How to Make Sure Your Family Loves Your Garden

You have a wonderful plan for your back yard garden. You will be the envy of all the neighbors. You may even be featured on "Home and Garden" magazine or "House and Garden" TV channel. There is one small wrinkle in your plan. Your family may not be as enthused about your ideas as you are. You forgot to take into consideration the needs of the other members when you planned out your ideas. A fairly simple way to satisfy everybody's needs is to divide your back yard into several areas.

Take whatever space you have in your yard and decide on how many areas you need. Do you have a pet? You may need an area for him/her. How many children? Calculate how much of an area you will give them to play. Do you want to set aside an area for an outdoor grill and eating area? Of course, don't forget an area for the vegetable and flower garden.

The best kind of area for children is an open space with grass. A tree may be nice especially on hot, summer days. This open area will give you lots of space for future projects as the kids grow and their needs change.

A pet area is best close to the house as you'll want to leash them if you don't have a fence. The idea of walking far on cold, dark nights to leash your pet doesn't sound appealing, does it? You also have the issue of pet waste. Make sure you keep it away for the children's play area if at all possible.

Do you have a fireplace? If you do, you need a place to store the wood. This wood storage area you want far from the house because animals and bugs love wood and can cause problems if the pile is too close to the house.

What about the garbage cans? Can you keep them in the garage? Do you want to keep them in the garage? If not, you'll need to find an out of the way place to store them. Remember, they are very unattractive, so find a place that is visually important to you and your neighbors.

Finally, we get to the garden area. Choose a southern exposure if at all possible. Notice the trees nearby. Keep their shade away from your growing area as much as you can. Decide how big you want your garden. Are you going to plant squash and pumpkins? They require lots of space. Maybe you only want to plant just tomatoes, some herbs, onion sets, lettuce, and other vegetables that don't need the space of squash plants. How close to water is your garden? During those dry, summer days, you'll need to supply you plants with this precious resource.

If your garden is large enough, you may want to plan for stone pathways and/or benches. These don't have to be wide, just enough for one person to walk.

With the right plan, consultation with your family, and some work, you can have a garden that will make HGTV calling you one day.