Gardening With Kids – Part 3: The Fruits Of Our Labour

Our tomato plants are finally fruiting! It's been great watching the flowers slowly turn into fruit and then seeing the fruits ripen! During the MCO months watching nature take its course has provided us with much excitement. Since we live in an apartment and going outside wasn't an option, we brought nature into our daily lives by creating a balcony garden. Surely many of you can relate.

Our toddler's excitement over this process shows in her eating habits now. Even though a good eater by all accounts, she's never been a big fan of tomatoes, but since the ones we serve with dinner these days are the same ones she picks herself, she's started eating them too! Yet another reason why involving your kids in gardening can be beneficial.

Since we replanted the tomatoes into the veg trug, we have been fertilising them with the AgroMarine Hydrolysed Fish Fertiliser once a week. It's also been helpful in boosting flowering and fruiting. The first flowers appeared around 6 weeks after planting the seeds and it has only taken 2 and half months from planting the seeds to getting the first ripe fruit!

In fact, our plants were growing so quickly and so vehemently, that we needed to rehouse quite a few. We gave some away to our neighbours and family members and donated some to the garden of the condo we live in, which made our daughter very happy. She likes watching the gardeners work so she enjoyed watching them plant the tomatoes she gave them in her little green bucket. The tomato plants have since become a permanent feature on our daily walks.

By now our toddler is so used to caring for the plants that she reminds us to water them. Now we only water them once a day and since her little watering can is not enough to do the job for the huge plants in the Vegtrug, we replanted a few tomatoes into individual pots, which she waters herself. She also enjoys helping mommy and daddy pick the ripe fruits and gets super excited when she spots a new red tomato on the balcony.