On weekends starting in April, there is a pretty high chance you could find me with dirt under my fingernails and my hair stuffed into a hat. I have been spending every weekend, and some weeknights, over the last month and a half working on my home vegetable garden and a demonstration garden at Lowe Park in Marion, IA.

I started gardening with a small raised bed (about 2 ft x 10 ft) about 10 years ago. I mostly grew tomatoes and attempted to grow green beans just to have some fresh produce. Over the last few years, this side project turned into something that takes up a lot of my free time in the growing months, which are surprisingly quite long in Iowa if you plan for it. I had been kicking around the idea of becoming a Master Gardener for a couple of years because I wanted to learn more about native plants. 

I finally took the leap in the Fall of 2023 when I became a Master Gardener trainee, and I met all of my Master Gardener requirements just last October.  Even as a Master Gardener, I have a heck of a time growing peas, of all things. I have also planted seeds indoors that have failed, or planted so many seeds that now I don’t know what to do with the seedlings. After learning about overwintering your garden in my training class, I managed to keep a garden of rosemary, lettuce, and cilantro growing throughout the winter and had an overabundance of produce starting in March! Gardening is just a whole lot of trial and error - what works for some people doesn’t work for me, and vice versa.

But, gardening has also brought me to a group of people passionate about plants. The Lifetime Master Gardeners (those who have committed over 1,000 hours of community service and 7 years in the program) are eager to share their knowledge with us newbies. They love to laugh together, but they are also hard workers who know how to get things done. I am so thankful for the community I have found through this experience. 

Not only do the connections help sustain me, but gardening relaxes and calms me in a way that I couldn’t have imagined. There is something about being out in the sunshine, digging in the dirt, watering plants, or picking produce that simply makes me feel happy.

If you’re looking for something new in your life that may bring unexpected joy, I recommend trying gardening. You don’t have to go all in and become a Master Gardener, you can get started with small steps. This article, “Five Easy to Grow Vegetables,” written by Cynthia Haynes from Iowa State, is super helpful because it has links to detailed growing guides for each of the 5 veggies. I also recommend Charity Nebbe’s weekly show, Garden Variety, on IPR for tons of great tips and ideas for your garden. Iowa State Extension’s Yard and Garden page covers almost any topic you can think of https://yardandgarden.extension.iastate.edu/. 

Happy Growing! ~Sheryl Bass