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| Photo Credit: Lane Greer |
| The tall stems and giant flower heads of Mammoth sunflowers make the perfect walls for a living sunflower house. | Two great hobbies you can share with your kids are the love of reading and the joys of gardening. Combine the two, and you’ve got an amazing learning opportunity for the whole family.
There are lots of great gardening-related children’s books out there. Reading them with your child can be lots of fun, but planting and growing a garden that’s inspired by one of these stories is even more entertaining! Here’s a peek into two garden-friendly children’s books that can be a springboard of ideas for your own interactive garden. Sunflower House by Eve Bunting (Ages 4-8)
A little boy plants sunflowers in a circle. As the plants grow, they turn into a fantastic sunflower house, where he and his friends play as “jungle beasts that roar and rage.” (But no parents allowed – they’re too big!) Eventually the sunflowers start falling over, and the children try to fix them – but it doesn’t work. Then they notice the seed in the flower heads, which they collect so they can plant another sunflower house next year. In the garden after reading: Plant your own sunflower house! With your child, pick an area of the garden and plant a circle (or two) of Mammoth sunflowers. Be sure to leave enough room inside the circle to play once the plants come up. Take care of the garden together, watering it and checking every day to watch for the sunflowers to poke up out of the ground. Give your child free time to play, imagine and act out his or her own story in the sunflower house. And be sure to save some seed for next year’s garden (while sharing some with the birds)!
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