The joy of morning micro gardening

Thank you, Mother Earth, for continuing to give during dark times

Back in April, spring was doing its spring thing. It probably wasn’t every single week but it felt like every single week that the weekdays were sunny and gorgeous and the weekends were cold, rainy, and even in one case, snowing (because, hello, this is just what living in New England is like).

I started exploring gardening last year, and because I’m a person who delights in process and planning (and my to-do app!), last year I pegged a number of gardening to-do items into my app to remind me to do them this spring. I share more about this in Mini Edit: Gardening Plans + Newbie Tips. But due to the aforementioned pattern of weekend weather, plus other commitments, my yardwork and gardening to-do’s kept bumping forward. And I was super sad about it!

And so, one beautiful weekday morning—knowing that severe thunderstorms were forecast again for the weekend—I thought to myself, well, maybe I’ll just tackle one 15-minute gardening task after Jon and I walk the dog and before I get my work day started.

It ended up being the best accidental discovery ever.

If you’ve been with me for a while, you know that I am all about the power of micro. If you go to the Edit Your Life catalog and search for the word “micro” you will get many episode results. And my latest source of satisfaction and joy is morning micro gardening. Here are my recommendations for how to make it happen.

1. Identify basic tasks to break down

The reason I started talking about micro goals on Edit Your Life is because big goals can be great, and they can be overwhelming. And we humans tend towards avoidance when it comes to big overwhelming things. So, my mantra has always been, identify your big tasks as a starting point. Then break the big tasks into smaller, quick reward tasks.

I have a tiny backyard and an even tinier front yard, but yet, even my tasks of “Clean up front of house” and “Clean up backyard” felt too big. So, for example, even a task like my tiny front yard—which really is half a tiny front yard since I live in a side by side condo—broke down into these nine micro tasks:

• Remove dead leaves along walkway hosta bed

• Remove dead leaves along front of house bushes (our half LOL)

• Weed walkway hosta bed

• Weed around bushes

• Prune rhododendron

• Mulch front walkway

• Mulch front bushes

• Weed sidewalk tree

• Remove weeds along front walkway stone

For all of my gardening projects I set up main tasks with micro subtasks in my to-do app. It is very satisfying to check items off as I complete them!

2. Set a timer for micro tasks that require more time

With gardening, the reality is that there will still probably be micro tasks that take more than 10-15 minutes. I definitely lose track of time when I start a satisfying garden project, which is when a timer comes in handy.

For example, in my backyard there are two corner mulch beds, each with a tree, lined with stone pavers. These areas are not big (one of them is maybe 4 x 4 feet or a bit smaller) but weeds grow between the stones and then there are weeds throughout the beds. I knew that tackling this bed for the first time in the spring when it was overgrown with weeds was not going to get done in one quick morning session. For tasks like this, set a timer for 10-15 minutes, or whatever you have time for.

3. Delight in aligning with your yard waste schedule

If you have the benefit of town or city yard waste pickup, it is so very satisfying to align your morning micro gardening efforts to that schedule. Just last week I had the very satisfying experience of dragging to the curb one barrel of sticks + three yard waste bags—the glorious cumulative efforts of my micro gardening.

4. Locate tools in an easy to grab place

This is such a small thing but it’s also a big thing. Akin to how putting your gym shoes by the door can help you get out to the gym, I find that having the tools you need easily accessible helps negate the friction that leads you to skip a task. For example, when I knew I wanted to focus on weeding and pruning in the front of the house for several micro gardening mornings, I extracted my Japanese weeding knife and pruning shears from the backyard storage and left them by my front door so it was easy to pop out and do what I needed to do.

Starting the day with a connection to the earth has proven healing for me, especially during these dark times. And making a little progress on something of course feels good. It also turns yardwork that might feel like an onerous chore into something doable.

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P.S. I wanted to share the miracle that is this oakleaf hydrangea. When looking to fill a space in my (half) front yard, I research and landed on this type of hydrangea because it is shade tolerant and compact in size. I planted it from a nursery pot in the fall and after the winter it was literally one very dead little stick sticking out of the ground. I knew it was early yet, but also figured, “Okay, maybe it is dead and I will have to go back to the drawing board.” Then a tiny little bud popped out of the top of the dead-looking stick, and then the plant burst back to life. Gardening is a constant provider of miracles. Thank you, Mother Earth.