Share experience and watch young gardeners blossom

It doesn't matter what you start the kids with, it could be as small as a cherry tomato in a pot on the verandah through to them making a scarecrow for their veggie patch or giving them their own plot to play with. They key is to encourage and share the experience with them. As a child I was the perennial pest to my Nana, she encouraged me to join her in the garden. She must have had the patience of a saint. We would pick flowers, vegetables and sneak out to the berry patch and gorge ourselves on fresh raspberries and then sit on the lawn making daisy chains.

10 top tips for kids.

1 Berry patch: Kids love strawberries and they are very easy to grow. Choose a position in full sun, and plant into strawberry potting mix, you can even plant the berries straight into the bag, keep moist and watch the crop appear, then disappear into the mouths of the little ones.

2 Pot project: Ask the kids to decorate a pot and choose a plant of their choice they want to grow. The butterfly bush is a neat one to try, it shows the life cycle of the butterfly from the caterpillars eating the leaves through its cocoon stage then hatching.

3 Pumpkins: A fun project, pumpkins can be trained along a fence or allowed to ramble over an empty area, as the pumpkins start to form carve a name or picture on the skin. Hold a family competition for the biggest, smallest, ugliest or funniest looking pumpkins.

4 Scarecrow: Make one using old colourful clothing, decorate the head with buttons, a hat and old sunglasses and place in the garden to keep the birds away.

5 Sunflowers: Quick and easy summer flower to grow, simply sow seeds directly into the soil in a sunny spot. Young plants will appear in a week or two.

6 Bug watch: Offer rewards for the capture of bad bugs such as slugs, snails and white butterflies. Choose slug baits that are not toxic, like Quash, to lay around plants round the garden, it keeps them, the plants and your animals safe. Help kids discover new garden friends such as ladybirds and bumble bees.

7 Water: Kids love it and it's the backbone of a garden. Explain how important water is to the garden and help them make water-capturing systems with buckets or bottles to save rain water or to save used bath water for the garden. Show them by using Saturaid water crystals how the soil won't dry out as quickly.

8 Flowers: Appeal to kids, choose brightly coloured types and plant. Pick bunches for the table, for a friend, even the teacher; show them what the joy of a bouquet can bring. Sand saucers are a fun and easy activity. Simply fill a saucer with moist sand, choose small types of flowers and arrange in patterns.

9 Gardening tool kit: Fit them out with their own gloves, small tools and wheelbarrows, so they don't need to steal yours. Choose brightly coloured ones in case they get left behind a bush or in the sandpit somewhere. Include a copy of the renowned, Tui NZ Kids' Garden Book, it's the perfect resource to start the kids off (and maybe teach you a thing or two at the same time).

10 Cash crops: Pocket money is always in demand, if space is available, dedicate an area for a crop kids can grow to sell such as corn. Cobs sell for a $1 or two and offer a reward for the effort. Picking excess lemons, apples or bunches of herbs to sell at the gate or the farmers market can be fun cash crops too.

Whatever they choose to do, choose a project, make it fun and all about the journey into the joyous world of Mother Nature.