3 January Gardening Tips

Over the past week it hasn’t gotten warmer than -5Celcius and the garden is completely frozen! Nonetheless, the vegetable gardening season is on the horizon and there are a few easy things we can be doing in January to set us up for an amazing. So let’s head inside and I’m going to share 3 January gardening Tips! 

PLANNING THE PERFECT VEGETABLE GARDEN

Before diving into the season ahead, I really encourage you to spend an evening on the couch with something warm to drink and make a garden plan for the season ahead.

To help with this, we have put together a FREE Guide: How to Plan the Perfect Vegetable Garden. I really encourage you to download it and work through it as it covers each of the key steps in planning the perfect vegetable garden (it’s exactly what I use to plan my garden each season!).

1. Goals/Intention: Spend a few minutes thinking through what you hope for your garden to bring you this season (i.e. peacefulness, bounty, vegetables, restoration, sanctuary, etc.)
2. Grow what you love: What are the vegetables you love to eat most? Write those down to ensure we dedicate space to them in the garden before it fills in!
3. Draw your garden: Ensure each vegetable has sufficient space to thrive while simultaneously determining the number of plants you’ll need for each plant. 
4. Seed Starting Plan: Once you’ve drawn your vegetable garden and determined how many plant babies will be calling it home, you can multiply by 5 to determine the number of seeds to start and when to be starting each of them based on your zone.
5. Mindful Gardening: Lastly, we’ve included a few ways that you can incorporate Mindful Gardening into your garden plan as the gardening season approaches. 

Use our Vegetable Garden Planning Guide to have your best gardening season yet!

PRE-ORDER SEEDS AND SEEDLING MIXES

With your vegetable garden plan now complete, you’ll know exactly how many seeds you want to be starting and therefore can place your seed order. I’m a big fan of doing this sooner rather than later as there have been A LOT of seed shortages over the past few years. A few of our favorite resources on this front:

• Seed Starting Kit: If this is your first time starting seeds, I encourage you to check out our Seed Starting Kit as it has EVERYTHING you need to successfully start seeds indoors. So much so that we offer a 100% money-back guarantee on it if you don’t successfully start seeds!
• Seeds: Head over to West Coast Seeds to check out all of their organic Non-GMO seeds. Everything in my garden (and every picture you see on our page!) started with a seed from West Coast Seeds! While you’re over there, definitely download and print their Regional Planting Charts - a tool I always have on hand!
• Seedling Mix: For starting seeds indoors you’ll want a seedling mix that has nutrients, microbes, and holds water to ensure that the seeds germinate. Our Worm Castings Seedling Mix has everything your plant babies need to germinate and thrive from Day 1. We have hundreds of happy customers using our Worm Casting Seedling Mix and seeing amazing results with it!

The 2021 seeds thrived in our Worm Casting Seedling Mix!

SETUP YOUR INDOOR SEED STARTING AREA

Lastly, with your Gardening Kit or Seeds and Worm Castings Seedling Mix ordered, the last thing you want to do is setup your indoor seed starting area (I save work in the outdoor garden until it gets a little warmer, expect to see more on that in our February update). There are really just two “mandatory” considerations with setting up this space:

• Temperature: Seeds need a warm and moist environment in order to germinate and begin growing. Ensure that the seed starting area is at least 70F/21C. The warmer the better and a smaller heater can be used to increase the ambient temperature of that space if your house is cooler.
• Grow Light Stand: We know every house is different so we have put together a video on 4 different grow light setups to help get your mind marinading on what setup could work best in your house. 

Once you have put together your vegetable garden plan, placed your order for seeds and seedling mix (or a Seed Starting Kit for those looking for none of the guesswork!), you’re all set for an amazing gardening season ahead (and if you’re looking for planning flowers, check out this great post by the incredible Mindful Gardener Christine Colvino: How to Plan an Organic Cut Flower Farm). Kick back, relax, and enjoy the remainder of the slower and shorter days because we’ll be getting our hands dirty before we know it!