Every gardening season whether it’s your first or your 50th it’s a good idea to to set goals for what you want to do, learn, experiment with in the garden. Every season offers new opportunities to learn something new, to grow and stretch your skills, experience and insights about growing your own food, flowers and herbs. The possibilities are endless depending on which way you want to go. I suggest either taking one full season to double down and really learn something deeply or pick something new to focus on each month. (This learning something new every month can go beyond the scope of gardening for the whole year.)  You can do a combination of the two by picking one broad topic as you main over arching goal and adding in each month a smaller new skill. It really depends on the kind of learner you are, how much time you have to devote to learning something new and your overall motivation. Below are a few ideas to get you started thinking about possible goals, each can be turned into the lengthy full season goal or a monthly goal.

• Cooking From Scratch – Not exactly a garden skill, knowing how to cook makes using your harvests easy. This can be broken into smaller skills by learning specific cooking techniques: Dry heat methods (Roasting, Grilling/Griddle, Sautéing, Stir-frying, etc.) Moist heat methods (Steaming,Simmering, Boiling, etc.) Combination cooking methods (Pressure cooking, braising, etc.) and No heat methods (Fermenting, Dehydrating, Blending, etc.) You can spend the season learning to use these methods with your garden harvests for some pretty incredible meals or you can break it up and focus on a single method. Once you get it down move onto another method, by the end of the season you will have great cooking skills.
• Compost – Soil health is the foundation of everything. Learning to compost means being able to help create and support the healthiest soil for your garden, which leads to healthier plants. Taking your time to try different methods or getting really good at one method is a great way to bring big benefits into the garden.
• Companion Planting – Learning to companion plant will help when it comes to garden planning and layout. It is very helpful when you plan to grow with intensive planting practices or even square foot spacing guidelines. Taking the time to learn this in a season means you can take this skill with you through every future season!
• Succession Planting – This is a skill that can bring you more harvests per season and keeps your garden producing. This is key for small gardens! Having a plan in place means you will know when to start new seeds and when to replace things. If you have new starts going, you’ll be ready to plant them in the space another plant was in that range it’s course. keeping track of days to maturity and harvesting at the right time is key for success.
• Growing Medicinal Herbs – Growing your own medicinal herbs is fun, rewarding and so worth it! There is nothing like creating herbal preparations from something you’ve grown and nurtured from seed to harvest. Learning to grow herbs is essential for any home apothecary if you ask me.
• Make Herbal Preparations – Learning to hone your skills in herbal medicine making means you will be prepared for anything your family may face, whether it’s a bug bite, cut/scrape, cough, sore throat, cold,  support general wellness, etc. You’ll know how to make something that can help support your family. Besides growing and cooking your own food this is a skill every family should have. 
• Starting Your Garden From Seed – Learning to start seeds will not only cut costs, but it’s a skill every gardener should possess. When sowing your own seeds you have the ability to grow so many different things that are often not available as starts from nurseries. The options are many! There is something so satisfying about watching a tiny little seed turn into food to feed your family. It is truly special and magical. Once you learn the basics you’ll be sowing your own seeds year after year.

When it comes to setting goals for the year or growing season, you have so many options to choose from, this list could go on and on. You can work on learning new garden skills in relation to food, flowers, herbs, growing techniques and methods. You can focus on new skills in the kitchen utilizing food and herbs from your garden. You can deep dive as far as you can take a topic or you can learn the basics and add something new each month. The journey is yours to create! Get curious, experiment and keep growing.