How to Decide What to Grow in Your Garden

Imagine this: you’re sitting in a comfy chair with a favorite cup of tea surrounded by all of the colorful seed catalogs you’ve gotten in the mail over that last few weeks. You’re paging through each one and marveling at all of the beautiful varieties to choose from. Eventually, it’s time to make decisions and order your seeds. But your eyes are bigger than your garden, and there’s no way you’ll have the room to grow everything on your list.

So, how do you decide?

In my gardening classes I try to convince advise people to think strategically about their gardens before placing their seed orders. Instead of throwing every seed packet that catches your eye into your (virtual) cart, stop for a few minutes and take a closer look at your lifestyle by asking yourself the following questions:

What do you buy from the grocery store on a regular basis?

Examine your weekly purchasing habits and think about whether there’s anything on that list you can grow in your own garden. Perhaps you buy lots of berries during the winter for your morning smoothies. Can you add a raspberry patch to your yard this year?

What meals show up on your family’s menu each month?

Deconstruct some of your favorite meals to see if you can grow some of the ingredients. In our house we often use burritos as a quick weeknight meal. We prioritize growing and preserving our favorite burrito ingredients: garlic, onions, peppers, corn and salsa.

Which foods provide the highest value? What vegetables are expensive to buy?

Think about the most expensive items you buy from the grocery store or farmers market each season. Which of those things can you plan to grow in your garden this year? I love to have a spinach salad with my dinner most nights. Sometimes organic spinach costs up to $9 a pound in my area. So I make sure to plant several beds with spinach in spring and fall to provide my own salads as many nights as possible.

What will make you happy to grow in your garden?

I’m all for being strategic when deciding what you want to grow in your garden. And gardening is also a source of deep joy for many of us. With this question, you ask your head to take a step aside and listen to your heart. Some of the things we choose to grow might not make financial or strategic sense, but they just plain make us happy.

Taking a step back to examine your eating, cooking and grocery shopping habits will help make your seed ordering decisions a lot easier. And it’s a great way to start getting excited about and prepared for spring!

Deciding what to grow is just one step in the garden planning process. Unsure about what else you should be doing to set yourself up for an amazing season? Download my FREE 10 Step Guide to Smart Spring Planning, and I’ll walk you through the action steps you should be taking right now.