Today we took the covers off, leaving them still attached at the base of the hoops just in case the predicted storms are as bad as they say.) We are under a level 2 hail threat again, so we will see. It’s in these challenging times that I like to think back to when I was just itching to get into the garden. Remembering just how badly I wanted to be gardening when it was winter reminds me that it’s all worth it. 

When we pulled down the covers this morning, after days of being covered, the growth was amazing. The weather may not be the best for my warm weather crops, but they are still doing their best to grow and produce. The garden can teach us that we too can grow even under less than ideal circumstances. The garden always has something to teach us, no matter how long we’ve been gardening. Calling on the deep desire we had before the season or before we started gardening can help support this growth. When the garden becomes unruly or overflowing with harvests and your kitchen counters are filled, definitely think back to when you were yearning for this, it really does help!

Whether you are having weather issues like me, an overgrown garden, plant disease or pest pressure or some other reason that is making the gardening season challenging, looking back and seeking the desire you held in your heart for this garden can immensely help you persevere through the challenges faced in the garden. Know that the garden wants to grow and will do its best. When it gets hard remember your why, you’re yearning for the garden and keep on growing with your garden! Come next winter, you’ll be wanting to be in the garden again, take those feeling with you into the next gardening season. Write them down, look back, call on your wants and your why to help you make it through!

Please share your tips for getting through challenging gardening times in the comments, we can all learn from each other! ⬇️