Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Library Bag: Family Gardens

I'm taking a day to catch up on email.

In the meantime, we are ALL engrossed in this British book by Bunny Guinness: Family Gardens: Creating Magical Outdoor Spaces For Kids.

7 comments:

Michelle @ Give a Girl a Fig said...

What a fun book! I wish I'd gardened when my boys were little...they are into it some. But not much. Starting them young is really going to instill it into them...good for you.

Unknown said...

I loved that book! It wasn't at all what I expected (I was expecting a pizza garden or something like that) but great, great, great to browse. I think I have the right one in mind at least....one idea in particular that I liked was using kids beach pails stacked for strawberries. I'll be scouting for some beach pails at garage sales and at the end of the summer......

laurel said...

That book looked great on amazon, but the one review didn't think much of it. I would be very interested to hear your thoughts on it. I really want to do something with our yard. It has so much unrealized potential.

Meredith said...

I would definitely put this book in the inspirational category rather than the practical (for most of us, anyway).

Although the author does include explicit instructions, they are often for things that would be unrealistic for the frugal gardener: a curved rolling rabbit pen, water features paved with stone, fantastic tree houses.

HOWEVER there is so much more garden inspiration just by looking at the photos, which are very different from American gardening publications.

There is also a lot of emphasis on creating certain zones in each garden, such as a place to dig, a place to play water, a place to climb, a place to hide away. Even though I might not do any of these projects, I will certainly incorporate the ideas into my plan.

Meredith said...

Note: as I put these different zones into practice, I will be sharing photos/thoughts. If it's an issue of ordering the book yourself, you may want to follow this series first and see what you think.

heather said...

Did you find this book at your library? I couldn't find it at ours...

Holly Campbell said...

Have you ever seen the books by Sharon Lovejoy? I love her details, and her illustrations (which she paints herself). Hollyhock Days and Sunflower Houses are two. . .